I am sure many of us can think of someone who cannot have children because of fertility problems. Fewer of us know someone who has gone the fertility drugs or IVF route, or both. But can you think of someone that's a result, a child, of those practices?
I'm one of those children.
When I was about ten years old my mother began to tell me that she wanted to be a mother to me and my sister so badly that she invested $10,000 (each) before we were even conceived. At first I didn't understand what she meant, I just figured she had to pay for a lot of doctor appointments out of pocket. As I grew older though I started to understand that my mother couldn't have children without the help of fertility drugs. Her cycles were irregular, her eggs weren't maturing fully, she was already past the age of thirty, and my father's sperm count was starting to slightly drop with his climbing age.
The details leading up to her finding out she was infertile I have yet to get out of my mother. To get her on the subject is difficult these days as it's been over 22 years since she first started to discover and deal with her infertility. Once she finally had me and my sister, once she fulfilled her burning need to become a mother, she sort of motherhood amnesia-ed all the difficulties leading up to it. She honestly doesn't remember a lot of the process.
But I want her to remember. The truth is, I sometimes feel like my life isn't meant to be. My father would not let my mother adopt, he didn't want to be raising someone's mistake. A naive and ignorant thought, I will admit, but the truth. My mother all her life didn't want children, but when she reached the age point in her life that gave the warning signs that it was now or never to have children, she wanted to soothe the urge and was willing to do anything.
At the time, fertility drugs and IVF practices were on the rise. The doctor told my mother about Clomid. There were health risks listed for the mother to be concerned about, but was considered "safe" and would not affect the baby. Instead of standing her ground and going with the adoption route, she went with the drugs. After a year of bills and trying, she told the doctor one last cycle and then she was done trying. I was conceived. My mom became a mother after carrying me to full term.
Once I was born and she was given the okay to have another child, my mother went with the drugs again. This time it took over two years until my mom said only one more cycle and she was done. My sister was conceived. My mom became a mother for a second time after carrying my sister to full term.
She told my father she was done having children, that two were enough for her. My father originally wanted four kids, but he knew she wanted to be done with the drugs. My mom was a wonderful mother and raised us letting us know that we were wanted, really truly wanted. She taught us to be curious, to be smart, to question the world around us. I don't think she expected me to start questioning her.
When I started to understand more about the process that was needed to have me, I began to question. Science classes taught me that nature's way of ensuring abnormalities weren't passed on to the next generation was by infertility. Anatomy taught me that once a woman's body was not fit to carry a child anymore, her reproductive system ended ovulation. Medicine and drug education taught me that sometimes side effects of a drug were not apparent until years later.
I started to look into fertility drugs research. Though they do list the side effects that the
mother can experience, there is limited research done on the effects it has on the
child when it reached adulthood. Fertility drugs and IVF has only been available in the United States for the last 50 years, and increase of use is only the last 20 years. Many of the children conceived with these methods are just not starting to try to have children. Many of these children are facing health problems sooner in life. Is there a direct correlation? Or is it just coincidence?
Doctors ensure mothers desperate for children that there is no side effects for the possible baby. But how do they know without the proper research? Doctors used to smoke in the office with the patient in the room before we knew there was a correlation between smoking and cancer. We were testing nuclear bombs in the backyards of citizens before we figured out radiation could cause mutations.
What if? Is it worth having that child if there's a possibility that one day he or she may face the same problems as you did trying to have a child? Is it worth possibly genetically passing on defective genes?
I can't change the past. I can't have a pity party for myself over the fact that I feel like I took away a home and parents from a child that needed one. I can't blame my mother for the route she took. I can ask women to really think about how they want to have children. If you find out one day that you are infertile, ask yourself do you really need to carry a child to be a mother, or do you just need the child? If you already have children, do you really need more to complete your family? There are millions of children growing up without parents, and more and more are coming into the world every day.
This is my plea as a child conceived with fertility drugs. Please, please, think past your need now and into the future of your child. They grow up to be adults one day, and we will question the ways of the world. We will question your choices and actions. We will question God. I understand it would be hard to part with the fact you will never carry a child. I would be devastated as well. But I would not want my child to have the same thoughts as I do, the thought of "Do I really belong, or did my existence go against God?"
