I want to share my journey to motherhood and hopefully help someone else who is feeling lost and overwhelmed like I did. I am not going to dive into my whole PCOS story here. I just want to share what actually ended up helping us conceive our daughter. Whether this will work for others I am not an expert but it is nice to know you are not alone. Maybe what I had to go through is something similar to what you may be going through right now.
TYPE OF PCOS
I have “lean PCOS.” So I have the cysts on my ovaries, irregular periods and slightly elevated testosterone levels. I have a normal BMI and have always been fairly active and ate healthy.
My partner and I have been trying to conceive naturally for years with no success. We weren’t dong anything crazy like tracking my ovulation but we weren’t using any precautions to not have a baby.
TESTING I HAD DONE
I had a feeling it would be hard for me to conceive with PCOS. I did see a fertility specialist who recommended me getting my tubes flushed to make sure there are no blockages. It’s called a Hysterosalpingogram (HSG). Some women will get pregnant after having this procedure done. That was not the case for me. We did try right after the procedure.
CHANGES I MADE
Next step was to try medication. I was reluctant to take medication – I held off and focused on being as healthy as I can. I focused on eating lots of protein in every meal. Honestly I started following this girl Olivia Adriance on instagram and started cooking a lot of her meals. She does gluten free, refined sugar free and high protein meals that tastes really good – check her out. My diet was definitely not perfect. I didn’t want to stress about what I ate all the time but I made sure to cut out all the really bad stuff. I also quit drinking alcohol and so did my partner. I did hot yoga as much as I had time for and walked a lot. I did go to the gym but was never super consistent.
Just being really honest here. Cutting out soda, candy, fast food and junk food was pretty easy for me to do. That does not mean I ate perfectly everyday and stayed consistent. I worked a 9-5 job Monday through Friday and it was very stressful. I couldn’t devote all my time to what went into my body. In case you are feeling that you have to be perfect – you don’t. Stressing about your diet is also not good for you. So give yourself some grace and do the best you can do.
SUPPLEMENTS I USED
I started taking my supplements religiously especially my prenatals. I used Ritual Prenatal’s. I’ve tried taking myo-inositol from three different companies. I took it religiously but never saw a difference in my cycles. I’ve took Magnesium Citrate at night before bed. I have tried countless other supplements but non of them showed any difference in my cycles.
MEDICATION I USED
At the end of 2024 around October is when I decided to give the medication a try. My fertility doctor recommended trying letrozole for three months. Letrozole is a medication that you take to induce ovulation. I started taking the medication in October as soon as I got my period. I was told to buy the Clear Blue Advanced Digital Ovulation Test Kit by my fertility doctor. It is the most accurate. I tried other brands and could never tell if it was working. This one has a smiley face and apparently it does really work.
So I took this medication for three months as instructed. You do have to plan out your intercourse which can be tricky. It was around the holidays for us and it made it very difficult to get it right. I would get the smiley face but some nights we really couldn’t make the time to have intercourse. I still thought we were close enough to when I would get the smiley face because they say as long as you have it around the day you ovulate you still have a chance.
Unfortunately, we just didn’t hit the mark on any of the three months. December 2024 was the last month for us to try and it still didn’t take. So we took a break in January. Next step was for my partner to get his sperm tested. That was scheduled in the beginning of February.
TAKING A BREAK FROM TTC
January 2025 was the month we took a break from trying to conceive. I got my period at the end of December 2024 and I still had some of the ovulation tests. I wanted to see if I ovulated without the medication so I took one at CD14 as usual. I got a smiley face which was exciting. We actually had intercourse the day before I got this and decided to try again that night and also the day after.
They say to take a pregnancy test 14 days after ovulation. I couldn’t wait and took a pregnancy test 13 days after. I was so shocked to see two pink lines. I messaged my doctor that day to get a blood test to be sure. I went that same day and the results came back positive. I told my partner after that because I wanted to be sure. I couldn’t believe it after years of trying we finally got pregnant.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I believe the medication helped kick start my body to ovulate. I don’t think I would have gotten pregnant if I didn’t take it. I am happy that I ended up getting pregnant while not taking the medication though. Im not a huge fan of pharmaceuticals but I can’t say they don’t help sometimes. I hope my story gives others hope or maybe answers some unanswerable questions. Leave a comment and let me know how your journey is going or share your thoughts.
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