Bust a Myth!

As soon as you adopt/stop trying, you'll get pregnant.

I heard both versions of these statements during the three years I was trying to get pregnant. Both were uttered by people who are intimately aware of my life.

The ridiculous part of this goes beyond the medical facts -- that in fact, infertility is not caused by stress, but rather an actual physical problem (upwards of 90%).

In my case, the ludicrous part of these statements is that I'm not married. I'm not currently -- nor was I during those three trying years -- in a relationship. Any sex I was having wasn't -- nor should it have been -- unprotected.

I'm not exactly sure how my friends thought this blessed event was going to happen once I stopped trying. Once I relaxed. Once I had an adopted child home.

The first time I heard it, I tried to explain just how wrong what they were saying was. Forget the fact that it was cruel hopefulness. It was just plain wrong. Biologically impossible.

But that didn't stop the well-intentioned from telling me that my success didn't lie with the fairly successful fertility specialist delicately placing viable embryos in my uterus, but rather just the opposite. I would suddenly become pregnant once I "stopped trying."

To learn more about infertility and options to become parents, please visit www.resolve.org/infertility101. Learn more about the background of National Infertility Awareness Week® (NIAW).