Taking the Two-Week Wait Challenge

When you’re trying to conceive, the two-week wait can be brutal. Brutal. And I would know — I had three years of ’em. Whether you’re trying the old-fashioned way or are using science or other means to up your odds, getting from ovulation to that magical time when you can pee on a stick can seem like an eternity of back-to-back moments of “what if?” “I wonder” and “Oh, just try not to think about it …” (Yeah, right!).

Which is exactly why Lindsay Fischer decided to create her book The Two Week Wait Challenge: A Sassy’s Girl’s Guide to Surviving the TWW. And I think it’s pretty brilliant.

Funny and full of lots of self love, The Two Week Wait Challenge is a humorous guide for women trying to conceive. Fischer, who is embarking on IVF, writes from personal experience as she prescribes a daily self-care challenge for each day of your two-week wait. In a very Course in Miracles kinda way, each day of the challenge you have a reading to reflect on, an affirmation to repeat and a to-do. From removing negative people on your Facebook page to meditating to cooking a new healthy recipe, each daily challenge gently and thoughtfully helps you to bring your focus back around to you and your mental and physical health — instead of spiraling in the “what ifs” or “what nots.”

The book contains Fischer’s personal story and experience, along with lots of space for note-taking and daily reflection. There’s even an infertility dictionary with commonly used acronyms — a must for anyone who’s ever stumbled up on a discussion board about infertility and wondered what the heck they were talking about.

Above all though, it’s the tone of the whole book that makes it really stand out. Fischer is fun, fiesty and isn’t afraid to tell it like it is. (Because, yes, sometimes TTC just SUCKS.) But she does it in a way that’s like your best friend giving you a hug — and giving you concrete tools to help you better get through that two-week wait, one self-accepting day at a time.

How do you get through the two-week wait? I had been using all of these tips and tools that I blogged about before I had Gwen, but now that we’re trying for baby no. 2, this book couldn’t have arrived in my inbox at a better time! —Jenn