In our 3rd year or TTC. I've had 2 chemical pregnancies...I'm currently on my period, which was 3 days late, which started with brown and pink spotting, which we thought was implantation bleeding because I almost never spot. As far as the doctors know there's no reason we can't get pregnant.... I'm angry, I'm sad, I spent my commute to work crying and literally screaming at God for favoring others while I have to suffer...All my friends are on their 3rd-4th baby and I don't hang out with them anymore because I just can't deal with the pain anymore. I know that makes me a bad friend but I just can't anymore ... I dread every mother's Day and Father's Day, It kills me every cycle no matter how much I tell myself to not care, my tests are always negative? I'm sick and tired of the false hope I get when my progesterone gives me any weird pms, like this time I had hot flashes,never had that before, I had the nausea and the fatigue and bam BFN and period, like I'm so genuinely tired of this merry-go-round of misery. I know the feeling will pass and the wheel will just keep spinning....I Just want to get off this ride of hope and heartbreak. It's getting to the point he's considering adoption which feels like the final nail in the coffin of my heart. I love My husband so so soo much and I want to make him a dad and I feel like I'm letting him down 😭...

Is there any point in continuing to try? Should I just fold and look at adoption? I feel like I've been left behind by fate/God/the universe. I just want someone to tell me things will be okay even if they might now be. I feel so alone.

I feel like the worst person in the world…

We’ve been off contraception since January 2025 and have actually been trying for a baby for 14 months now, though initially without tracking my cycles because we didn’t want our sex life to depend on it. In February 2026, I had an ectopic pregnancy and was given methotrexate after we’d seen the foetus. (Another thing in my head - that we actively terminated that pregnancy) Since then, I’ve been tracking my cycles very closely.
Next month we’re due to start our fertility treatment, but so far all the tests have come back negative and everything (cycle, scan, egg reserve, sperm, hormones) looks normal.

Since Thursday alone, four people close to us have announced that they’re pregnant… and I’ve been absolutely shocked by my own reactions and feel like the worst person in the world. Just now, I ended up screaming and shouting at everything after the latest announcement (which, by the way, she made coldly via text message even though I’d seen her on Sunday because, and I quote, ‘she didn’t have the guts’ to tell it in person). . Because why them and not us? I want so badly to be happy for them and when someone tells me it in person I’m always very happy for them in their face… but every time when I’m alone after that, my heart breaks a little more. It’s already got to the point where I’m cancelling plans for fear that the next friend or family member will announce they’re pregnant…

I feel like the worst person in the world, I hate myself and I don’t know what to do…
I’d rather just disappear.

My husband (39M) and I (35F) have been TTC for 6 months, including two back-to-back chemical pregnancies. I'm feeling a lot of frustration and resentment about what feels like his lack of engagement and initiative.

Right now I'm the one managing everything: peeing on a different stick every day (OPK, pDG, BBT), scheduling and attending my OB-GYN appointments (initial screen and bloodwork all came back normal), and researching what additional tests I should ask for next. He says he wants a baby, but beyond that seems passive. He's participating in the "bare minimum" biological sense, but I'm the one directing the whole process.

It would mean a lot to me if he took some initiative himself, for example, independently deciding to get his own fertility testing instead of waiting for me to suggest it. When I brought this up yesterday, he said he didn't realize that was something he should do.

I know carrying the pregnancy naturally puts a lot of this on me. But I'm not sure if my expectations for his engagement are reasonable, or if this passive, wait-to-be-told dynamic is just normal for a lot of couples going through TTC.

What has TTC looked like for your husband/partner?

Okay, husband and I have been TTC for over 3 years all of my tests have been normal however my husband makes no sperm. We have been trying to fix this situation through medications and procedures however no luck. So we moved onto IUI with donor sperm. We have had 3 IUI’s so far, first one I got pregnant however we miscarried at 6 weeks and 3 days. We have spent over $12,000 on IUIs so far with donor sperm. I am currently 12 DPO and had a negative test this morning (I know I’m not out until my period starts just wanting to prepare for the worst). My husband would like to continue IUI however I am worried we are wasting our money however he doesn’t think we can afford IVF currently. So how are you guys affording to continue to TTC (both of our insurances cover nothing for infertility) ?…. If this isn’t the right thread for this sort of questions please let me know thank you

Today I'm 6DPO after a messy postpartum (loss) and today I've just felt like when I reach the end of this two week wait, I'm not expecting to see a negative or a positive.

Maybe I'm compartmentalizing all the trauma and grief I've been through in the past 11 months but I truly don't have any expectations. I would love to have a positive AHT but I also know that ttc doesn't = pregnancy or baby.

I wish I could feel the joy of getting a positive for the first time or the excitement of seeing the future but I feel like I can't see past each day.

