Dr refusing fertility assistance as I'm still BF

[1940s]

My periods returned when I was EBF my 6 month old (first baby is 26 months old now)

I've had fairly regular cycles 30-41 days long and use OPKs and temperature check every month and see from that data set that I am ovulating.

But after a long time we're still not pregnant.

I breastfeed maybe once a day for a short feed and Dr said that it's definitely that which is stopping me falling pregnant and is refusing to help until I stop breastfeeding.

Surely the fact it looks like I'm ovulating is enough? She also said 'in Africa breastfeeding is a contraception'?! Lots and lots of women get pregnant if breastfeeding and their periods have returned!

Anyone faced similar feedback?

I got pregnant a month after stopping breastfeeding, my periods had long returned and I wasn't taking precautions. Your dr has a good point!

@Tiletiletile1 It's the Bourn Fertility Cinic in Cambridgeshire x

I’d be interested to know the Dr’s precise wording about ‘women in Africa’ so let’s not assume racist undertones or whatever. There is a very big different between ‘lots of women in the developing world who don’t have access to contraceptives use breastfeeding to try and avoid conception’ and ‘African women breastfeed as contraception’.

My doctor told me this too and I laughed and replied "i conceived two children whislt breastfeeding!". This is such BS advice.

Nobody is going to do any fertility investigations while you are bf.

End of.

It’s time and financially intensive. There’s just no point if you’re bf as stopping may solve the problem.

'If you had fertility struggles...'

Does 8 rounds of fertility treatment count as enough?

Seriously - you do not want to go down ANY kind of fertility investigation/treatment until you have to.

It is heartbreaking.

I would love to have been given the 'give up breastfeeding' option.

What your GP knows and you don't is that prolactin (produced when the body is still making milk) is not necessarily dependent on how often you are feeding. As well as this, prolactin inhibits both ovulation AND the development and maturity of eggs.

So even if you are ovulating, breast feeding may be preventing implantable eggs from releasing.

I hope for your sake you never need to know as much as I do about fertility.

Now you need to decide between bf and TTC. And see the doc again in a year if it hasn't happened:

Good luck
Good luck.

Oh my god OP, welcome to Mumsnet....
I can't believe some of the responses on here! Would you actually dare say this to OPs face if she was your friend in real life? Guess not. Then why say it on here....

OP, I totally get where you're coming from and I'm sorry you're struggling. I fell pregnant with no 2 when I was still breastfeeding. I'm actually appalled by the comments your GP made - any chance you can speak to another GP?

If you're temping and get a rise then you are ovulating, so that's not the issue. How long is your LP? Anything that could suggest potential progesterone deficiency eg LP on the shorter side...?
My second pregnancy didn't work out (tfmr at 14 weeks and I've since had 3 consecutive chemicals). I had to push my GP very very hard to get a referral for further tests which she has finally agreed today is the right step ahead. Since you're temping, I would suggest a progesterone test to be booked in 7-9 days after your ovulation. And don't let them fob you off with "we don't do them" or "come on day 21 of your cycle", go by your cycle and stand your ground. Again, if you can see another GP maybe try and get seen by them. Or if you can afford it, go private.
I really hope you will be taken serious soon and get some support.

Quote from the dr
' Stop breastfeeding'
'I didn't realise that breastfeeding with my other indicators that I think point to ovulation was a problem. (Or frankly I wouldn't have bothered asking GP)'
'Yes breastfeeding is the issue here, All the women in Africa use it as contraception'

I thought it was a crass and factually incorrect comment sweeping all women across an entire continent....and quite frankly also didn't have anything at all to do with my body and my circumstances.

BBT tracking while breastfeeding isn’t going to be at as reliable as when not. There’s a piece on fertility friend about it. It can work but getting decent charts relies on a block of about 4 hours sleep before you take your temperature and feeding hormones can affect it. I don’t have any experience of OPKs and haven’t temped since having DD. We’re not ttc so I’d like to go back to it for predicting my periods but haven’t bothered while still having broken sleep and feeding (a lot still in my case).

I'm not doing any night feeds and toddler has slept through with no feeds for about 8 months now so I'm hoping my temp charts are a reliable indicator of ovulation.

OP, clearly your GP's manner and approach here has rubbed you up the wrong way, and that's unfortunate. I'm worried that might be clouding the issue a bit for you, though - it sounds like you're focusing more on the crapness of the GP than on practical next steps.

