ISG Movie Night Monday October 29th!

Just wanted to post a quick note to let you all know we will be having an ISG Movie Night! It may seem counter-intuitive, but we will be watching 'What to Expect When You're Expecting.' Those of us who have seen the film really loved it, probably because we are super-obsessed with BABIES! lol. Anyway, if you haven't seen it, be forewarned, you will bawl your eyes out. And laugh till your stomach hurts. Bring your hubby if you can, and a yummy snack to share! Feel free to bring friends!

Monday October 29th at 7 PM

Megan Anderson's Home

 

Shoot me an email or comment for the address!

Meeting Place and Time for November 15th!

Thanks for all ya'll who came to our last two guest speakers. This is a reminder email that our next guest speaker will be Rachel Newkirk on the subject of Foster Care/Foster Adoption. 

We will be meeting in the chapel overflow section of the Frontenac building at 7pm. 

 Thursday November 15^th, 2012

Who:Rachel Newkirk, Children’s Home Society, St.Louis,MO

About: The foster care process, adopting a child through foster care, costs of getting registered, age requirements, housing requirements, foster parent qualifications, etc 

More Info: www.chsmo.org

If you have any interest in attending, please drop us an email to help us choose room size.

Meeting Time and Place for October 10th!

Hey gals, this is just a reminder (although hopefully you've been getting the information thru RS as well) that tomorrow is our next Infertility Support Group meeting, with special guest speaker Devin Mears from LDS Social Services all about the ins and outs (and paperwork!) of adoption! We hope you can join us!

Sorry about the late update with time and location on this blog, I've been out of town more this past month than usual!

Location: Chapel Overflow: Frontenac Ward Building

Time: 7 PM

Meeting Time and Location for September 12th!

Hello folks! Because things are a little crazy with the construction at the Frontenac building, we will be having the September 12th ISG meeting at my home at 7PM. Please send me an email or request the address via comment. Jenny Shelley will be our guest speaker (see the previous post for information on her topic).

Foster Care Speaker Joins ISG Guest Speaker Series

We are excited to be adding to our guest speaker series at Infertility Support Group! Rachel Newkirk from Children's Home Society just joined our roster as November's speaker!
Thursday November 15^th, 2012

Who:Rachel Newkirk, Children’s Home Society, St.Louis,MO

About: The foster care process, adopting a child through foster care, costs of getting registered, age requirements, housing requirements, foster parent qualifications, etc 

More Info: www.chsmo.org

Location for All Speakers is TBD, but will most likely be at the Frontenac Chapel providing we can find a room with the current construction. Check the blog for up to date information.

If you have any interest in attending, please drop us an email to help us choose room size.

Exciting News! Guest Speakers at our group!

Clear your calendars gals, because we are lining up some fabulous guest speakers for our infertility support group! The following are the first couple dates you want to pencil in your calendar in red...you know, just slightly smaller than your ovulation dates...

Wednesday September 12th, 2012

Who: Jennifer Shelley, Maryland Heights Ward 'Triplet Mama'

About: Navigating the Maze of Medical Testing for Infertility and 

In Vitro Fertilization.

Wednesday October 10th, 2012

Who: Devin Mears, LDS Adoption Services, St. Louis, MO

About: The adoption process, costs, qualifications, and commonly asked questions of potential adoptive families
More Info: www.itsaboutlove.org

More information to follow as the dates get closer, but I just wanted to get this up so ya'll can start marking it on your calendars. I know both dates are on Wednesdays, that's unfortunately just the way it worked out with both of the speakers availabilities. Hopefully you can find a substitute, miss a week, get a babysitter, whatever is necessary if you have a conflict on Wednesdays. These should be great presentations chock full of information!

Man Up: When Environmental Infertility is About Him

This entry is the concluding one to the Woman Up Series about environmental factors for infertility. Sometimes all of the environmental changes mentioned in this series, being overweight or underweight, being inactive, being over-stressed, smoking/drinking, inadequate nutrition, lack of intimacy, are ones that your husband needs to change. Although they might seem less directly related to infertility, things that can make your body hesitant to accept and build a baby, can also affect the building and formation of sperm in the male’s body. It doesn’t matter how healthy you manage to Woman Up and be in order to get the best baby-making bod possible, if your husband doesn’t have sperm capable of fertilizing your egg.

For Those Not Feeling it Tonight: Woman Up

One of the most challenging elements of infertility is the necessity of putting marital intimacy on a schedule. Once doctors start giving you shots and drugs to open up windows of ovulation, ‘not feeling it’ is just ‘not an option.’ Unless you are into wasting even more time and money.  Still, it is important to understand that even if lovemaking is happening on a schedule, it should still be making love, not just making a baby. Remember to express love and appreciation for each other, even if the timing of the requisite intimacy is not optimal, or must be brief.