I ordered cheap AHT and LH strips and I'm fully stocked knowing that this could be a long journey to the next positive.

I don't want to sound negative by any means but I just feel indifferent this time around. And I wish that wanting a living children didn't come with so many complex emotions.

I had a successful pregnancy five years ago. At that time my cycles were typical, 28 days with a 14ish day LP. I stopped tracking ovulation after that but always noted my period in my app. I knew we were going to start trying again this summer and noticed last year that my cycles were short, sometimes 22 days. I started tracking ovulation with the strips and confirming with temping in January and that's when I realized my LP was always between 8-10 days but mostly closer to 8-9 days.

I was hoping I could figure it out before TTC so I mentioned it to my OB in February and he didn't think it would be an issue (I'm aware that low progesterone and short LPs is a controversial topic for TTC). Low and behold our first cycle trying I get a positive test at 9 DPO but had already started spotting which turned to heavy bleeding same day and eventually a CP. (I had light positives on different brands for 5 days so I know it wasn't a false positive or indent). I know that CPs are common and it could have been an egg quality issue but I can't help but feel like with the timing of the spotting starting before the positive test that it was probably due to my lining starting to shed and the egg couldn't fully implant.

I messaged my OB and got an appointment for next month. I guess I am just wondering how to advocate for myself? I feel like I have plenty of data to back up my concerns but worry I'll have to fight for progesterone supplements which I truly think would help me a lot. Anyone else have luck convincing a skeptical doctor and did it lengthen your LP?

Long time lurker here, first time poster. My partner (31M) and I (38F) are finally ready to start trying to conceive. I have been on birth control of one kind or another most of my life, so I’ve never really tracked my cycles. I’ve been off birth control since June 1 and I’m noticing my cycles are abnormally long.

My first cycle off BC was 52 days and I think I ovulated on CD40. Right now I’m on CD41 of my second cycle off BC and I don’t think I’ve ovulated yet.

Do I just need to wait longer after stopping birth control to get more regular? Should I start trying to see an RE now? Am I possibly perimenopausal, and does that mean I can’t get pregnant? Thanks for any advice or support, feeling very disheartened.

31F, TTC for a few months, and today I had one of those moments that completely ruined my mood.
I was talking to a few people when someone in the group casually asked me, “So, when are you planning to have a baby?”
I know people often ask this out of curiosity and sometimes don’t even realize how personal or insensitive it can be. But honestly, you never know what someone might be going through. Not everyone who doesn’t have a child is “waiting for the right time.” Some people may be trying, struggling, dealing with loss, or simply not ready to talk about it.
I just smiled and said, “There’s still a lot to do in life.” I could have replied rudely, but that’s not who I am. I’m a sensitive person, and these comments genuinely affect me more than I wish they did. I actually teared up a little in front of my friends afterward.
I’m still learning how to deal with people who feel entitled to ask such personal questions. How do you girls handle this? What do you usually say when someone asks about babies/marriage/pregnancy?
I’m especially looking for some polite but savage/sarcastic comebacks that shut the conversation down without me having to stoop to their level.

Let's see those lovely charts, folks!

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Hi all - I am about 9-10 months into TTC. No positive tests thus far. I am 36F and, thus, have plenty of friends and family members who have young kids and babies. I have always loved babies. I remembering babysitting as a teenager and wanting to wake the babies up from naps because I could never have enough time with them. When my best friends had their first babies, I was SO excited to meet their babies. To hold them, smell their little heads, hear their little coos and giggles. I just loved it.

Now that I’m struggling to conceive, I’ve found myself completely apathetic towards other people’s babies. It’s like a switch flipped. It’s not that I dislike being around the babies, I just do not care at all about them. I have no desire to look at them, hold them, nothing. Two of my best friends have had their second children in the last couple months and I have to actively remind myself that the babies exist and I should ask about them.

I feel like a bad friend and I don’t like feeling so apathetic. I think it’s just that I want my own baby so bad, no one else’s baby is really important to me right now. Can anyone relate?

Anyone else out there TTC but afraid of getting pregnant?

As much as I love kids and want to have the experience of raising my own, it also scares me so much. Parts of pregnancy sound interesting and exciting, and other parts sound miserable. Giving birth sounds like a nightmare. Then add in all the myriad ways that things can go wrong (and I live in a very red state) and it sort of feels like I'm choosing to play Russian Roulette.

At 35 though, I don't feel like I have time to think about it, and honestly thinking about it too much will probably only make the fear worse.

So I just end up with this weird mixture of hope and dread as the TWW comes to an end, and I start hoping that my period starts. Then when it does, I get this messy mixture of relief and sadness.

Are there others out there like me? Or am I alone in this?