If I were you, I'd get in touch with a fertility clinic, explain the situation and enquire about whether it's appropriate to begin any investigations now. I think you need to be prepared to be told that they can't assist until you stop breastfeeding, but they may feel they can do some aspects of those investigations beforehand. Either way, you'll know where you stand in that regard. Yes, this would have a cost associated with it - but in the grand scheme of the potential costs of infertility it's peanuts, and it would give you a little more control over the situation and enable you to make informed decisions.

I'm anticipating that my fertility clinic will expect me to stop breastfeeding before I can have an FET to try for #2, and this is likely to mean some trade-offs between when I'd ideally like to feed until, and when I'd realistically need to be pursuing treatment. I plan, though, to ask that certain investigations (like ultrasound to check in on how some known prior issues have fared post-pregnancy) be done before I commit to stopping feeding, because it would be a bit pants to do that and then learn that I couldn't go ahead with any treatment anyway.

@YouJustDoYou

My doctor told me this too and I laughed and replied "i conceived two children whislt breastfeeding!". This is such BS advice.

I feel so sorry for GPs sometimes. They must have to deal with so much of this ‘its my body so I know best’ nonsense. No one is saying you can’t get pregnant while breastfeeding!! Thousands of women do! But can you not understand that just because you personally got pregnant while breastfeeding, doesn’t mean that it isn’t scientific fact that it CAN interrupt fertility for many women?! Fair enough in your case to be cautious with contraception as you have first hand experience that it doesn’t stop conception for you, but telling the OP that it’s bs for the Dr to tell her to try stopping bf to see if it helps...well that’s completely unhelpful because she HASN’T got pregnant while breastfeeding.

And to the PP who insists that the OP is ovulating therefore the dr doesn’t know what they’re talking about-as another PP has pointed out, bf can affect fertility in other ways not just preventing ovulating.

Imagine having to sit all day listening to people who know far better than you despite zero medical training in most cases, and having to remain polite to someone jumping up and down that the NHS won’t find tests for something that she is actively choosing to impede.

OP I’m sorry things aren’t panning out for you like you hoped but you and the other posters who seem to think that it’s perfectly reasonable to expect the NHS to test you for infertility while you’re doing something with KNOWN potential to prevent conception....the mind boggles. I just hope you weren’t out clapping each week.

Listen to the poster who pointed out that even if you have tests, the only outcome whether they find an issue with you or not, will still be that you’re told to stop bf. So why on earth not try that as step one?! I understand, you want to be one of the women who falls pregnant while bf and it feels unfair, but you have to make a choice here. You could give up bf and still not get pregnant but at least you’d have ruled it out as the issue.

Good luck and I don’t mean to be blunt, but your posts do read a bit like someone going to the Dr and demanding help losing weight while refusing to stop eating chocolate every day. It’s a bit frustrating to read, but I’m sure you feel worse so I sympathise and wish you all the best.

I thought it was a crass and factually incorrect comment sweeping all women across an entire continent....and quite frankly also didn't have anything at all to do with my body and my circumstances.

I 100% agree with you here @1940s. I posted yesterday when you originally started the thread, and I still think that what the GP said to you was entirely unreasonable. It does sound like she didn't actually listen to what you had to say, however I do honestly believe that even if she had listened and taken what you were saying on board she would have still concluded that there wouldn't be anything they'd be willing to do without you stopping breastfeeding.

Everyone on here (even the rude ones) have listened to you, and the resounding response is that although breastfeeding may be a complete red herring it absolutely can't be ruled out. It could be affecting much more than just ovulation unfortunately, even if it does seem like you're breastfeeding a really insignificant amount.

By the sounds of it you're unlikely to get much further through the NHS if you're breastfeeding and also as you already have a child.

But if you are able to go down the private route then you can probably have a really good conversation with a private GP where you feel you have been heard and are then given advice you trust. Also if you feel tests would be helpful they'll be more inclined to do them if you're the one footing the bill.

Good luck with everything.

Oh my god OP, welcome to Mumsnet....
I can't believe some of the responses on here! Would you actually dare say this to OPs face if she was your friend in real life? Guess not. Then why say it on here....

Yes. O/p is breastfeeding. If she is to start with fertility investigations she needs to stop as that may be preventing conception, regardless of whether she is ovulating.