8 Snickers are Less than 2000 Calories: For the Nutrient Deficient: Woman Up

Maybe you manage to exercise, manage your weight, manage your stress, avoid poisonous substances, but you subsist on a diet of soda and candy bars with the occasional pizza thrown in.  Unlikely- but possible. For you, this section alone is applicable.  For most of us, inadequate nutrition is a problem that piles into the car along with some or all of the other environmental factors in this fun ride along the infertility highway.

Smoking, Drinking and Buzzing: Woman Up

And quit. It has been proven more than adequately in a host of medical studies that drinking and smoking are far, far more bad for your body than they are good. So quit. Alcohol and tobacco are socially acceptable methods of altering your mental state by essentially poisoning your body. Your smart body might just be avoiding further trauma by adding a baby into the mix. I added ‘buzzing’ to this list of substances to be avoided, because the proliferation of energy drinks on the market is a relatively new phenomenon, one that the medical community has not quite caught up to yet.  However, it is my personal opinion that once they do, and the ‘energy drink generation’ ages another 20 years or so, a lot of people are going to be shocked at how very, very bad ‘buzzing’ is for you.  If you need more energy - nap or eat an apple. Do NOT artificially force your body to perform beyond its capacity.  Especially not if you want it to perform a little pregnancy miracle for you on the side as well.  

For the Stress-Heads: Woman Up

Life is stressful. Sometimes I feel like it’s a matter of “I breathe, therefore, I stress.” Some of us handle it better than others, some of us even thrive on it as a way to spur ourselves to greater action. But our bodies DO react to high stress levels in ways that the medical community is just barely beginning to understand.  If you are experiencing infertility, reducing stress is something to think about very seriously. It’s an unfortunate catch-22 that infertility can dramatically increase your stress levels (hello!) but understand that, accept that, and cut out something else you ARE willing to give up on, assuming you are still interested in trying to get pregnant.

When 'Plan A' Bites The Dust

So, if you are reading this blog as someone who has experienced infertility, chances are that your Plan A has failed. Crashed and burned. Bit the dust. Exploded in your face spectacularly. Because Plan A was...start trying to get pregnant and 3-6 months later (at the most!) have two little lines on that pregnancy test.

For the Couch Potatoes: Woman Up

Maybe you spend most days sitting at a desk or on the couch, don’t even think about cardio, and still maintain an absolutely normal weight.  If so, congratulations! You have either won the genetic lottery or have really, really great self-control when it comes to diet and nutrition. However, in order to feel healthy and ready to proliferate the human race, our bodies need some base levels of cardio happening. Add 30-45 minutes of cardio into your daily schedule just to make sure your hormones can fire happily on all levels.

*Remember- this series of entries is about environmental factors for infertility. Your level of activity may not have anything to do with your infertility, and exercising regularly could still not affect it. But you will feel happier!

Next Meeting Thursday August 23rd 7 PM!

The next meeting will be Thursday August 23rd at 7 PM! We are slowly growing our Infertility Support Group and I'm looking forward to meeting everyone in person! Speaking of which, the term 'infertility support group' is quite a mouthful! Eight syllables! Nicknames or other ideas anyone? My default reference is turning into 'ISG' - which is kinda boring, but gets the job done.

Footsteps for Fertility 5K and Grants for IVF at PayItForwardFertility

A wonderful foundation Footsteps for Fertility is sponsoring a 5K on September 15th, 2012 in Draper, Utah.  Registration is $35 dollars and all proceeds go to benefit local couples who need IVF. So if you or family are in the area, it is definitely something to put on your calendar! Also very cool, an award winning fertility specialist, Dr. Foulk, from the Utah Fertility Clinic, has donated a free IVF cycle to be raffled at the end of the race. Every race entrant gets one ticket into the raffle (friends and family can enter your name on their raffle ticket).  Pretty nifty, eh? Even for those of us who are not local, it is still very exciting to see communities getting activated to help families on this heart-wrenching issue.

Next Meeting July 26th, 7 pm

Hello gals! Our next meeting will be July 26th at 7 PM. We will be meeting at the ever-yummy Pastries of Denmark (desserts and salads/sandwiches). Come and chat with all of us!

Pastries of Denmark
12613 Olive Boulevard
Creve Coeur, MO 63141

For the Big Girls and the Skinny Chicks: Woman Up

Being overweight or underweight. This one sucks ladies. Weight can be an environmental factor for infertility if it is interfering with your menstrual cycles and causing you to skip ovulation, or ovulate irregularly. Which makes sense when you think about it – bodies are pretty smart – and if they are too far to either side of the weight spectrum they tell your baby-making hormones now is NOT a good time to be pregnant, as all is NOT well. As if infertility isn’t devastating enough, we have to face the fact that our personal choices could be contributing to it. It’s a rough row to hoe gals.

Environmental Infertility: Woman Up and Make The Necessary Changes

Sometimes the results of an infertility work up provide you and your spouse with data that is actionable.  For example, some causes of infertility are purely environmental. And sometimes environmental causes are ‘possible contributing factors.’ Basically ladies, if you are struggling to conceive, don’t wishy-wash around the ‘Is it really? Is this maybe? Could it possibly be preventing…?” and DEAL.

