Fertility Problems – What Happens
By definition you can only be considered infertile if you are incapable of becoming pregnant within 1 year of having sex without using any birth control methods. However, it is not uncommon for people who have been diagnosed as infertile actually go on and do become pregnant.
85% of couples who use no treatment to conceive a pregnancy will become pregnant within the first year of trying. The percentage rises to about 93% after trying without treatment for 2 years.
There are couples out there who cannot get pregnant and do come back with normal test results. These people are diagnosed with unexplained infertility. 35% of those couples diagnosed with unexplained infertility who do not seek any form of treatment naturally become pregnant within 3 years. The percentage of those that do become pregnant within 7 years jumps to 45%.
Some of the major factors which will affect your chances of conceiving with treatment or without treatment depends on how old you are (age), the cause of infertility, and how long have you been trying to conceive.
Women who are over the age of 35 generally become less fertile, while fertility decreases as you age. When you reach older ages, you increase your chances in not becoming pregnant as well as increasing your chances of having a miscarriage. This is usually due to her egg supply aging. Overtime these eggs start to degrade making it harder for her to conceive, or have a healthy pregnancy. If you are over 40 years of age it is encouraged for you to use donor eggs if you are non-responsive to in vitro fertilization (IVF), or you aren’t ovulating with or without treatment.
If you try to become pregnant and haven’t in the past 3 years without using any birth control methods, it is very unlikely that you will become pregnant without some sort of treatment. You should seek advice and help from a certified doctor.
If the doctor says the cause of infertility is clear and that there’s a treatment for that cause, then becoming pregnant will be more likely. However, if your doctor diagnoses you with unexplained infertility then your chances of becoming pregnant significantly decrease. However, medicines or other assisted reproductive methods may still be effective. It is good to note that couples who have tried infertility treatments with no success have turned out to be pregnant afterward, without using any kind of treatment methods.
Infertility Concerns for Couples
- Testing and treatment for infertility can have an emotional and social impact on your life
- Using different assisted reproductive technology methods, there are legal and ethical issues. Such as how many embryos should be transferred to the uterus and what to do with the unused ones
- Think about adopting after trying infertility treatments with no success.
- Limit the amount of testing that is done to you to help support yourself emotionally, physically, and financially. It can be a grueling and expensive mission.
