My husband (28M) and I (28F) have been trying to conceive for almost five years. Four of those years were fertility treatments (IUI, IVF, surgeries) and a formal infertility diagnosis from endometriosis. I have never been pregnant.

My BIL (24M) and his wife (22F) got married in September 2024. They were open about using protection, and this January she was telling people she was scared of getting pregnant and having kids. She was diagnosed with PCOS in March and conceived around late April.

They announced the pregnancy to us with a handwritten card. In it she wrote that doctors had told her she was infertile, that she'd been praying about whether they should adopt, that God had done a miracle for them, and, my favorite line, "I know He will do a miracle in yours.". We believe in God, so that's not the issue.

The same card mentions she was prescribed birth control and metformin (I don't know why she felt the need to include that). That's standard PCOS management for someone who isn't trying to conceive. PCOS is a common cause of infertility, but a PCOS diagnosis isn't an infertility diagnosis, and nobody gets one after a few months of trying, least of all someone who wasn't trying.

We weren't obviously weren't overjoyed when we read it. Since it's hard so hear pregnancy announcements, especially for me. Because of this, they gave us the cold shoulder. My husband asked his brother about it and he admitted they were hurt by our reaction. When I asked SIL directly, she said they were "giving me space". By ignoring me while I'm trying to talk to them?!

We sorted through that issue. But, now she's now telling everyone the good news, and that she was told she was infertile and conceived anyway. It's becoming the story of their pregnancy.

I don't want to make a scene. But if she says it in front of me, I want to ask how she got an infertility diagnosis if they weren't even trying to conceive and were using protection.

My husband thinks I should let it go, and part of me knows that's the mature answer. The other part has spent five years as a lab rat and can't listen to someone describe a few weeks of fear in the same words.

They also live in our mother-in-law suite, so there's no avoiding her either way.

Watching Jasleen Singh's (the wife of comedian Akaash) speak openly about her fertility journey really stayed with me. It struck a personal chord because both she and my family are from India, where in many families, there's still a lot of cultural pressure surrounding marriage and children. Every family is different but in mine I saw firsthand how heavy that expectation can become.
My sister spent years struggling with infertility before eventually turning to IVF, whenever we visited relatives in India, someone always had another suggestion. She was taken to temples believed to bless couples with children, encouraged to participate in Santan Gopal Pujas, observe fasts like Santan Saptami and Putrada Ekadashi, and have priests perform havans for fertility. Family members genuinely believed these traditions would help and I know their intentions came from a place of hope rather than malice. But when someone is already enduring the emotional and physical demands of IVF, constant reminders about becoming a mother only make the burden heavier.
Over time I watched my sister lose her confidence and her sense of self. Family gatherings became something she dreaded because the conversation almost always circled back to children. Even comments that were meant to be encouraging left her feeling like she was somehow falling short. She began questioning her own worth and wondering if she was disappointing both her husband and the rest of the family.
That's why Jasleen's story resonated with me, living with PCOS and going through IVF is already exhausting in every possible way. Having strangers online or even relatives suggest that you're somehow failing because you haven't had a child yet only deepens that pain. A woman's value isn't determined by whether she becomes a mother. Whether someone is child free by choice, trying to conceive naturally, going through fertility treatment or grieving a pregnancy loss, those experiences are deeply personal. We rarely know what someone is carrying behind closed doors and sometimes the kindest thing we can do is stop asking questions and allow people to share their story only if and when they want to.

What's making you say "WTF?!" this week?

