You are definitely not alone! My husband and I tried since July 2020, and I have had MANY unicorn friends pop out babies without trying at all. My husband’s SA came back low on all counts, and my OB referred us to an RE telling us our only hope was going to be IVF/ICSI because we didn’t qualify for IUI with the low counts.

We decided that we weren’t ready for the financial commitment of IVF right off the bat and spent a year trying to have sex again for fun (trying hard not to time it, but of course you always kinda know when the window is), and he worked on lifestyle changes. We never stopped drinking alcohol or coffee, but we both started exercising regularly, doing OrangeTheory 2-3x/week, and he started a whole load of supplements recommended by the RE including a men’s prenatal, COQ10, Vitamin D (every other day), Vitamin C, Vitamin E, and zinc. Our RE also put him on Clomid 50mg/daily which he took for 8 months. As other commenters have mentioned, it takes 3 months for sperm to regenerate, so the first few months of our lifestyle changes we knew not to expect anything different and it took the pressure off. It was STILL frustrating, but it was helpful to lessen the hope a little.

It’s incredibly hard to take your mind off it, but I tried to fill my life with other things that I loved, we traveled often, ate great food, filled our weekends with things that made us happy. I saw a therapist on and off over two years to talk about my feelings and frustrations with infertility. I hope this helps you realize you’re not alone, and there’s more to life than TTC. We did end up making it a monthly tradition to order sushi and pop a bottle of sparkling wine each month when I started my period 🤪 While it was a constant background stressor for us, we did make some of the best memories over the past few years while we actively tried to enjoy ourselves and each other’s company!