The corona crisis is messing up our lives in many ways. The pandemic can even influence the desire to have children, as these women tell the "Dailymail".
The current corona pandemic has presented the world with a great challenge. Public life has been standing still for a year. Home office, contact restrictions and one lockdown after the next determine our lives. Quite a few of us are currently struggling with mental problems, feeling insecure and eagerly waiting for things to improve.
But the pandemic does not only limit us in terms of our current life, as the stories of these young women show. It also determines the future – at least as far as a child's wishes and thus the course of further life are concerned.
Typically around 6,000 cycles of IVF, or artificial insemination, are produced in the UK. With the start of the pandemic in the spring of last year, all private clinics had to close – the staff was needed in intensive care units to fight the virus. Katie, Laura and Lucy * explain the effects this measure has on many women’s desire to have children.
Katie Glass (39) from Cornwall
No artificial insemination and no wedding
Katie says that a child's original wish was that of her ex-fiancé. At the age of 39, however, Katie also questions how, when and whether she will ever have the chance of having a child again.
For two years Katie and her partner have tried in vain to realize their desire to have a family of their own. As Katie's got older, the two decided to take the path of artificial insemination – after all, time doesn't stand still.
Registered in a private clinic in order to avoid waiting times, the 39-year-old began to take appropriate medication before the corona wave. With the start of the lockdown, however, she could no longer attend her follow-up appointments in the clinic. The real problem was yet to come. Katie broke up with her partner, not because of a lack of love, but because of the stress, worries and fear of the future.
Sometimes I imagine what it is like to see my ex again with a happy family. And I gambled away the chance of a future together with offspring …
Hoping for a new man seemed hopeless. The lockdown makes it impossible to meet a partner, let alone get to know them – sex and intimate moments? Nothing. Nevertheless, the Englishwoman does not give up her desire to have children.
There are other ways to become a mother. A close, gay friend and I can imagine artificial insemination together.
Katie is also considering adoption. She wants to give her love to a child who has had a difficult start in life. However, this is currently not possible either – because an adoption cannot be concluded without a face-to-face meeting.
Laura Barton (43) from Kent
When the options run out
After four years, Laura separated from her partner. The reason: a large number of miscarriages and an age that makes it impossible to wait any longer. But giving up the desire to have children was not an option for the 43-year-old. She applied for artificial insemination using a sperm donor – alone. This was not possible in her local clinic, which is why Laura decided to visit a fertility center in Crete. But then the shock:
The artificial insemination did not work. I was devastated.
Giving up wasn't an option for Laura. Back in the UK, she wanted to have another IVF treatment. But the lockdown did not stop at the fertility centers either, places were limited to a minimum.
It is a fact that the number and quality of our egg cells decrease significantly with age.
Laura has been on a waiting list at a London fertility center since April, trembles and hopes to finally realize her dream of having a child.
Lucy Holden (30) from Bath
With the lockdown came the separation
Lucy and her ex-partner had big plans. First get married, then father three children and move to the sea. Even the names were already fixed – it should be Margot, Olive, and a boy. But then came the separation of the two, painful, cold and destroyed the dream of family happiness. The reason? In lockdown, her husband showed hidden sides.
Jealousy had turned love into hate. A spiral of desperation settled in my life and changed my future.
The 30-year-old returned to her parents' house. But the loneliness of the isolation tore Lucy apart, and two couples of friends announced that they would have a pregnancy. She felt like she had stopped on the path of life while her friends began a new chapter.
Grief and frustration drove her to see dating as the solution to the unbearable emptiness in her life. But the plan failed and only showed her how much she regretted her breakup and compared every date with her ex. She knew that she was ignoring the negative aspects of her ex-partner.
The rose-tinted glasses that I didn't want to take off when my relationship went down the drain are shattered. I feel strong now for leaving.
The Englishwoman now appreciates being alone, accepts being single and has recognized that wrong relationships take more from you than they can ever give. She knows that she has enough time to wait for the "right one" and to fulfill her future dreams with him.
Would you like to know more about women? You can find all the background to the stories at Dailymail.
* Names have been changed