Why is it so hard to find the “right” way to respond to everyone else’s good news? Just got a phone call from a friend I’d texted to catch up with - she danced around it and then finally sheepishly told me she was pregnant and wasn’t sure how to tell me, but wanted to before we saw each other in person. I’ve gotten so many of these calls being a 33F, married, with many friends/cousins/other peers in similar boats.

If they don’t know that we’re 2 years into this, I feel like my feelings aren’t valid.

If they do know, I’m treated like someone they pity. “Well, you know your time will come!” “We’re thinking of you!” Or the worst - anything along the lines of “we weren’t even trying!” “We didn’t think it would come so easy” etc

So my (25f) husband (26m) and I have been trying for over 2 years. I was finally diagnosed with PCOS in January after our fertility clinic missed my cyst covered ovaries in an ultrasound in December 2025. I was happy to finally be diagnosed after over a year of telling any doctor who would listen that I thought I had it. Anyways, I got in to see an OB after waiting 3 months for an appointment, and he told me to lose 17 pounds and see him again 3 months later. I exceeded expectations and lost 25 pounds. He then said in order to get letrozole my husband will need a sperm analysis. We get the analysis back and his sperm count is 6 million (low), while motility, morphology, and volume is above average. Now we have to wait ANOTHER 3 months to retest and I don't get letrozole. I'm still not ovulating and my cycles are still irregular which is why he wanted me to lose weight to try to fix them. I don't even look forward to getting pregnant anymore. I've just given up.

Anything (within the rules) goes. (Commonly broken rules: don't talk about an ongoing pregnancy outside the weekly BFP thread; don't ask for success stories.)

You can find the wiki here!

Don't forget to check out our themed threads:

• Moody Monday
• Temping Tuesday
  
• Waiting Wednesday
• Wondering Wednesday
• Trying Again Thursday
• Thankful Thursday
• Health and Wellness Thursday
• Looking Forward Friday
• Wondering Weekend
• 35 and Ova

There's also the Weekly Introductions and Read Me Thread, which contains links to all sorts of handy bits of info, like popular wiki posts and acronyms.

It's time for us to air the things that have been bothering us, TTC-related or not! It's Monday, complain away!

I'm 36 and now at 4 months ttc. The main thing I'm struggling with is LH tests and BBT when working shifts. I work a mix of earlies, lates and nights so my BBT is all over the place due to the shifts/broken sleep.

Am also struggling to find a LH peak as its difficult to test in the times that are suggested.

Am due on period today and did a random LH test yesterday which was highest its ever been however negative HCG. Maybe I'm just late but also think my body might still be on a comedown from the pill which I stopped in April. I don't even know if I actually am ovulating!

Any advice from other shift workers?! Other girls at work seem to manage to get pregnant however they are a bit younger than me!!

Hi everyone! This is my first post here. I’m still super early in the process (cycle 4) so I’m very logically aware of what to expect as far as timing goes! Still, I don’t think I expected the roller coaster of emotions to be as rough as they are each month.

I have like 3 years of cycle data but an average cycle length of 32 days. I wasn’t on hormonal birth control and when I had my copper IUD I could always tell when I was ovulating (cervical mucus etc) and it was pretty spot on with my app predictions. As of now I am at 34 days and all my apps are screaming at me that I’m “two days late for my period” but I have negative tests and know I’m not pregnant. I went back through my app data and I have several instances of 35-39 day cycles that I didn’t even notice when I wasn’t TTC! It’s crazy how little I paid attention to that stuff haha. Anyhow, just trying to stay sane and give myself a little TLC this month.

I think one thing that kind of messed me up is that I usually ovulate around CD18 and when I didn’t catch any kind of surge by day 21 I kind of just stopped testing. I assumed I missed it and had no idea that it’s possible to have such variation in ovulation times! Is everyone else essentially testing until they get a peak or their period essentially? I’m definitely learning a lot.

Anyhow, just had to vent a tad and would love any words of wisdom anyone has on helping to deal with cycle variation while TTC!

TTC has broken me down into a bitter and resentful human.

My coworker, let’s call her Amanda, is so nice and there’s literally no reason to hate her, but deep down I do. The short version is that I’ve been trying for a baby since before she was pregnant with her first, and she just had her second yesterday.

The long version is that I see her as what I could have been. There’s a long standing joke around our workplace that Amanda and I are twins. We have similar facial structures, almost the same age, height, mannerisms. I laugh it off. New people regularly mix us up and ask if we’re sisters, it’s uncanny and weird. But deep down it stings because I know that I’m the inferior one. She’s thinner, prettier, more accomplished, and always the first one to take on a hard task. I’m depressed, have ADHD, a type B that used to be type A, and I’ve been suffering from unexplained infertility.

