Let's Talk about Physician Infertility

An anonymous reader recently posted a piece on fertility and medical education. She posed some important questions to this community of brilliant and inspiring physicians:

What your journey was like?

For those that balanced being supermom during residency, HOW?

For those physicians struggling with infertility, looking back, was it worth it? Will it be worth it for me?

What advice would you give young trainees for whom having children is a top priority in their lives just like medicine?

Let’s see if I can tackle some of these questions.

What your journey was like?

I started my EM residency planning on having a child during my training. I was ready to start my family. The FIRST day of my residency orientation I was singled out as the only married female in my class and instructed, in front of all my peers, that I would NOT get pregnant. I went home that day and told my husband that we would decidedly not be starting a family any time soon. I ended up getting a divorce at the end of my residency training, which put all attempts at child-bearing on hiatus.

When I married again, it was to