I feel really embarrassed to post this, but I could really use some support because I honestly don’t have anyone to talk to about this.
I’ve been crying for two days.
My husband and I have been trying for a baby for almost two years with no luck. After trying for a year, we both went to the doctor. We had all the recommended tests done, and everything came back normal. The doctor reassured us that sometimes it just takes time.
Last Friday, my period was supposed to start, but it didn’t. For the first time in a while, I let myself believe that maybe this was finally it.
Spoiler: my period showed up three days late.
I’ve been through this disappointment so many times that I tried to prepare myself emotionally. I kept telling myself not to get my hopes up because, deep down, I had a feeling it was going to come anyway.
Right before my period started, my mother-in-law called me.
She told me she’d gone to church, prayed for me to get pregnant, and said, “Don’t worry. You’ll get pregnant soon.”
It felt so random. I thanked her, but something about the conversation made me uncomfortable.
A few minutes later, I went to the bathroom and realized my period had started.
I still got upset, even though I had tried so hard not to.
A couple of months ago, my mother-in-law had also suggested that I go see a doctor and even offered to pay for it. I know she meant well, but when you’re trying to conceive, conversations like that can be incredibly painful.
Today I found out why she called.
My husband’s brother and his wife are expecting their second baby. She’s already 10 weeks pregnant, and they already have a one-year-old.
Suddenly, yesterday’s phone call made sense.
I don’t think she was trying to hurt me. I think she was trying to comfort me before I found out.
But sometimes, even the kindest intentions can break your heart.
Yesterday, I was hoping this would finally be our month.
Instead, my period came.
And then I found out that someone else is living the dream I’ve been praying for.
I really am happy for them.
But at the same time, I’m heartbroken for myself.
I’m trying so hard not to let this consume me. I keep telling myself to focus on my work, my marriage, and everything else I have to be grateful for, but it’s so hard.
And now I already know there will be a baby shower, a gender reveal, and all the other celebrations. During their first pregnancy, they celebrated every little milestone, and I just know it’s going to be painful for me to be there this time.
People always say, “Stop thinking about it, and it’ll happen,” or “Just enjoy your life.”
I’ve tried.
I really have.
I honestly don’t know how you’re supposed to stop thinking about it

This is my first time posting on reddit so apologies if I make any errors but I just need to vent. I think that I have officially lost hope. I am a 26 female diagnosed with unexplained infertility. I am perimenopausal, I have tried clomid, IUI, and have had two hysteroscopies and a laparoscopy, my left fallopian tube is blocked and my hormones are all over the place. My husband and I have been TTC for over five years. Last year I conceived and I was on my knees thanking God every night because we had finally been given our miracle. We started buying baby clothes, picking out cute names, and telling our loved ones. God, we were so happy. I thought that everything was finally going to be okay. We could finally start our family. Until I went in for an ultrasound and my NP was quiet. She wasn’t saying anything and her silence was so loud. I was going to miscarry in the next few days. Our miracle was to be ripped away from us just as quickly as we had received it. A sick and twisted joke. Was God laughing at us? Are we cursed? What is the point of living? Holy shit it was the most painful experience of my life, not just emotionally but physically as well. Why was I not informed of the fact that it would feel like I was dying? I threw up all over myself just because of the sheer amount of pain that I was in. I don’t talk about how traumatizing the pain was because who tf want to hear about it? Nobody ever asks or welcomes discussion of it because it is too uncomfortable.

A year has passed since my miscarriage. I thought that it would get easier. It didn’t. I thought I would make advances in treatment. I didn’t. I thought that people would be more sensitive to my husband and I’s pain. They aren’t. I have had to delete social media because every time I open an app there is another pregnancy announcement. I’m not even kidding it happens *every* time. I want to have faith that this wasn’t all for nothing. That one day I will be able to hold a baby in my arms. It just hurts too much to have faith. It also hurts to admit defeat. I am just tired of being poked and prodded, cut open and scraped, examined and screened. My body is tired. My soul is tired. I just want a baby. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I’m just at the end of my rope here.

Help me. I’m starting the infertility testing process and I don’t know who to trust or which questions to ask. In May of May 2025 we lost our little girl just shy of 19 weeks. We’ve been TTC since. In October 2025 I had a follicular phase hormone blood test and ultrasound. Everything looked normal. Fiancés sperm was also tested. Mostly normal but slightly below average in forward progression and strict morphology.

My last cycle was a heartbreaker. It was my first cycle on Letrozole 2.5. My body responded very well and my blood test 7 days after ovulation showed my progesterone at 23. We also timed sex really well. Negative tests.

