To think people without fertility problems should not give advice to those with fertility problems however well meant it is?

[Moonfacesmother]

My heavily pregnant friend came over last night. She does not know we have been ttc for 18 months and have had one failed ivf cycle. However she told me about a close friend of hers who I also know although not very well.

My heavily pregnant friend (hpf) said that she said to this poor woman who has been ttc for four years and is about to start ivf the following:

'I said to her it's probably because you need to relax. Book yourself a dirty weekend and get drunk and I bet you'll get pregnant. I wasn't bothered if I got pregnant or not and I got pregnant first cycle so I think if you just don't worry about it it will happen.'

This is exactly why I have not told people about our problems! I was somewhat annoyed on behalf of our mutual acquaintance.

Aibu to think that people should just not say anything like this?! If you've been ttc for 4 years it's unlikely to require you to 'just relax.' My hpf spoke as though she was some sort of fertility guru.

I think you are largely not being unreasonable.

Certainly when my BF was going through fertility problems for 3 years I wouldn't have dreamt of offering advice or suggestions.

I asked how things were going occasionally, listened lots and offered her & her DH the option of coming to stay for a bit if they wanted a chance of scenery - that was it.

I very much doubt that she was add the peak of relaxation when she had her first fertility treatment but thankfully it worked.

YANBU OP. Worst thing I ever did was tell anyone I was TTC. It took 10 years. 10 years of crap "advice" and pep talks.
If we ever try for no 2 - I am not telling a soul.
Good luck OP - fingers crossed for you and your mutual acquaintance.

I've got a colleague going through ttc hell. She has been for 5 years. During which period, I have had 2 children. I am 10 years older than her. There is nothing I can say to her.

But, what I can do is step in to carry her workload when she is taking leave for medical appts, let her cry all she likes without asking intrusive questions, never gossip about what she is going through, and never issue glib advice like 'Oh, just relax'. As if, if that were all that were needed, her expert doctors would not have mentioned it. So that's what I do.

I think it depends on how the advice is given and how much you know about the person's situation. An IVF consultant once told me that lots of people think they are infertile when they are simply not having enough sex - once a month won't do it. I can't remember why we discussed this, as she wasn't suggesting it to me. I did pass that advice, along with advice on the importance of reducing her stress levels, on to a close friend who felt it was taking a long time to conceive her second child. She was in a job she hated & was having marital problems. It worked for her, but I would never ever give that advice to someone if I didn't know the details.

For me, relaxing was never an option. Because I worked in quite a close knit team and am a rubbish liar, people knew I was going for IVF but didn't know why (no tubes, likely to need a hysterectomy in my early 30s) so I got lots of well-meaning but actually quite upsetting advice. Relax, don't worry you're young it will happen etc etc. All, of course, from people who didn't have any experience of infertility themselves and all leaving me wanting to scream/cry.

It sounds like IKEA is only giving her advice to relax to close friends where she knows their circumstances, and I think that's fine. Equally, with a close friend in the right discussion hopefully you have an idea of what they want to hear. I know on infertility forums, people sometimes ask for positive stories because they want to feel hopeful & then I will share that when given a very slim chance of success on our last round (knowing I'd be listed for a hysterectomy straight after if it failed) I conceived twins. But I'd never ever just say to someone who'd been told they had a slim chance of success 'oh, so was I and I am now pregnant with twins.' In fact, being told about people who tried for years and then had twins/triplets was one of my pet hates going through IVF.

I agree with pp, when it's just that you don't know what to say if someone tells you they have infertility issues, the responses I've found most supportive have been simply 'that's shit, I'm sorry.'

Victims of rape may get pregnant and obviously that's not a "relaxing" situation.

I think a lot of the problem is that infertility is still such a taboo subject - many people just don't understand the true biology behind getting pregnant, that there is really only a window of a few days at very best a month where you can get pregnant, this then creates the dumb ass comments. When I was going through my IVF/ICSI cycle I would tell my closest female friends about it - all the tests, what the results meant etc, my AMH levels, oestrogen levels, how your lining affects the outcome, the difference between embryos and foetuses these women all had children of their own yet none of them knew what the body had to do to create a successful pregnancy. Its WAY more involved that just a shag! I was very open with people if they asked - I believe this is the only way to stop these ignorant and ill-informed comments.
Also - why does it only seem to be the job of infertile couples to adopt? People who have children who then tell an infertile couple - so many children need loving homes etc - I would ask them - did you consider adopting one of these children before you embarked on producing your own biological child? No? I didn't think so.

giveme, that's what my sister has always said about having children. People don't know they can, until they try.

