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The Groups
The I Word
There are very few occasions where we get to talk about infertility out in the non blog world. I mean sure, if you got a group of us together we would certainly be talking about it, but chances are you aren’t having coffee with your non-virtual friends and spending the entire time debating the strength of follicle stimulating hormones. (high five to you if you are!)
One of my favorite bloggers, Pamela Jeanne of Coming2Terms, has always been very outspoken and brilliantly honest about her infertility. She is now about to celebrate a significant birthday and she and her husband have made the very painful choice to stop trying to conceive. After over a decade of trying, people. I mean holy FUCK, right? And if that wasn’t enough, this week she was featured in the New York Times talking about her struggles, her journey, her thought process, her acceptance, her pain. The article has sparked some very interesting (& sometimes hurtful) comments both on the NYTimes site and PJ’sblog.
Please take a moment to read the article and support her as she wades through a very public conversation about something that is usually very private. Mad props to the woman!
While you are thinking about PJ’s coolness, why don’t you also ponder about other people that have inspired you in a public way. Authors, musicians, actors…who has been public about their infertility struggles? Who has erased some of the shame?
Mel is now accepting nominations for the first ever A.L.I. Awards (ALI= Adoption, Loss, Infertility). She wants to know what books or movies have featured positive and/or real portrayals of A.L.I. Take a moment to think and then go nominate. You don’t have to have an answer for ever category (there are 11).
It is in the spirit of both Mel & Pamela Jeanne that I wanted to create a new warm fuzzy badge that we can give out to blog friends when they have helped us out or helped us through a dark place, a hard place or an impossible place.
I am giving this to every member of The IVP and every person that hired me to design a header and every person that listed something or bought something on the UTERUS auctions and all the people that donated directly either with money or kindness.
Who has helped you today or this week or this month? Let them know!
Starting the talks. Again.
I have written before about my various talks and conversations with GM concerning assisted reproduction and how I am all up in it. I haven’t spoken to her about it really since the unpregnancy in the winter. But lately I have been bringing it up. Some days she is incredibly geeked out to hear about the science aspect and some days she really wants to hear about the sperm donor (the perk have having no in-laws is always her favorite thing). Most days she just wants to know if I will have a girl. Those are sweet, sweet days.
Since I will be leaving again in a month or so for several days I am bumping up the frequency of the talks. It is actually probably more for my own mental state than hers. It’s not like I am all, “baby this” or “embryo that”, but if there is a way to gently weave it into a conversation I do. She seldom retains anything in her colander of a short term memory. But sometimes she does retain and if I begin a conversation, usually with something as simple as, “When I go up north in a few weeks”, she will finish it with, “you will see the baby doctor.”
It was with the spirit of keeping the concept at the front of her mind that I recorded the Discovery Health’s special Quads with 2 Moms. Obviously I was really interested to see how the hell that happened and what sort of crazy ladies could endure it. But I was really hoping that there would be some good scenes talking about IVF and assisted reproduction.
So this morning I loaded GM up with some good coffee and a bowl of chocolate cereal (something she gets if her hands are working well) and we began the show. She was, for the most part, totally into it. First of all the two women, a very sweet married couple named Karen and Martha, weren’t portrayed as multiple seeking crazies. Not to say that women with multiples are crazy. Hell no, I am not saying that. But you have to know the women I am talking about- you know the “I’ve got 30 follicles on clomid & I am totally going to have that IUI!” or the “I’m putting back 10 embryos and if they all stay then that is what Jesus wants!” Those women.
I found both Karen and Martha very likable and above all else, relateable. Here was a couple that had tried and tried and tried and endured failures and miscarriages. They knew they had one more shot of having a child together and then that would be the end of their journey. I think many of us know that anxiety, that hope.
I hope I am not spoiling it for anyone when I say that they used Martha’s eggs, the same sperm donor, and had two five day blasts transferred on the same day. Meaning Martha got two embryos and Karen got two embryos. They were gambling, but based on their reproductive history they were not too hopeful. So when they both got pregnant it was something they had not prepared for. Then they discovered that they were both carrying twins. Insane!
I think the hardest part of the show was watching Martha go in for her delivery at one hospital and two days later Karen went into delivery at another hospital twenty minutes away. That’s right, because they are not covered by the same insurance, they could not be together for the birth of the 2nd set of twins. I can’t imagine going through that.
GM and I talked throughout the show. I was able to explain what things I would be going through and what things were unique to Karen and Martha. At one point there was a bit of confusion as GM thought that I would have the same sperm donor. As if there was only one donor for everyone to use.