Next Meeting: Thurs, June 21st

We will have our next meeting on Thursday evening June 21st at 7pm.  We are still deciding on the location! Please bring ideas about different posts and entries you would like to see on the blog!

Inviting Guest Bloggers

One thing that I really want to focus on with this blog is that I want it to be a forum for more voices than just mine. I am relatively new to the wholes infertility journey, and still know so very little. I know only my own situation, and little details I pick up from others when chatting...

Grateful for an Uneventful Surgery

My laparoscopy was Thursday and was a nice, short, uneventful surgery.  Which doesn't prevent me from being a total wuss about recovery.  I have an astonishingly low pain threshold. The good thing is, I know this about myself (and now Richard does too) so it helps me eliminate any delusions I might get about skipping the epidural part of childbirth...lol.

Ten Steps to a Successful Semen Analysis

1. Have your semen analysis done by a fertility doctor or a fertility clinic. Busy hospitals and labs can sometimes let samples sit too long before processing them, resulting in faulty results.

How to Help Your Hubby Through the Semen Analysis

Men hate getting this. Maybe Mormon men more than others, I don't know. First of all, it can be awkward and unpleasant to 'retrieve a sample' in medical speak. Second of all, they are usually TERRIFIED that they will come up with a 'bad' diagnosis, of low sperm count, low sperm motility, or dysfunctional sperm.

Doctor Can We Have an Extra Chair: The Power of Husbands at Appointments

From the beginning I told my husband that even though this baby was going to be coming out of my body this was going to be a we thing from start to finish. Which meant if I had to go to the doctor, so did he.

Get Thee to a Fertility Doctor

Although most OBGYN's recommend waiting 12 months to see if you get pregnant before seeing a fertility specialist, IMO (in my opinion) there is no harm in jumping the gun a little.  Especially if you want A LOT of babies and you are not getting any younger!

Why Did it Take me This Long to Reach Out?

For a long time I didn't talk to anyone because at first I assumed we were just on the longer curve for conception, and the big 'infertility' word wasn't really an issue. But each time a cycle ended without my becoming pregnant, my frustration grew.

Why this Group, Why this Blog

It has taken me a bit to feel comfortable starting a blog dedicated to infertility. After all, I discuss the topic on my own blog, ChroniclesofLetty.blogspot.com, so what was the point of an additional forum? However, I recently started meeting with a couple friends who were also struggling to have children. At first there were three of us, then five, then seven, as everyone seemed to know someone else who was facing either primary infertility (difficulty/inability to conceive a first child) or secondary infertility (difficulty/inability to conceive an additional child after a successful pregnancy.) I was startled to realize that instead of being part of what felt like a very small minority (especially in the LDS culture) I was part of an ever-growing community of women who desperately wanted children, but were having a hard time getting them here to earth!

I started this blog today because a friend of mine asked me if I would consider making the group available to a wider community, inviting women to come who I might not know by face or name, but who are found sprinkled throughout the LDS wards (congregations) in St. Louis. Of course, anyone not of the Mormon faith is more than welcome to attend, but thus far the only women I have known well enough to invite are Mormon. So spread the word folks!

What do we do in Infertility Support Group? Well, we talk, we laugh, we SUPPORT. Sometimes we just sit and chat, sometimes we eat at a fun restaurant, sometimes we catch a movie, sometimes we go to Walgreen's en masse to help our newest member find the appropriate supplies...lol. Often we share Dr. information, insurance information, adoption information, natural remedy information, helpful articles and scriptures. The most fascinating thing I have found about the support group is that I didn't know I needed it until I had it, and my sisters and friends poured solace into wounded places I didn't know I was harboring.

So far sharing my burdens with this group of women has been a source of enormous comfort, and an invaluable source of information.  A sorrow shared is a sorrow halved, according the old proverb. I don't know if sorrow shared is halved, but I can testify that it is lessened. Perhaps because as sisters we constantly remind ourselves that 'joy cometh in the morning' and that our Father in Heaven is mindful of every cry from our heart. And that, ultimately, God is able, and the one whose eye is on the sparrow also keeps an eye on our ovulation charts...

"The issue for us is trusting God enough to trust also His timing. If we can truly believe He has our welfare at heart, may we not let His plans unfold as He thinks best?"

Elder Dallin H. Oaks, General Conference October, 2003 "Timing"

http://www.lds.org/ensign/2003/10/timing?lang=eng

In His infinite Atonement, Jesus Christ literally suffered the pain of what it felt like to face another month without a child, what it feels like to look back upon two years not as two years, but as 24 separate months where no baby came. So even if you don't feel comfortable or able to come visit with our little band of sisters, please allow the comforting love of the Savior to fill your heart and soul.

 "...and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities."  

The Book of Mormon, Alma 7:12