Now, I can’t see a Reproductive Endocrinologist until December. I will try letrozole as well as an HSG this cycle. Fiance is also going to get his sperm rechecked. We also have an appointment to discuss IUI. I love my OBs but I don’t trust the institution they work for. Where I live, my options are limited (which also matters for insurance coverage reasons).

I’m trying to do what I can. I’m in the process of trying to use clean products (hit me up with your favorite brands), I’m on the Mediterranean diet, no smoking or alcohol, and
I take a well thought out supplement regimen:
• Ritual Essential Prenatal – 2 capsules
• Selenium (L-selenomethionine) – 200 mcg
• Magnesium Complex – 500 mg
• NAD+ – 500 mg
• Acetyl-L-Carnitine – 500 mg
• Citicoline (CDP-Choline) + Tyrosine – 500 mg citicoline + 50 mg tyrosine
• Myo-Inositol 2,000 mg + D-Chiro Inositol 50 mg (40:1 ratio)
• Alpha Lipoic Acid – 600 mg
• Astaxanthin – 12 mg
• NAC (N-Acetyl-L-Cysteine) – 600 mg
• CoQ10 – ~600 mg
• L-Arginine – 500 mg
• L-Citrulline – 1,000 mg total

Here’s catch 22. I gained a ton of weight from depression after we lost our baby. My BMI is 44. I am off my GLP-1. I exercise. I eat fine (some days are too busy and I slip up). I’m struggling to get to a healthy body weight.

As for insurance, my insurance covers up to $20,000 lifetime for infertility. I don’t want to deplete that.

I guess my questions are all over the place.

1. Is there anything else I can be doing to improve my chances? How about my partner?

2. What testing should I be sure to get (again, love my doctors, don’t love the institution. I don’t know how thorough they’ll be and I wont know any different)?

3. Is there a way to get some of this billed not as a fertility issue? I really don’t want to deplete my $20,000 lifetime infertility coverage.

4. Give me any and all product recommendations, supplement changes or recommendations, and anything else you’d be willing to share about the journey.

This month has hit me harder than any month has.

Not just because it’s officially marked a year of trying with my fertility clinic, but because I realized next month is officially 3 years of trying.

3 years of comments like the most recent « You guys just need to relax, » as if we didn’t relax for 2 years before seeking medical intervention.

My friend recently gave birth, and I use to joke that I wouldn’t get pregnant until after she gave birth. Well, she gave birth and I’m still not pregnant.

I am finding moments where I feel envious seeing other people with kids, so sometimes I just write into my journal so I can manage my feelings. Sometimes, I just listen to music to figure myself out.

I’m just lost in this exhausting journey - and I’m finding my way back to myself, but it doesn’t take away from the exhaustion I feel behind infertility.

How are you doing today? Let everybody know in gif, emoji, or text format.

I’m 31 we’ve been TTC for almost 3 years now, my husband is infertile and now we’re just hoping we’ll be lucky enough to conceive naturally. Every time and since I started TTC my body played and keep playing games on me. My cycles range now between 28 to 37 days ughhhh. This cycle I was 35CD and all sort of symptoms started to occur all at once, nausea, spotting in pinkish and a lot of other things that really made me believe I’m finally pregnant. Then at the 36th day period decided to show with a looot of pain and cramping as if infertility isn’t enough.. and now I need to deal with cramps, mood swings and disappointments. I’m tired, I’m broken, I’m distraught and crushed. I tell myself not to track symptoms and just accept that we are childless and that we may never experience the feeling of parenthood but my body shows new symptoms every fucking month, and it’s always the same: late period, new symptoms, hope, period starts.

1. Infertile. Finally reached acceptance we wont have kids, but struggling to navigate how to not feel socially isolated or punished.

Our friends with kids stopped hanging out with us, not the other way around. Totally get it's human nature to gravitate towards people in the same life phase (and kids are a handful). But that doesn't negate our feeling of wanting to belong.