She’s so nice to me, the entire department loves her, and honestly I should love her too. But I’ve had a really hard day with the work group text pinging over and over again congratulating her and I just can’t be happy for her no matter how hard I try. I put up the best front I can, I am civil always, but I’ve started keeping her at arm’s length and avoiding her when I can. I congratulated her too but it was kind of pathetic, my heart wasn’t in it I just felt obligated. This isn’t sustainable because my job requires me to work with her. I don’t think I’m mean outwardly, but she has to have noticed by now that something’s up. I know it’s not her fault. It started after her first pregnancy was announced and I just totally detached after her second announcement. Her second announcement was in a room full of people and I had to go to the bathroom and cry, and then I just couldn’t look at her the same because I hated me so much. I didn’t think she’d be pregnant a second time before I was. All the while dealing with the constant comparisons and jokes about how similar we are made by other people.

I have a therapist but honestly there’s just nothing helping and my workplace and coworkers have been triggering really bad thoughts lately through no fault of their own because none of what I’m feeling is a normal human reaction. Even doing something as small as signing her card made me tear up.

I hate this. It’s so irrational. I’m sorry Amanda.

This is a thread for TFABers of AMA (advanced maternal awesomeness)! TTC past 35 comes with its own challenges -- discuss (and rant about) them here. Like the Pirate's Code, "35 and over" is more of a guideline.

Anything (within the rules) goes. (Commonly broken rules: don't talk about an ongoing pregnancy outside the weekly BFP thread; don't ask for success stories.)

You can find the wiki here!

Don't forget to check out our themed threads:

• Moody Monday
• Temping Tuesday
  
• Waiting Wednesday
• Wondering Wednesday
• Trying Again Thursday
• Thankful Thursday
• Health and Wellness Thursday
• Looking Forward Friday
• Wondering Weekend
• 35 and Ova

There's also the Weekly Introductions and Read Me Thread, which contains links to all sorts of handy bits of info, like popular wiki posts and acronyms.

Hello everyone.
Me and partner are on CD12 on C10. So we are used to the negative tests and I’m mentally preparing for a negative test in two weeks and medical involvement (probably leading to IUI/IVF) in about two months.

I’m worried that this post might provoke negative reactions in a negative way. But I’ll try anyway and if the mods feel it’s not proper I’ll ofc try in the daily chat or wondering weekend.

Me (26F) and partner (30M) live pretty healthy lives. Both work physical jobs, and eat pretty healthy - could be better, could be worse. Lifestyle-wise I have only two worries. I work at a plant where I am exposed to chemicals that can affect fertility (formaldehyde and melamin) but I am adament about using PPE. The other is smoking (only rarely) and drinking.

We have so far tried not to change our entire lives while TTC, but obv no luck so far. I use OPKs and we have had perfect timing every cycle but the first.

I drink «heavily» approximately 1, maybe 2, times a month. Usually only during follocular phase. Between 6-10 units, not spirits only wine and beer. And while drinking I tend to smoke. I know, its bad. I am aware. I dont do it when sober, but when alcohol is in the system and cigs available I go rabid. I would say I consume about 1-5 cigs usually when this happens.

Is this the reason we havent had any luck yet? I will quit if you think so. That means no drinking (it goes hand in hand sorryyyy). Partners SA is okay but low morphology.
And, if (WHEN) we pursue IVF, will our first message be «try being perfect for a few cycles and then come back»? I have done one ‘perfect’ cycle and several almost perfect. Because if so, I’d rather just do it now even it if means killing my social life.

Just to be clear I am NOT worried about quitting when I do get pregnant. And I know both are very bad for general health and fertility.

Thanks in advance. It’s nighttime now (after a night of both) so I’ll try to answer when it’s morning here.

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We have rules we expect all community members will follow. Posts and comments that do not follow these rules will be removed by the mod team. If you see something that is breaking one of these rules, please use the report button or message the moderators. We also have this lovely post written by a community member on the sub's culture and how to interact and expect as a new member!

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Hello peeps. We are on cycle 8 of ttc, with one loss in between and I can already tell or am anticipating this cycle will be a bust.

Husband and I had multiple discussions over the last few months over how this whole process is starting to affect our relationship. Especially this week we both had multiple discussions about the burden of timing sex, our happiness, and his reservations about moving on to an RE at the end of the year. In this whole process I wish I could just find the “off button” and forget about all of this but I cannot. I have found some months I deal with it better than others but the ups and downs are real.

I guess I would like to receive some advice from people in our situation or long haulers- how have you overcome some of these struggles in your marriage? How have you dealt with having to see an RE? Does this get better as time goes on? Will the wish to be a parent rob us of all of our happiness? Thanks guys ❤️