Christmas survival tips for IVF ladies

Christmas is a time for giving thanks for what you have. But for Liz, who recently failed her third round of IVF, it can also be a reminder of what she doesn't have. The sharp-witted IVF blogger shares her expert advice on how infertile ladies can best enjoy the festive season - to be taken with a good pinch of salt and all the trimmings...

The Christmas season can be particularly hard for the babyless. All those rosy cheeked children on telly behaving adorably and fluffing their nativity lines just highlighting your childless state. So here is my guide to surviving Christmas...

Try aversion therapy

Visit Hamley’s or any other toy shop in the week before Christmas. Just stand for a moment, taking in the frazzelled parents, the screaming over-tired children, the mother struggling to get her off-road buggy through the doors, the persistant 'I WANT THAT ONE!!! NOW!!!' Yes, you want children, and yes, it is shit that you can’t get pregnant as easily as most, but sometimes - just sometimes - you can see the benefits of infertility.

Turn it into a game

No Christmas will pass without some clueless relative saying precisely the kind of thing that would normally have you in floods of tears. Whether it is 'Christmas is really for the children, isn’t it?' or 'I see Donna is pregnant again, that girl only needs to look at a man to get pregnant.' Award yourself a point for every faux pas. Compare points with your significant other and see who wins.  By the end of lunch you’ll be so keen for points you’ll be engineering your Aunty Judy into remarking 'You’re not getting any younger, you know...'

Do the wine glass shuffle

If you are in the midst of fertility treatments or in those two weeks between ovulation and the (inevitably negative) pregnancy test you might want to lay off the booze. However, doing so could well be misinterpreted as a sign that you are definitely pregnant and mean you spend the whole festive season under increased scrutiny. Instead, arrange a glass shuffle with your partner, casually placing your full glass down and picking up the half drunk one as he casually takes yours. It’ll mean he gets paralytic, drinking twice the volume of everyone else, but at least his drunken antics will distract the group from you.

Revel in it

If you are staying in a house with children over the Chritsmas season you will be woken up between 5am and 6am by the sounds of excited screams. You won’t be able to get back to sleep but, unlike their parents, you can still lie in bed and snooze/read for the next five hours. By the time you come downstairs for breakfast the children will be at the crying stage, their parents will be exhausted and you’ll be serene and rested. If you are going to be infertile at least take advantage of these fringe benefits.

Stay away from everyone else

Christmas with just the two of you is brilliant. I first tried it about four years ago and, leading up to the big day, was very worried that it would just feel like any old Sunday. But they are now our favourite types of Christmases, in fact - this year is the first time since that we’ve given in to our families' entreaties and agreed to spend Christmas with them. Together we’ve combined the best of each other’s Christmas traditions (stockings, buck's fizz from the moment we wake, digestive post-lunch walk), ditched the worse (turkey, ban on presents before lunch, the Queen’s speech), and made a few of our own (kedgeree for breakfast, jigsaw on the go). Of course, it is a bit late to change any plans this year, and next year we’ll all have babies anyway, right?

Since 2008 Liz has kept an online record of her quest to conceive on her blog Womb For Improvement. Read more from Liz at Womb4improvement.blogspot.com

• Read Jacqui Leigh's blog on the 10 things she hates about Christmas
• Tips for coping with fertility problems
• Liz examines clichés she relies on after IVF