FRIDAY'S DIGEST: Fertility Facts, News and Views - Cancer Treatment and Fertility

Women of childbearing age and men battling cancer, will sadly find that their infertility is affected due to cancer treatment.

Cancer treatment can affect fertility in a number of ways although it largely depends on the age, type of medication used, type of cancer and target area for chemotherapy or radiation.

Infertility can be permanent or temporary although it can never be determined how soon it will be restored.

This is why women and men diagnosed with cancer have been preserving their fertility. Women are freezing embryos, having parts of their ovaries frozen or take a hormone which puts their ovaries into temporary menopause, while men are doing sperm banking, which simply involves collecting a sample of semen and freezing it.

I learnt as recently as yesterday, on a local newscast, that there seem to be a new drug that can be administered to women at the time of their cancer treatment, which also freezes the ovaries until cancer treatment is completed so that later when a woman decides to have children, her ovaries will be unaffected by her cancer treatment, making it possible and safe to conceive.

Apparently this finding is very new because I was not able to find any further information online. I will continue to check, so stay tuned for more on this.

The more we know.....








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NAMING REMORSE ANYONE??

As our struggles with infertility intensified, I began thinking that if we were ever given the privilege of having children, it would be appropriate to give them names with meanings signifying triumph over our long struggle with infertility. We began thinking of names with meaning such as triumph, gift of God etc., and was also very drawn to biblical characters who we read, had struggles with infertility.

Without knowing the meaning of Theodore, I became drawn to it because a couple on a popular daytime soap, who had struggles with infertility, named their son Theodore. I was drawn to this part of the storyline because at the time, with not many persons knowing of our struggles with infertility, and not many such stories out there to identify with, I quickly embrace this, as fiction as it was.

When we first became pregnant and learnt that we were having a girl, we decided to name our little girl SaraMarie. In the bible, Sarah, Abraham’s wife had struggles conceiving and eventually bore a son  Isaac. (Genesis 21 NIV).  I remember someone asked me what name I would give our baby and when I told them the name, they said to me, why would you give a child a name synonymous with such hardship? I said to her, yes it signifies hardship but the greater meaning in this story was the fact that out of that hardship came triumph, the birth of Isaac, now is there a better story? Sadly we lost that baby, but she still remain fondly in our hearts, our precious SaraMarie, our first miracle.

When we became pregnant with our son, we knew very soon that we wanted his name to mean divine gift or gift of God because after such intense infertility struggles the birth of a child for us, would be nothing short of Gods graciousness. It was then we found out that Theodore meant gift of God and found also that Matthew meant that as well. We chose Theodore because it was not a common name being given to boys and it is also a very strong name which we also wanted for him, and Theodore it was, amidst disapproval from a few family members.

Sometime after this, we were out when some children began asking us what our son’s name was. When we told them they looked at us and chuckled. Is he named after the movie Alvin and the Chipmunks? they asked (That movie was recently released at the time). My heart sank, and I felt awkward and even some remorse, thinking that this might be the beginning of hard times from his peers because of his name. I was quickly cheered up though when I remember the reason we chose that name for our son.

We are still trying to find the meaning of our daughter’s name LeeAnna, and have not been successful so far. What we do know already is that Lee means meadow or clearing and so we might have to just separate the names and use their separate meanings. However that turns out we love this name dearly. It is my name in part (Annetta Lee), and so I do not think we will have any naming remorse as a result.

So this is our naming story. How about yours, are you still happy with the names you have chosen for your children. According to a recent report, some parents are having naming remorse, how about you? 

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ANGER AND INFERTILITY

Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.

Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows in a warrior’s hand

Psalm 127: 3 & 4

"HOPE MAKES ALL THE DIFFERENCE"

Infertility made me angry and sometimes I just could not deal with the fact that I was so angry. I was most times angry at God, for giving me the cross of infertility to carry. I was also angry at him because he made women with nurturing qualities and then this is frustrated because that which we need to nurture is being withheld from us. Why was he taking so long to fix this, when I was so earnestly praying to him and he can fix things with just the flick of a finger.

I was angry because so many things in my daily travail of life, reminded me of what I wanted so much, a baby, a family of my own.


But, is all this anger and stress good for our trying to conceive efforts? No, they are not, they just add to the problem, because the body needs to be a healthy place to conceive and grow our precious little ones. I knew this, I knew this so much, but I just could not help how I was feeling.


I remember when I was at (what I believe was the darkest point in my struggles), a conflict arose in my family(largely due to frustration from my struggles with infertility) and I strongly believe it was this conflict that is responsible for the birth of my son. My family finally found out about the pain I was in for so long, and could not talk to them about it, and this was a great part of the stress that I was experiencing. I could not deal with the fact that I had such a loving family, so close to me, yet was struggling alone.

This took a great big load off my shoulders and I was finally able to exhale. I was finally able to release a big part of the stress I was facing, because those who I love most, could now understand and support me as I so deserved. I became pregnant very shortly, and after a miscarriage, became pregnant soon after again, and subsequently, gave birth to a healthy beautiful son.

Anger and stress, as a result of infertility is understandable, but we should remember that they can further delay the arrival of what we want so much, a child and so, (as difficult as this may be ), we should try to remember this. Take some time to exhale then, scream if you want to, cry, whatever it takes to lessen some if this anger and stress at times.


I am finding now that when I write on issues that has to do with the emotional struggles of infertility, on my blog, I still find a little bit of anger creeping in. I guess after being angry for the better part of a decade, it takes time to get over it, even though I am not sure that I will completely be rid of it, because when I think back at the pain I was in, and what I was subjected to as a result of infertility, I must admit, there is still a little anger there, but this often vanish with just one glimpse of my son.


Whenever I read some of the posts of my fellow bloggers who are currently struggling with infertility, and see the anger that is there, I understand all too well and my heart goes out to them even more.


Here is a post from a fellow blogger who speaks on this issue as well, and please find a link at the bottom of her post, which speaks about anger and infertility.


http://infertility-fertility.blogspot.com/2010/04/infertility-makes-you-angry.html

Be encouraged, therefore and until next time, keep clinging to hop