Whitney and Spencer Blake really wanted a baby, and it just wasn't happening. With every thwarted attempt at becoming pregnant, the couple coped by posting "infertility announcements" in response to the myriad happy baby announcements on Facebook feeds.
How did you break the news that you were expecting? For celebs, it goes something like this. For the rest of us mere mortals, it comes down to an email or Facebook post. But that wouldn't cut for the Taylors.
For many couples struggling to conceive, undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF) is an intense, largely private experience. In order to shed some light on their journey, a St. Louis couple are undergoing the fertility treatment... on live TV.
When we think of gender inequality, we tend to think about careers rather than biology. But when it comes to fertility, women inevitably draw the short straw. While men have no worries when it comes to fathering, the clock shows no such mercy for women. For those whose marriages unravel before they manage to start a family, divorce carries with it a double edge sword. By the time they meet a new partner, such women may be too old to fall pregnant.
You'd be forgiven for thinking this headline was just another Jerry Springer doozie, but not so. An infertile mom was arrested for forcing her 14-year-old adopted daughter to conceive by artificial insemination (AI). According to the article in the Guardian, the girl was a virgin when she first miscarried then later delivered a baby at 16. Her adoptive mother was apparently so desperate for another child that she forced her daughter to inseminate herself with internet-bought sperm.
Though by rights old enough to be a grandfather, Tom Arnold (best known as ex-hubby to Roseanne) became a dad for the first time with wife Ashley Groussman.
According to an article in Huffington Post, after fertility treatments, Arnold is now the proud daddy of a boy named Jax Copeland.
We're having fewer babies these days. If birth rates are plummeting here as in the U.S., then it's because we're either having less sex, more abortions, or simply becoming more efficient at inhibiting the progress of those 'little swimmers.' Whatever the reason, if you're struggling to conceive, there are ways to boost sperm count.
Welcome news to the estimated 70 million couples who experience forms of infertility, with an estimated 50 percent of whom attributable to the male partner. Biology of Reproduction's Papers-in-Press announced that eating 75 grams of walnuts a day improves the "vitality, motility, and morphology of sperm in healthy men aged 21 to 35."
Some studies have speculated that the quality of sperm in industrialized nations has declined, due to factors like pollution, poor diet/lifestyle habits.
You love your friends, of course you do. You support them in any way you can. You throw a few bucks at their ubiquitous 5K runs and buy their daughters' Girl Guide cookies. You donate to charities that have touched their lives.