Isn't it punishment enough I don't get to be a mom? Why do I have to lose all my best friends too?

I don't know if I'm looking for advice or validation this is a normal feeling. But figured I'd share cause I'm really down in the dumps about it and trying to pull myself out. And yes, I have communicated and voiced it to my friends....it just naturally didn't help much.

I swear I keep accidentally watching horror movies that make the villain someone with infertility, which is the big twist in the movie so you can’t ever tell what you’re getting into by the trailer.

spoiler alert, but I highly reccomend not watching these movies anyways:

undertone (2026)- absolutely terrible movie about a podcaster who finds out she’s pregnant and doesn’t want to keep the baby gets haunted by a jealous infertile entity.

The calling witch (2026) - A family is attacked by a women looking for her stolen daughter. The women turns out to be the real mother of the main character who was stolen after her parents suffered numerous miscarriage. It is implied her brother was stolen too from another family. The daughter immediately hates her “adoptive” father even though the father did rescue her from a very abusive situation.

there are so many more, but these are ones this year that I hated and would of avoided. The idea is so overdone and doesn’t even capture the anguish those with infertility go through. It just makes them seem like monsters. It seems the media is always villainizing those who are infertile.

I was Messenger chatting with my sister, and she brought up the subject of me being 31 and still not pregnant, when she’s 35 and is expecting her third, saying things like being pregnant after 30 is def not easy and that I should “hurry up” and “do something” before it’s too late, because my eggs quality is decreasing and once I hit 40 I may hit menopause cause our mom had it at 39. Like why mentioning all this shit and ruining my day? Why not just talking about anything else other than pregnancy and menopause and shit ? As if being infertile isn’t enough and now people really do their best to give you hard times. Man I’m tired😞

Infertility sucks and so does Debra in accounting, who just came back from her maternity leave. Who are you mad at IRL this week? Call out anyone who has wronged you and add a nice "fuck you" at the end. Or just type out a whole bunch of swears. We won't tell on you.

I've been following this sub for a few months after I found it but was never brave enough to post. But lately I'm at my witts end.

I (32, F) had a hysterectomy at 23 for severe fibroids and endometriosis. I was in graduate school at the time, so didn’t have much time to process what it meant. Now that I've been situated with a good job and my husband and I have bought a house, the next step was children and it just really hit me in the last couple years that pregnancy isn’t possible. I've been in therapy for years now, I'm on medication for depression/anxiety, but I find that reminders/triggers of pregnancy hurt the same everytime, like it's still fresh.

Now, my BIL's girlfriend is pregnant (by accident, after dating my BIL for about 3 months) and it feels like a slap in the face. My husband and I have been together for 11 years and a pregnancy will never be in my cards and it hurts so bad that she gets this with someone she barely knows.

I've found myself wondering if I even want kids anymore. Everyone says we can adopt or do surrogacy, and I know they mean well, but it isn't the same as carrying and birthing your own child.

Does it ever get easier? Genuinely wondering if my time and effort I've put into therapy is worth it because it feels like I'm stuck in the same loop. Just feeling very defeated and find myself wishing I had made different decisions in the past.

I’m trying so hard to be okay. I threw a sip and see for my cousins wife because she didn’t have a proper house for people to come visit and am trying to be supportive of all my friends approaching due dates. The cousin i threw a sip and see for is so negative, complained through her whole pregnancy and still through post partum, which I understand it’s not all rainbows but like, you have your baby. They ask to hang out everyday because they don’t seem to be content in their new postpartum life just him, her and a beautiful new born baby girl but I’ve told my husband that’s too much from me from now on. I just texted my 3rd friend , the latest of the due dates to check in on her and just try to be a friend during this time, despite my heart break month after month. The response, she’s actually in the hospital after having contractions starting yesterday. I broke down. I had a negative test this morning, day 12 DPO after 18 months of trying and one polyp removal almost a year ago. I’m completely broken today. I feel so hopeless and feel like no one understands what I’m going through, not even my husband. I try to keep faith but I’m starting to lose every ounce of it. I started seeing a therapist, and that has helped. Ive done all the prework for IVF and then when I got the 20 page long authorization form , I just feel like I can’t do it. I’ve repeated bloodwork after bloodwork, uterine evaluations, ultrasounds, everything seems normal. Male factor infertility was a factor but seems to have improved in recent months. If I start IVF , the egg retrieval will land one day before my 33rd birthday, a milestone I never thought I would get to without a pregnancy. All I keep thinking is that I don’t want to see a 34th birthday without a pregnancy but as the months pass, it feels more and more like a probability. How do women cope with this because I’m really struggling?

