Welcome friend! When I started on my journey to Trying To Conceive (TTC), as a reader, I went hunting for books. Let’s begin with the first and only book I read dedicated to TTC: The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant.
Comforting and intimate, this “girlfriend” guide to getting pregnant gets to the heart of all the emotional issues around having children—biological pressure, in-law pressures, greater social pressures—to support women who are considering getting pregnant.
The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant is a complete guide to getting pregnant—the medical, psychological, social, and sexual aspects, told in a straight-forward, funny, and compassionate manner, like talking to a good friend who’s been through it all. Jean Twenge covers everything you’ll be wondering about and advises what you can do at home, before getting a doctor involved.
Twenge explains how to prepare mentally and physically when thinking about having a child, how to talk about it with family, friends, and your partner, how to know when you’re ovulating, and when best to have sex, how to tilt the odds toward having a boy or a girl, how to handle the great sadness of a miscarriage, and what to do when you do get pregnant.
Trying to conceive often involves an enormous amount of emotion, from anxiety and utter disappointment to hope and joy. With comfort, humor, and straightforward advice, The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant is the bedside companion to help you through it.
The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant – Review
The main reason I picked up this book is because of the author, Jean M Twenge. In 2023, I was thrilled to get a review copy of her latest book, Generations: The Real Differences Between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents―and What They Mean for America’s Future (Goodreads). I had a wonderful time browsing the plethora of research in this 560 pager and discussing it with friends and family, looking at the people I know through the lens of their generations. When I saw The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant was written by her, I knew it was going to be exactly the book I needed. I know Jean’s work and I expected her to be thorough in her approach to conception. Also, the name is fantastic! While I never thought of myself as impatient, I am a planner and this book promised to be organized with the right tone of friendly advice. I read it in three days and I learned so much. I love this quote:
“The first time we’ve had an important goal we can’t make happen by working hard.”
The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant is divided into 11 chapters followed by 8 appendixes for extra information. It walks through everything. From the many ways that people arrive at TTC, whether one is getting off the birth control pill or other contraception, the kinds of supplements to take, things to incorporate in one’s diet, attitudes towards acupuncture and herbal medicines. There is so much to know and it’s not as easy as ‘stop taking the pill’ and ‘have a lot of sex’. I was in my early days of TTC when I started reading this book and the first chapter of ‘What To Do Before You Start Trying’ made me feel late to the party. But now that I had begun, it was time to keep going.
The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant gave me the vocabulary to approach TTC. It introduced the basics on ovulation and charting, the different ways, digital and analog for charting, statistics around age and fertility, the psychology of getting pregnant and how to handle the waiting period when no amount of sex can affect the outcome anymore.
“There is always a next time about 10 days away.”
With helpful tips on navigating disappointment and staying positive as every cycle is another chance, I liked that there were recommendations based on age for when to see a fertility specialist. Jean presented sensitive information around miscarriage and birth defects, letting me work through these hard situations with her guidance. She also talked about the research around how the sex of the baby may be chosen. At no point did I feel that Jean was telling me to do anything, that there was a right or wrong way to get pregnant faster. This book was an accumulation of all that she had read, heard, researched, learned, tried and tested. It was personal and enlightening.
I loved that Jean talked about the changes in attitude towards sex that can happen once couples are months into TTC and suggestions on how to keep Baby Dance fun. There was also data around IVF treatments. I loved that this book is serious but also fun with lots of information. I never felt overwhelmed as I read but I often found myself caught up by the statistics and how they applied to a person.
Once I finished, I felt a bit dazed. I won’t say it was the book though. It was the fact that I was TTC and this book gave me a holistic picture of what that would look like – the joys, the anticipation, the anxiety, the mental fortitude needed, the end goal I was striving for.
One of the first actions I took when I started this book was what to look for in a prenatal vitamin. With the numerous brands out there, each with its own composition of vitamins, there is no consistency at all. Jean gave a short list of minimum amounts for each nutrient, mineral, etc., and scouring the vitamins shelf with my husband, looking for the best one for me, is a memory I cherish. This was one of many moments and conversations we had because of this book, such as our stance of knowing the gender of the baby before birth, and our opinions on testing for birth defects and what the results would mean for us.
The Impatient Woman’s Guide to Getting Pregnant gave me the confidence to start to observe my body and try things while also having open dialogue with my husband about things I had never considered about conception and our pregnancy journey. In the vein of being written for the impatient woman, Jean shared 5 book recommendations at the end. That is where I discovered Taking Charge of Your Fertility, a book that blew my mind, but that is another review to be written and shared another day.
I highly recommend this book to anyone trying to conceive. Maybe you will see yourself in it like I did. Find it on Goodreads, your public library or wherever books are sold!
Also check out my review of It’s Not Hysteria: Everything You Need to Know About Your Reproductive Health by Karen Tang.
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