And if it works, no one really questions it, so it could have been thanks to super-fertility or the most outside 1 million to 1 chance, they don't know.
Which is another reason why unthinking advice must to so galling to the people on the receiving end.

I will also add that people don't realise how fertility can fluctuate from month to month - I certainly didn't before I started treatment. People assume a guys sperm is either super sperm or firing blanks - when in fact you could have 60,000 million one month and down to 5 million the next which plays a huge part in the process.

Everyone knows someone who was just about to start ivf, relaxed and got pregnant! But I know lots more people who this 'didn't' happen to!! Including myself!! I started out very relaxed and enjoying TTC...got me nowhere and how can anyone relax during fertility treatment?! It's impossible....yet it can still work!

I know most people are just trying up help make us feel better, but I often find a lot of what most people say to me can upset me even more!

When you're going through shit - whether it be infertility or something else - you may not need or want advice. Just having someone to listen to you, to hold you while you cry and to stick by you counts for loads. Telling them how X overcame their infertility, unemployment or MH problems is often, just going to shut them down.

I am a MH social worker (nearly ;)) and the best advice I was ever given is to ask yourself "did the person ask for advice?" and actually no, most of the time, people ask for compassion and a listening ear. If someone asks you for advice, then give it but if they don't (and they probably haven't), then your role is to be a friend and listen and be there.

Candy that is absolutely wonderful advice

Thinking about it, the worst advice I was given was that being infertile was God's way of telling me to adopt as I'd be such a good parent for a damaged child. Quite obviously, this advice was not from an adoptive parent but from someone with several biological children conceived without problems. Having seriously looked into adoption at that stage, I did ask them if God went around making individual women infertile, why he didn't choose the people who would abuse/neglect their children. It didn't seem to make sense to inflict years of trauma on children and then make 'good parents' infertile to make up for it - surely they could be born to the 'good parents' in the first place. That shut them up.

Candycoated, think that is fab advice.

Bloody hell! That isn't just "advice", that is actually a very cruel comment

Love your name btw - fan of the jungle kitties?

What the friend in the OP said may be correct for a few people (as IKEA seems to prove), it is more the extrapolation that it is always that easy that is offensive. In other words, i do not think that people should necessarily hold back advice becuase the advice might just work for that person, but it should be done with an acknpwledgement that everyone's position is different and it does depend on the cause.
I had my DC by IVF/ICSI FWIW.

Angela you sound a fantastic colleague :)

Ikea ain't changing her mind by looks of it

kandy do you mean change my mind about what I believe helped me become pregnant or change my mind about sharing my experience with friends who are experiencing fertility issues?

Thanks Ohfour I did very much want an ocelot when I was a child & still think they are amazing. I got a tabby cat instead, which with hindsight was much better.

I think they meant it as a huge compliment. Which I suppose goes to show you can't always anticipate how what you say will be received.

YANBU I also hate when someone says/said "I just know you're going to have your baby" - No you fucking don't!!!

Thanks, Kandy. I talk far too much and eat too many of the communal biscuits, but I like to think I get the big things right.

I was coming to say YABU because it is silly to suggest that only people who have undergone IVF should be allowed to have an opinion about it, but your friend's "advice" was ignorant and insensitive.
My best friend and her husband cannot have biological children and are trying to adopt. She has lost count of the number of well-meaning people who have told her that as soon as she has an adopted child she will fall pregnant naturally.

Jeez, I hope there's nobody out there stupid enough to start the adoption process in the hope it will get them pregnant. Fortunately, they'll soon discover that the social workers want to be assured they are using contraception...

"Everything happens for a reason" and "stay positive and it will happen" are both very annoying too!

My favourite (worst) was said by someone who'd been through Ivf to get her child (her second go) - 'if it's meant to happen, it will happen'. I mean WTF is that meant to mean? Basically, I'm not meant to have a child??? It's not 'meant to be'??!

It's always the people who've had children already who assume it was "meant to happen" for them but not for someone else, isn't it?