Infertility is hard, and we all have coping mechanisms. Sometimes we need to just treat ourselves. Whether it's eating cheetos all day and marathoning your comfort show, a video game, a really great recipe you just made, or a haul from a store you love, what is your treat this week?

It just baffles me that some people get pregnant “by mistake” or seem to have multiple successful pregnancies so easily, while here I am after 4 years of trying and still not pregnant.
Some days I genuinely catch myself wondering if I’m somehow “doing it wrong,” because it’s hard to wrap my head around how something that comes so easily for others feels completely out of reach for me.
I know fertility isn’t that simple, but that doesn’t stop it from feeling like such a deep, personal failure sometimes. It’s exhausting carrying that weight, especially when it seems like everyone else is moving forward while you’re standing still.

Having fertility problems is devastating. Nothing can prepare you for the day you hear something like that. Your whole life, from childhood, the last thing you ever expect is that you might be infertile , or even subfertile.
Then you become sexually active, and you do everything you can to avoid getting pregnant or getting someone else pregnant. But once you finally settle down and decide you’re ready to start a family, you begin trying for a baby. Six months go by, and you tell yourself, Plenty of people don’t conceive within six months. That’s completely normal. Then a full year passes, and you think, Another six months isn’t the end of the world.
Then another year goes by, and for the first time, you begin to wonder if something isn’t right. Bob got married the same year you did, and now he has a toddler. Vanessa had her first baby, started trying for a second around the same time you did, and now she’s pregnant again, almost due.
You reassure yourself: I’ll get checked. I’m sure it’s nothing serious. My doctor will prescribe something, and I’ll be pregnant in no time.
Then the appointments begin. The tests. The procedures. The money spent here and there. Until one day, your doctor starts saying words that have never existed in your vocabulary: azoospermia, poor sperm motility, endometriosis. Conditions you never imagined even existed.
And that’s when you hit a wall taller than Mount Everest. You suddenly realize that having children isn’t nearly as simple as you always believed it would be
.

Of course I know that it’s not true, but I don’t know anybody else who had any problem with trying to conceive. All of my friends got pregnant on either first try or after a few months. Last week I found out that the only childless friend couple we knew got pregnant and of course it was on the first try! instead of being happy I felt like somebody slapped my face. I didn’t see a single positive test in my whole life and I’m currently hitting 2nd year of trying! There’s also the fact that we lost all people to hang out with to do any childfree activitie. I can’t understand how is it that in theory almost 20% of couples have fertility issues but apparently that doesn’t apply to our circle of friends. It feels so isolating, especially since I‘m somehow unable to talk to anybody about it. Last week my friend, the same one who is currently pregnant kept saying things like she needs to do genetic testing since she’s almost 35 and I was there, thinking that we’re the same age and at least YOU WERE ABLE TO GET PREGNANT AND ON THE FIRST TRY SO MAYBE STOP SEARCHING FOR PROBLEMS THAT YOU APPARENTLY DON’T HAVE? I’m getting more and more salty these days.

I don't really have anyone in my real life to talk to about this because we haven't told our families that we're trying.

We're a little over a year into this process, and being around family has become so much harder than I expected. There are babies everywhere, pregnancy announcements, conversations about kids... and then come the inevitable questions: "So, when are you guys having kids?"

I usually just smile and say "Not yet."

Then come the responses: "Enjoy your freedom while you can!" or "When we decided to try, it happened the first month." The one that hit me the hardest recently was, "Enjoy not having kids right now. It's so hard."