Overall I found the show to be a really good glimpse into a healthy marriage with some crazy sauce (4 babies!!) thrown in. I think even younger kids would benefit from watching some parts of it.
Did any of you guys check it out? What did you think?
When your past visits you.
Something happened this weekend that brought me swiftly back to a specific time in my life. It was just a little story on the news, but instantly I was back in my old life circa 1997-2002. Last night I had vivid dreams about picking up dry cleaning and firing actresses. I woke up with deep, deep anxiety. Seriously I was all in a sweat and my heart was racing.
I have had stupid dreams about my old life out west often, but usually the sick feeling will sort stay with me for several hours. This morning I am proud to say that I woke up, acknowledged the anxiety and then just told myself the truth: that is not my life anymore. It will never be my life again. I have moved on.
One of the sick and fucked up things about infertility is that you can never really escape your past. Each active cycle has residual emotions from a previous cycle. And then I imagine that even once you get pregnant there is still the dirt and grime clinging to you, that ick and fear of waiting for the shit storm that that you are all too familiar with to happen. I wonder if having an actual child after infertility is like the biggest mind blow. Are you suddenly free or do you feel like at any moment it could all be over?
When I was briefly pregnant in late December, early January I was miserable. Honestly. Not physically. But mentally I was completely in a constant state of dread. I knew that if something horrible happened that it would be unlike any horrible I had ever known. A specific emotion that I had witnessed in friends and loved ones, but never really walked through.
And I could beat myself up about it. I am really damn good at self blame. Maybe in my darkest, quiet moments there is still a little part of me that thinks that my doubts made me unpregnant. But I don’t really think I did something. I think shit happens. And it sucks ass when it does.
This weekend I was talking to Sarah about some mirroring personal attitude changes that we both have been working on. She told me about a book that had helped her with her internal shift. I am going to nudge her to blog about it because she is so beautifully eloquent on the subject. But during one of our rapid fire e-mails I told her that I had finally really turned a corner on my depression. I mean sure the medication helps, maybe it even saved me, but I think it also got me to a place where I could evaluate. Elevate.
Things I have let go:
my old job out west
my inability to win lost friendships back
body hating (ok, totally a work in progress, but when I say I have a fat ass I do it with MUCH more love)
and…big shocker (at least to me): infertility
The personal statement that is rocking my world right now: I can’t change the things that can’t be changed.
I shared this with Mother late last night and she reminded me of the Serenity Prayer and something else clicked. Hating on myself, being suffocated by depression, wallowing in the misery of infertility- those were addictions for me. I was (am) addicted to the sadness. It is comforting and familiar and easy to hid in. It doesn’t push me or challenge me, it keeps me anchored down.
So I am going to be working on letting it all go. I can’t change so much, but I can change how I deal with it.
What are you letting go? How can we help each other?
Move over Gloria Gaynor!
Thanks to The Shins I have a new personal infertility anthem in, “It’s ok, Try Again.” Yes. You will love it. Pinkie Swear.
(sorry had a link problem for a minute)
Passing along a must read
Bleu posted a link to an great read on her blog today. I clicked over and was thrilled to find something that I think anyone that has struggled with (in)fertility would embrace. The name of the article? ‘Support Your Local Infertile.’ Says it all, doesn’t it?
Of course I don’t mean us bloggy people, but I know that through the course of years full of struggles and treatments and failures there have been moments of hurt feelings. Because, let’s face it, NOT getting pregnant when you so so so want to sucks a giant fat turd. And our friends want to support us through it (& if they don’t well isn’t that telling?) but many times they haven’t a clue what we are going through inside or out.
In the 3 years that I have been trying I, as I am sure many of you have as well, have become a bit of an expert on reproduction. There is all sorts of shit that I didn’t learn in 8th grade biology class. Why did we spend so much time on urban legends and things never to do with a glass coke bottle? You’d think an all-girls school would be more with it on the cycle situation. We had fricken wicker baskets of tampons in the bathrooms, for period’s sake!
If your friends are anything like mine they are actually really interested in what you are up to. They want to know what the drugs do, what the procedures are like, and it is sort of comforting in being able to share the information with someone that has no clue. Not that dishing with the interpeeps isn’t great, but isn’t it fun to tell someone about lupron? Or explain cervical mucas? I live for that.
However, so many times we get annoyed when a friend doesn’t say the right thing or respond the right way. There is no right way. See? Don’t they get that every day we need something different? That has got to be annoying as hell. Being a F.I.P. (friend of infertile person) is a tough job and this article is a great place to start.
