One in Six
Infertility is more common than you think—and far more complicated than we acknowledge. Let’s change that.
Weird question—do you feel like you’ve been seeing more orange this week? Maybe on social media, or you noticed a larger amount of people wearing orange on Wednesday than normal, or maybe you’ve even seen some buildings or city landmarks lit up orange.
If you have, you’ve been noticing National Infertility Awareness Week (NIAW), which takes place during April 20-26 this year. Established by RESOLVE in 1989, the goal of NIAW is to raise awareness of the reality and widespread experience of infertility while reducing stigma and barriers to fertility care access. The orange you see represents the official color of infertility awareness.
I don’t have a personal experience with infertility, but I’m a provider who serves clients navigating infertility and I care deeply about it. When you spend your days bearing witness to the ragged, visceral, disorienting grief of infertility, it’s hard not to.
As a result, I’ve made it my quest this week to use my little part of the internet and social circles to highlight the invisible struggle of infertility and say, “Hey, you matter and this issue matters.”
One of the reasons that infertility awareness matters is because when grief, loss of control, and profound overwhelm combine with isolation and social dismissal, our bodies can experience it as trauma.
If we can increase awareness, language, and social support for infertility (along with access to treatment and interventions!), we can decrease its traumatic nature. At least, that’s the goal.
So we start by defining infertility and describing how it impacts people.
Current data indicates that about 1 in 6 people (or 1 in 5 couples) experience infertility. Per the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, it's time to consult a fertility specialist if pregnancy hasn’t happened after a year of trying, or after six months for women 35 and older. If you already have particular diagnoses that may predispose you to fertility struggles (such as PCOS, endometriosis, or specific genetic disorders), you should go to a specialist sooner.
Infertility is sometimes officially diagnosed with a specific cause and related to one or both partners, or it may remain unexplained because there’s simply no clear medical reason why pregnancy and subsequent full-term gestation isn’t happening.
Some people experience infertility and never conceive without intervention. Some people experience infertility and reproductive loss together. Some people experience secondary infertility, meaning that they struggle with infertility after a previous successful pregnancy.
Infertility isn’t just one moment of disappointment, sequestered to the moment when you take a pregnancy test or when your menstrual bleed begins again. Instead, it ripples into holidays, doctor’s appointments, friends’ pregnancy announcements, baby showers, and comments from well-meaning or oblivious family members.
It is a multi-faceted experience of grief, sweeping into every aspect of life, impacting relationships, life goals, finances, and mental and physical health.
It can prompt you to feel distant from friends and family. People don’t know what to say, or they say the worst thing, or you may feel exhausted trying to explain to Aunt Susan why you and your partner still don’t have a baby.
It can impact your mental and emotional health, causing unexpected waves of sadness, anger, panic, or hopelessness.
It can have a profound effect on relationship satisfaction because when the goal of making a baby becomes the priority in the marriage bed, it impacts connection. To say the least.
Infertility may make you feel betrayed by your body because up till this point, you believed that your body was “supposed” to facilitate this conception and pregnancy thing without issue.
In the midst of an overall misunderstanding and lack of awareness about infertility, men’s experience of infertility and reproductive loss is particularly sidelined. There’s a weird myth, nefariously floating about the social milieu since the dawn of time, that infertility is a female issue. Women are consistently blamed for fertility issues, and it’s often assumed that women care more about having children than men.
So let’s just take a lil pause here - infertility sucks for everyone. But can you imagine the impact of consistently dismissing one particular partner’s pain within infertility? Implicitly inferring that one person’s struggle with infertility matters more than the other?
You guessed it—more trauma.
My clinical supervisor, Dr. Clay Brigance, specializes in infertility and reproductive loss and has dedicated countless hours of research, speaking, and writing to the impact of infertility on couples and on men, in particular. Last summer, he generously invited me to collaborate with him in a qualitative study on men’s experiences of infertility.
Societal norms often tie masculinity to fatherhood, leaving men struggling with infertility feeling isolated and inadequate. We were curious about whether internalized perspectives of masculinity impacted the emotional experiences of men who have navigated infertility.
Our study highlighted that societal views of masculinity make it even harder for them to process these feelings, often leading to guilt, suppressed emotions, and a sense of loss. Men often struggle with the belief that their masculinity is tied to their ability to conceive, and the pressure to prioritize their partner’s pain over their own further complicates their emotional journey. Infertility is not just a biological challenge for them—it's a deeply personal and identity-shaping experience.
Why does this matter?
Whenever there’s an internalized expectation or narrative that becomes shattered by real-life experiences, people experience distress. I wrote about this previously through the lens of the reproductive story, and this study is just another example.
If you’re among the 1 in 6 who have experienced infertility, I hope this National Infertility Awareness Week reminds you that your grief is real and you’re not alone.
On the other hand, if someone you love is going through infertility, I hope you feel more empowered to lean in with compassion, offer a listening ear, and show up with care.
Also, if I can be of any help to you, either for resources or questions on when or how to get support during reproductive struggles, please don’t hesitate to reach out! I’m always happy to chat and provide support in any way I can.
Disclaimer: This essay is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Reading or engaging with this content does not constitute therapy, nor should it be considered professional advice or a substitute for therapy. Everyone’s experiences are unique, so what’s shared here may or may not resonate with you. For more details, please review the full disclaimer on my About page before reading. To learn more about my clinical work, please click here.