Laura Rahel: Infertility- The Importance of Choosing the Right Partner

Infertility is hard. With a husband, it's hard. But when your single and living with infertility it opens up a whole new dimension of problems that don't exist if you're already married and living with infertility. (I would know, I've been both married and single during this long journey.)

For example, when do you tell a potential boyfriend, spouse about your infertility? How do you tell them? How do you deal with wanting a family, and not being able to have a family, when you don't have a partner to even think about overcoming those burdens with? How do you choose the right partner? There are a lot of factors that go into choosing the right partner when you're single and have infertility.

For me, even when I was single (not dating) it burdened me to think about all of these things. I got lucky in finding love with my best friend because he already knew my story. I didn't have to tell him. Though, surely we had to talk about it once we started talking about dating. Did we both want kids? How far were we each willing to go to have a family (are both of you on the same page about IVF, adoption, not having children, and other choices you may be faced with?)

Though we don't talk about children often (we will do the whole marriage thing before we make any real decisions,) it is something that I bring up on occasion. The last week has been one of those occasions, constantly. "Hey, hunny, you should give me a baby. That way I can put it in a cute little snow suit and we can have such fun during the winter." "Hey, babe. we should have lots of cute little kids. A whole bunch of them."

Usually his response is something funny like "Hunny, keeping kids in snowsuits would make it awfully hard to change their diapers when needed." Something that lets me know that we aren't worried about having (or making) kids right now, but that one day we will try. Something reassuring that lets me know that we are in this together. We want the same things and one day we will try to have those things.

These little conversations are sweet. And they let me know I'm safe. I know I've chosen the right partner. One who will be by my side if we don't have children. One who will be by my side if I want to try every single option of having a family once we are married. One who is by my side right now in the in between while we are neither married or trying. I know my heart is safe because I've chosen a partner who loves me (despite all of my quirks) and is making this journey with me.

And I remember what is was like to be single. Single with infertility. I remember how important choosing the right partner is. On this journey, there are plenty of obstacles. You'll have tenfold fewer if you choose the right partner.