My favorite bit: “Hope lives outside of logic. Both hope and the lack of hope have a purpose in our process, and you can support your friend by accepting that.”
The Dog Years of (in)Fertility
It is an established fact that due to the actual lifespan of a dog versus the lifespan of a human a typical dog’s year actually ages him more than a typical human year. The most common arithmetic applied is a number multiplied by seven. As in Fido is two, but in “dog years” he is 14.
Recently dog experts have snubbed their wet noses at the number seven saying that it is actually a bit higher. They claim that the early months and years may age the dog more than the latter years. I feel that the opposite can be said for infertility.
Today marks my three year anniversary of trying to conceive. The traditional gift to mark such an occasion would be something leather. Let me know if you need my zip code…
Early on, my adventures of trying to get knocked up were almost whimsical and giddy. Oh the fun of shopping for sperm and joining message boards! The excitement of buying my first basal thermometer, the thrill of charting! I actually brought in my first positive opk to my RE like it was something I had won from a carnival. Then there was the giddiness of the first time I had a date with the wand which led to my first time seeing my ovaries. There were the appointments where I actually planned my outfits the night before. The cycles where I got moon-eyed over estimated dude dates. Oh! I could have a virgo baby!!
And then, at some point, the process began to age me. In trying to pinpoint when that was I created a chart of things I have waded through during my three year quest to have a child. By the way, I mark this based on my first IUI. So in theory this has been a bit longer than 3 years, but I am trying to be tidy here. I spoke to a couple other soldiers in the baby battle to see if they felt that infertility wounds had aged them and by how much.
Most feel that the process has aged them anywhere from a decade to a few years. I think it is the constant exhausting cycle of hope dashed by the crippling effects of failure. Rinse, repeat. Infertility is Einstein’s concept of insanity realized: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Oh sure we change things around. New protocols, new drugs, new RE’s, new sperm, new eggs, new year…but ultimately we all bravely push forward and expect the happy ending.
My age chart is totally that, mine. I imagine the aging process is different for all of us. Some things I have gone through may have aged me more or less than they did for you. So many variables to fuck around with. For instance I did not feel that I aged at all during my first several IUI’s. But this can be attributed to the fact that I am single and for me these were exciting. I imagine if I found myself at IUI station after ages of trying it with my partner under the sheets I would have had a different aging response.
And there are also steps along the way that I have not had to face that many of you have: high FSH, zero fertilization, thin lining…and so on. I think anyone that says this process hasn’t changed them is full of shit or smoking something good. (you can wrap some in leather and send it to me)
And because this is a full disclosure post I will share why I felt like I was going to get knocked up on April 20, 2005. There was a new Pope! (not even Catholic, mind you) It would have fertilized on Earth Day! I would have a Capricorn!
My state of mind for the last three years:
April 20, 2005: Insanely positive and hopeful. Twinkle in my eye bliss and excitement.
April 20, 2006: Totally depressed and sad. Wanting to quit trying altogether.
April 20, 2007: Was just accepted as an egg donor and was finding my joy again.
April 20, 2008: Utterly defeated but inching forward.
Happy Anniversary to me. Pardon me while I spike the punch and pop the balloons with my leather whip.
oh look…Calliope has pets
help shine some light
One of my favorite infertility blogs is probably one of your favorite infertility blogs. Stirrup Queens has been an amazing cornerstone of the blogosphere for a couple of years now. It’s where you go when you need to vent (thank you for the virtual lushery posts!), where you go when you need to send up a powerful bat symbol to garner advice or support and where you go to be inspired by things other than infertility. Just last week I learned how to make bagels. Bagels, people!
Now Mel, the head honcho of the Queens has been nominated for a really posh blog award (The Weblog Awards). Not only do I think she should win because she is wicked awesome, but I also think that by her winning it will shine a brighter light on infertility and infertility blogs.
This is a chance where you can help Mel help you. If she wins this award she will generate a hell of a lot of hits and then those hits will be flocking out to you and your blog. Just think of all of the women (and men) that had no idea such a fabu community such as ours even existed. It will also shine some light on infertility - something that is greatly needed. How else will we get better insurance coverage if nobody knows what a big problem it is?
If you have five seconds just click on this link and vote for Stirrup Queen. You can do it once a day. There is nothing to register or sign up for. It is seriously just a click.
Go vote!
Protected: Protected: Wham Bam…
Protected: Protected: 1st day at Clinic
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