Don't blame the meds.

I went off the meds around before pregnancy (along with the pill), but back then I had a diagnosis of major depression, not bipolar, along with the rest, except the ADHD. By the time we started trying, I was taking all kinds of herbal stuff just to sleep & function, doing acupuncture.

I belonged to an online fertility forum and read so many moms posting about pregnancy, either wanting to conceive or horrified that they had conceived on psych meds.

Let me tell you, for the majority of those moms, it worked out just fine as far as ending up with healthy babies; I am not sure how they handled motherhood beyond that. There were moms on psych meds their entire pregnancies because sometimes the parents and OBs just have to make tough choices, and if a mom is doing risky, dangerous stuff, drinking, doing illegal drugs (self-medicating in a sense), that is likely to cause worse harm to the fetus. One mother with a due date very new my own stayed on some amount of Klonopin while pregnant and something else (but I can't remember if she was bipolar or had major depression). Her child came a little early, but she had high blood pressure issues (not psych med related) as well.

I wasn't diagnosed as bipolar when I started trying to conceive, but I'd been misdiagnosed, so yes, I was already bipolar. I was lucky and able to stay off psych meds most of my pregnancy, except the last month, I was on Zoloft and Xanax. After pregnancy, I was diagnosed with postpartum depression and talking it out, weighing the choices with H, we chose I breastfeed while taking Cymbalta, not recommended by any doc, for sure, but my daughter is no worse for wear.

My middle sister has 2 sons. Right between them, she had a miscarriage in the 2nd trimester (a girl). That whole pregnancy was tough. Bad numbers from the get go, hormone levels not increasing correctly, heartbeat not right. She did everything under the sun (this sister of mine & her husband are quite well off, so money was not a barrier). She wanted that baby so bad. She never even took psych meds. It just happened.

And with me, I was lucky, I got pregnant pretty much right when I started trying. Then, when H and I decided to go for #2, nothing. Every test was normal, and we didn't have money for fertility procedures. I was getting really bad mentally, worse than I'd been in the past (except not much anorexia issues at that time). I think I lasted 2, 3 months without any psych meds. Pdoc said go on them, I can think about stopping them if I should get pregnant. We never did get pregnant again. I wonder about the psych meds, but doubt it. I wonder if I shouldn't have used a copper IUD for birth control after my daughter, but I don't think that did it either. I wonder if I exercised too much after my first was born.

It was secondary infertility. It sucks, but it happens. The doctors don'tknow why.

But anyway, it was nothing you did and not the psych meds. Honestly, if women manage to have babies all hopped up on cocaine and other illegal drugs, psych meds are pretty tame in the big scheme of things.

You can PM me if you like. I don't remember too many exact pregnancy details; my daughter will be 11 in December, but if there is something you want to ask, I'm glad to help.

And a supportive spouse or significant other is an absolute must.