Girl... that's all I want.

I've spent months dreaming about becoming a mom and months getting my hopes up, only to have them crushed again. I'll still notice my body doing something a little different and catch myself thinking, "Maybe this is the month." Then my period comes, and I'm right back where I started.

I know people aren't trying to be hurtful. They have no idea what's going on behind the scenes. But every one of those comments stings.

As far as we know, we're the only couple in the family dealing with fertility issues. It feels incredibly isolating, especially when everyone else seems to have gotten pregnant so easily. I often leave family gatherings feeling completely drained, even though nothing "bad" actually happened.

I don't really know what I'm looking for by posting this. Maybe just to know I'm not the only one who feels this way. If you've kept your journey private, how do you get through family events and all the well-meaning comments?

Just found this subreddit and I’m not sure if this belongs here but this is as close as it gets to my situation, I think. I miscarried last year at 12 weeks and due to some severe and rare complications of the pregnancy I had to have a uterine ablation and be sterilized shortly after. I can never carry a child. I am struggling so hard with the complete loss of fertility. Not only do I not have my child, I can never try again. It feels so isolating even in groups for miscarriage because it seems that everyone there is back to TTC right after. It’s hard to maintain happiness for friends that are expecting, it’s hard to grieve the loss knowing it was my only chance and I’ll never have another, everything is just so hard and it feels like so many people just don’t understand.

I am struggling to hold onto the version of myself I knew.

I worked very hard in life to get to a point where I could have a family. Pretty much the only dream I ever really wanted. Nothing fancy. A house, a couple kids, a loving husband.

Found a good man and married him 4 years ago. Started trying to have kids right away. A year of trying and nothing happens. I start having weird symptoms that include pretty bad pain flare ups, fatigue, and mental fog. Chase medical rabbit holes for another year only to find out I have an incurable, progressive condition called adenomyosis. Due to the severity the chances of me getting pregnant or even being able to carry a child to term is pretty low. Only cure is a hysterectomy. Trying to decide if its worth our financial security to try IVF (I was given about a 40% chance of success) or pursue surrogacy.

While trying to decide the path forward on children, my husband starts getting sick. Nothing serious at first but over the next year he declines quickly. He's a vet and we are pretty sure he has gulf war syndrome but trying to get anyone to take that diagnosis seriously is hard. We play whack a mole with symptoms and he's had a few close calls. His condition is getting worse. I feel like Im getting to watch him die slowly, everyday. He cant work anymore and I'm now his caregiver. Its changed everything about our relationship. I dont feel like I have a husband anymore. We don't have any family nearby so it all falls on me. All the while my biological clock is ticking away just like our savings.

All this to say that everything I thought I would be able to do with my life has been taken away from me. I wake up not sure why Im even trying anymore. What am I working for? Why wake up to see my husband suffer? Why go to work to have a house when the rooms will be empty because I cant have children? Why work on my health when my body has failed to do the one thing that it was supposed to be able to? Why have friends when its just a reminder of everything you dont have?

All the parts of me that made me are gone. I've just had to morph into this person that life has turned me into and I hate it. I cant even really have relationships with the people that still do care about me because I dont want to tell them the truth. The truth that everyday is harder than the last. That I don't know who I am anymore. That life has turned into my own little personal hell.

I've tried therapy but it didn't really help. Maybe I haven't found the right therapist. I was adverse to medication but maybe I just need to take something that causes me not to care. Just not feel anything.

I dont know what Im looking for here. I want to find help but at the end of the day nothing will change where my life is and why its is the way it is. I just wonder how much more of this I can take. How much longer can I endure living the life of a person who no longer resembles me.

I just really miss being able to enjoy books and media like I did before infertility. I can’t seem to read any books without pregnancy becoming a major plot point(but by then I’m invested). The last two I read were pregnancy heavy and I made I through ok. This next book I picked up, but by page two the narrator is pregnant and I just had to put it down and won’t be picking it back up.

What's making you say "WTF?!" this week?