Family and friends can be the most marvellous support during fertility treatment. They can offer a shoulder to cry on and good, sound advice but every so often one of them can produce the most amazing ‘clanger’? It’s not that they don’t want to help or mean to offend, but the comments hurt none the less.

So what should you NOT say to someone during fertility treatment?

"I know of someone who found out she was pregnant right before they started their IVF" – I’m here, now, doing this cycle, knowing that someone else made it happen without doing IVF is really not helping me now.

"Never mind, if it doesn’t work, I know of someone who conceived naturally after 5 failed cycles" – that one really doesn’t help! I’m going through a cycle right now and I need to focus on the positive effect this might have on my life.

"You must be having lots of fun trying!" – Actually there's almost no sex involved. The drugs have dried up all vaginal fluid, given me sore boobs, a bruised thigh (or stomach), hormones rage around my body and I’m under a huge emotional strain - there's not much 'fun' in it! The sexiest it gets is an empty room at the clinic and a small plastic pot.

"Don't you feel like you are playing god" – When someone we love gets cancer we don’t ask if treating it is questioning god’s will, so why should we raise this question treating infertility?

"What are you getting so stressed about? It’s only IVF" – Infertility has permeated right through me and every aspect of my life, including my relationship with my partner. It is at least as stressful as other major life changes such as divorce, moving house or changing jobs, so please don’t tell me it’s only IVF.

"Oh I could never do that" – aren’t you lucky you don’t have too!

"What will you do if this doesn’t work?" – Please can we try to be positive!
"Just think this time next year you’ll have a baby" – well maybe not that positive, it puts me under a lot of pressure you know.

Being flippant about how easy it is for you to get pregnant isn't really helpful when we're in the middle of paying a fortune to be injected with hormones that make us feel awful, then having invasive procedures, not knowing if this will be successful. Please keep your pregnancy stories to yourself until we're pregnant too.

And from the person with a child already and is trying for their second "It’s worse for me because I know there’s nothing wrong with me" – Thanks for the confidence boost, would you like to tell me I look awful while you’re at it?

Don’t call everyday with a "how’s it all going then?" – When I want to talk about it I’ll tell you. This is too much pressure.

"Silence is Golden"– it is truly heartbreaking when those who know what is going on appear to avoid you and don't even ask how you are.

"Don't be so touchy" – I’m on an overdose of hormones, of course I’m touchy!

"Don’t worry, you'll be fine"- Have you listened to anything I’ve just said?
When it doesn’t work

"You could always adopt" – that's not really the point and the local authority doesn’t hand children out like sweets you know.

"So what did you do wrong?" – I’m under enough pressure without thinking that this is my fault (actually I probably do think it’s my fault, but I don’t need anyone to add to that feeling).

"But you did say that you weren't 100% sure about wanting children" – I did try to explain that was just a cover in the early days when things didn't quite seem right but we weren't aware of our diagnosis.

"There is more to life than children" - that may well be true but at the moment it really does not feel like it for us

Well my advice is to stick to the basics.

"How are you?" – Much better than ‘how’s the IVF going’ which is a very directional question. Sometimes we don’t want to talk IVF and ‘how are you’ gives us the option.

"Is there anything I can do?" – Careful about the tone here, you could sound flippant. There probably isn’t anything you can do but it’s nice to have the offer.

"Can I get you a glass of drink" – IVF is really dehydrating and there is a growing body of evidence that drinking lots of water and at least some milk can help. Besides it’s no good offering tea or coffee as many of us give it up while in treatment.

"Can I get you some tissues?" – IVF is emotional in itself, and with the added hormones running round the system we are almost certain to cry at some point.

"Hug?" – my personal favourite!

But lets face you are probably reading this because you have had or are about to have IVF, you know better than anyone else the things you do and don’t want to hear, it’s your family and friends who might not. So my advice to you is to talk to these people calmly and rationally before your next cycle and explain to them the things you really don’t want to hear and tell them the reasons why. And if you really can’t bear to do that then print out this article and ask them to read it.

Many thanks to all my good ‘fertility friends’ who helped me out with quotes for this article.