You wouldn’t expect someone to start fertility treatment if they were using condoms or had a coil placed. If there is something that is likely to be preventing pregnancy, in this case breastfeeding, that needs to be eliminated as a first step.

I really don’t get the issue, are gps busy and sometimes dismissive, yes! Welcome to the nhs!
Do you want to see if breastfeeding is hindering you conceiving- if yes then give up bf- if not, pay to go private but equally I think even with going private it’s a good idea to stop breastfeeding before laying out hundreds of pounds you may not need.

Hello, just wanted to share my experience, I was still breastfeeding my first baby of six months when we fell pregnant with our second. My periods had returned (although irregular) and my baby never had bottles but had begun to try 'solids' so your doctor is wrong. Breastfeeding can be used as a form of contraception (but it isn't reliable) if all the below factors are done together: periods haven't returned, baby is under six months, baby is exclusively breastfeeding and baby is still waking for night feeds. I would ask to speak to another doctor. Hope you manage to get some answers.

I think your GP could have been more helpful with this OP - and I write as someone who is very supportive of GPs (see username). I'm unsurprised as fertility and breastfeeding are two areas in which GP knowledge AND biases vary quite markedly between individual professionals.

I second the suggestions of other to go on to some of the relevant breastfeeding and fertility Facebook groups and seek advice and experience from other people in a similar position to you, with similar motivation to both breastfeed and attempt to conceive.

After that you can make a decision about whether to approach a private provider for initial assessments or not.

Thank you!

Christ on a bike, this thread is hugely frustrating.

I conceived dc2 while bf 10mo dc1. I know that my anecdata doesn't translate to a whole population however, so I know my pregnancy does not mean jack shit. Hth.

Whoops that “thank you” was supposed to be for frangipani13!

You need to stop breast-feeding! Yes, it isn't a reliable contraceptive people do fall pregnant while breast-feeding but it does prevent some women conceiving.
When your GP said that women in Africa use breast-feeding to prevent pregnancy, she was right. Hunter-gather women, for example, like the Dobe Kung, carry their babies bound to them all the time, so the infant is constantly nursing. Most Dobe Kung babies are born about 3-4 years apart. A big enough gap to have one baby to carry, while the older sibling can walk, vital if you live by gathering. Yes, you aren't constantly nursing, but the nursing hormones are still in your system and may be the thing stopping you conceiving.
I had to have IVF for my first child. In the tests, they found elevated levels of prolactin, one of the breast-feeding hormones, in my blood. I wasn't producing milk, and they found out it was linked to a benign tumor in my brain, but this slight elevation in prolactin not enough to even cause me to lactate was the first thing that needed to be addressed before I could even be considered for IVF.
I know you are frustrated, and I know what it is like to desperately want a child, but this is an easy step you can take. Your GP was being very reasonable, even if it wasn't what you wanted to hear.

When was the last time you spoke to your husband about this and what did he have to say? Did he have any suggestions or thoughts? Everything ok his end?

You could move your two year old on to other milk, which would most likely help, as it would most likely help. Are you a healthy weight? Is your husband?

Hop on to the does anyone feel failed by the NHS thread too and have a little read.

I should add to my message above that I live in the US, so the doctors here are VERY keen to get going on any intervention, and basically, if you ask for something (tests, whatever) you get it (because you are paying), but even in this context the doctor would not start infertility work before the breast-feeding chemicals were completely out of my system. I don't understand why you are resisting what is THE most sensible, the most reasonable advice from your GP?

It’s not 100% effective but both my grandmothers (one from the African continent fwiw) successfully used BF as contraception before other forms of contraception existed. Aunties too.

It does seem wrong to insist on fertility treatment without stopping BF as it does have an impact upon fertility. It’s not dissimilar to saying you need to stop using the pill/using condoms before insisting on IVF. You are doing something which doesn’t make conceiving impossible but it does make it less likely. If you want the treatment, stop.

I think your GP is being totally unreasonable. It would do no harm to do blood tests to see if you have actually ovulated and what other hormone levels are doing. Can you speak to another GP? The bit about contraception and breastfeeding is rubbish - midwives are at pains to dispel that myth!! I have fallen pregnant 11 times whilst breastfeeding (4 miscarriages) and tandem fed several times too. Some women are very sensitive to the hormone balance that controls ovulation but it's not unreasonable to expect investigation.