I was so certain that we would conceive right away. I ate all of the "right" foods and refrained from drinking any alcohol. I read What to Expect When You are Expecting and did everything that a pregnant woman is supposed to do. I told all of my family and friends that we were "trying." I fully expected to announce our pregnancy any day.

When I failed to get pregnant the first month, I told myself that it was probably a good thing because my body needed to fully flush out the birth control pills. When I wasn't pregnant the second month, I was disappointed, but I hoped that month three would be the charm. It wasn't.

As months 4 and 5 brought disappointment, we were into the holiday season. I kept thinking that Christmas would bring me the "best Christmas present ever," but it didn't. When my in-laws poured wine for all of us to make a toast, they asked if it was okay for me to drink wine. I said, "Yes, unfortunately."

I did not wake up one day knowing that I was infertile. Instead, it was like a dawning awareness - a sickening realization that tugged at the back of my mind but that I kept resisting.

My sister and my mother had both become pregnant quickly. My aunt was known for her fertility. We had a funny family story about my Catholic aunt challenging her priest about her use of birth control. The priest asked her if she was prepared to stand before God and justify her "sin" of using birth control. She said, "YES, I AM!" and went on about how God would need to rain down the money to pay for all of these children if she stopped using birth control because she was so fertile.

There was no family history of infertility and, therefore, no reason to believe that I was infertile. But then why did I still have an empty womb?

When I returned to work after the holidays, I confided in a friend that I feared my husband and I might have an infertility problem. She had recently become pregnant, so on her next visit to her OB-GYN, she asked how long somebody had to try to conceive before he would screen for infertility. He told her that 6 months was long enough, and she passed that information along to me.

Related Topics:

• Beyond Barren: Perceptions of Female Infertility Through Time
• First Things First