Why We’ve Chosen to Not Pursue Fertility Treatments

I get this question a lot – more often lately, as we are getting closer to beginning this adoption process.  It’s not a short or simple answer, so I thought I’d try to put my many thoughts on this topic into a blog post.  These are not in order of importance or any type of order.  They are all fairly equal factors.

1.  Cost-Effectiveness
The more we opened up to families similar to us that adopted after infertility, the more I hear something along the lines of, “I wish we would have stopped fertility treatments sooner”, or “I regret all the time and money we poured into medical testing that we could have put toward adoptions.”  There is no guarantee that a problem will be found. If something is found, chances are it’s something that is either a pricey fix, a lengthy and invasive fix, or something with a “solution” that we are uncomfortable with. Or all of the above.

We live on my husband’s small pastor's salary and pour what I earn (as an elementary school aide) into our adoption fund.  We cannot afford to pursue tests and treatments and move on to adoption if medical interventions do not work.  I feel like adoption has the better chance of becoming parents in the end.

2. We have issues with many common fertility treatments.
We will not do IVF or IUI. 

As far as 'simpler' treatments go, a lot of them don’t apply to us.  I know a common ‘first line’ fertility treatment is several months of Clomid (a medication that induces ovulation) but what’s the point of inducing ovulation if we know I ovulate?  Personally, “because it sometimes works” isn’t a good enough reason to force my body to do something that it already does perfectly fine on its own.  And for what it's worth, my primary doctor agrees with me.

I have also been advised that several months on the Pill sometimes works to stabilize hormones, and going off of it can temporarily give you higher levels more likely to allow you to conceive.  First off, we strongly object to the Pill, as it can be abortifacient (read more about that here).  Second, again, why throw my hormones off balance and back again if they are fine right now?

3. The most basic of fertility issues have already been ruled out.
To disclose a bit, I’ve always had very regular menstrual cycles.  I ovulate regularly.  My height and weight are healthy.  I work out and eat well.  I have had bloodwork done, and all my counts and hormone levels are where they should be.  My paps and pelvics are normal.  These factors rule out some of the more common causes of infertility, such as hormone imbalances, irregular cycles, anovulation, and PCOS.  

4. I love adoption!
I have three cousins who were adopted.  I was 12 and 16 when they came home, and I remember it well.  I remember the long waiting process, the tough decisions that my aunt and uncle had to make, and most of all, I remember that beautiful, joyous result of LOVE for everyone involved.
I could go on and on about this, but in short: I want to do that.  We need children, and there are thousands of children in the world that need parents.  I feel like this might be our call from God to do something about that.

5. Having biological kids is not a priority for us.

We realized at some point that parenting is the end goal, not pregnancy and birth.  We don’t care if our kids don’t look like us, an ‘unknown’ gene pool doesn’t scare me (at least, not too much), and having a child from infancy is not a priority to us.

I realize that not everyone will share these opinions, and that’s fine with me.  I don’t think that those who take different paths to resolve their infertility are wrong.  This is simply our way of thinking, and how we feel God has led us to build our family through adoption.