2014 National Infertility Awareness Week

Yesterday began the 2014 National Infertility Awareness Week.
This year's theme is Resolve to know More.

While I appreciate that this year's theme is to educate yourself and others, I'm not really feeling connected to this. With me being outspoken about our infertility struggles, I'm wondering why I'm not feeling connected to the theme.

I think the main reason I'm not connected to this theme is that I do this all the time. My behaviors are not going to change one bit this week just because it's NIAW. I do this all the time. I don't ever hide the fact that we needed fertility treatments to conceive our children. I try not to allow comments laden with misinformation to go unaddressed. I try to educate as much as I can. Is the root of infertility female, male or both? Were there medical issues in one's past that are the direct reason for today's infertility (cancer as a child that required chemo and radiation that one knew would affect future fertility)? Is this primary, secondary or secondary after primary infertility? Depending on what each individual's situation is, it requires a completely different set of infertility awareness that needs to be shared.

Also, just because two people are going through infertility with the same set of circumstances, it doesn't mean that what each individual (or couple if in a relationship) needs is the same. I may need people to just let me talk, where others may want their support system to ask them questions so they don't have to always be the one to bring up the topic of infertility.

I guess what I'm getting at is that there is no one thing, no one set of facts, no one set of "this is what I need my support system to do" list that I can really share. What I can do is resolve to keep doing what I've been doing. Share what I know, acknowledging that is is truly my own unique experience, listen to others who are struggling with infertility, and correct misinformation whenever I hear it.