Apology & Going Incognito

I've been struggling lately with infertility, emotionally. Two years into this, I somewhat had a good handle on it. I was able to put it in perspective and keep it in a place in my life that didn't invade everything else.

But four years have passed and it seems that my anger and sadness are seeping out into other places,  unintended, and as this journey wears on, I'm having a harder and harder time reeling it in. It should be the other way, right? I should be able to just accept the fact that we haven't been able to conceive with grace and dignity and in fact, get better with age, as any one does with a finite loss...

But guess what, the loss of infertility is NOT finite.

There is always one next step or one more month, or one last try, or one other option, and because of this, it is so hard to ever really 'give up' and finally just DEAL with the loss and try to move on. Its hard to just be at peace and take the rest of the world moving on in stride. Some have this talent. Clearly...I don't.

(Meditate more, my mind says, Do more yoga, my mind nudges.... then maybe, just maybe you'll be able to accept this...)

But let me share this with all of you out there in my bloggy world. And maybe I should have shared this sooner, or maybe I should not have assumed that you understood my intent for this blog...

You see, I've treated this blog as MY personal space to journal the raw, honest and emotional gut reactions to my life as an 'infertile'.  I have assumed that it is a safe and OK place to do just that, to be true to the anger and disappointment inside my head, before reason and compassion take back over and I return to the normal caring person that I truly am.

And here's where I maybe have made a mistake. Most people don't share their journal with those they know in real life. And probably for good reason. Because it lets them in to a side that they don't normally see, even though we all know that each one of us have this side. People assume intentions when they read, just like getting into an argument via something written in a email. The intent might not have been there, but because you aren't there to defend or help the reader interpret what you meant to say, miscommunication and hurt can ensue. 

But my intentions were pure and good. Honest. I really wanted to use this as a space to get the thoughts out of my head and also to have an avenue for my family and friends to peak into how our journey was going with out having to ask us all the time. 

The trouble with blogging is such... The more people you let into your "blogosphere" that know you IRL (In Real Life), the harder it is to be brutally honest and share the true reactions you have to life as you struggle to build your family. 

I desired to share this perspective with all of you.  I wanted you to understand me and how this has changed me, in both the ugly and pretty ways. But I didn't want to force it on you. So this blog was an easy way to to accomplish just that. Its a place that I can spill what I need to spill and feel better after getting it out on paper. Its a place to bring awareness to the internal struggles caused by infertility. 

So here are the points I want to clarify:

1. I'm truly sorry if I did offend anyone by comments I made here, especially about people that exist IRL. I never intended for this to be mean-spirited. It is really just my point in time gut reaction to things as they float in and out of my life.  
2. I need and deserve the freedom to say whatever I want to say in my blog because in the end, this blog is about me and my journey and finding support for the torment that infertility puts us through. I'm not saying my life is worse than anyone else struggling with something. We all have our own demons. I'm just saying that this blog is a big piece of my therapy for this demon that I carry. It helps me get my emotions out so I can live as peacefully in real life as I can while awaiting our child.
3. I had also hoped that this blog would be a way to communicate with my friends and family in real life without them having to ask me if they didn't want to. But I see where that fails now. It fails because I should have open verbal communication with them instead of having them read this and make assumptions.  I've always expressed that you can ask me whatever you want, when you want. I'm pretty much an open book. And if I'm not in the mood to answer, I'll tell you that nicely. 

I've been mulling this over for a few days and came to the conclusion that I either take this blog to a private place or make sure that I don't put my blunt emotions here that can potentially be taken incorrectly. But if I do the latter, then I don't get to use this as a place for my inner thoughts and heal them, which was the primary purpose of this blog. 

So I've decided to go private. I will be changing my url and blog name to something else and not sharing it with people IRL. I'll be going incognito in a sense.  I need to be able to express myself freely and not worry if my inner thoughts are offensive to others. I AM a compassionate and loving person. I hope that you can see this. But here, I am simply sharing the truth and ugliness of this journey. 

For those of you that I have hurt with my words, I am deeply sorry. I hope that you can see that my words were not meant in malice, but just simply a point-in-time reaction.

For those in the ALI community, you will hopefully be able to find me on ICLW coming up soon. Just look near the end of the list. I'll also post on Lost & Found. Additionally, you can email me at asfastasmybabycan@gmail.com and let me know who you are or leave a comment on this post and I will share this new url with you. I do hope you find me at my new blog my wonderful ALI friends. I love you all and need you to help me through this as I hopefully help you too.

Not So Happy Blogger

Spring is just beginning to peak its warming head around the corner. I welcome it, but it also marks the passage of time and yet another season without success. I can almost transport myself back to the fall when I had oodles of hope that our next steps would bring us some happy news this past winter.

I'm struggling to peel away the defeat from this long-time battle and find joy in my current life.  I'm struggling to get excited about our final transfer, our final try at our genetics. I feel like I'm just going to go through the motions... BCPs... lupron... estrogen... progesterone, transfer... wait, wait, freak out, wait, false hope... BFN.

And then some hard decisions ensue.

I wish I could be a happier blogger lately, but I only really feel inspired to write when I'm feeling down. I should let you all know however, that since I'm not writing all that often, that I'm really doing ok. In my daily life, moment to moment, I'm ok. Its just that as these emotions well up inside me and they need to come out.

By the way, I took my first BCP last Sunday. Our FET should be sometime at the end of April... here we go again.

A Quick Thank You

Thank you all so very much for supporting and comforting and commiserating with me... It means more than I could ever express

A special thanks to the person who sent me flowers at my office. I don't know who you are, but they surely brightened my day and my office. :-)

Facebook Does it Again

No matter how hard you try, no matter how good of a handle you think you have on the pain and the unfairness of infertility, no matter how good you have been at ignoring the fact that you have a BIG GAPING HOLE in your heart that can only be filled by holding your baby in your arms and knowing this journey is over, things still come along to knock you off your feet.

(Granted, I haven't been trying very hard or been very good at handling the pain or ignoring it lately...)

Once again, facebook caused me to trip and fall over and land flat on my face today. Stupid facebook...

I just found out a person in my life, who isn't married and is lacking financial stability is expecting a 'new addition' due in September....

All I can say is... Unfairness... you have the upper hand... And I hate you for it.

Wasted

We decided to take a month off before we start BCPs for our FET (Assuming we do an FET... more to come on that...). I thought this month off would be good to emotionally heal and map out our path (still haven't done that... a few weeks to go I guess).  I also thought I was being a good sister. My brother is getting married in December, out of town, and if we did the FET right away and not taken this month off, AND for some miracle it worked, we would have been due right around the time of his wedding.... Even thought there's a part of me that doesn't want to worry about anyone ELSE's time frame regarding our potential baby, I would have never forgiven myself if it worked and I would have missed his wedding... So mostly the month off is for timing.

Of course, with a month off infertility treatments, and the knowledge that all of our parts technically work, when one is hoping for a baby, and has been trying for 4 years, one expects to try naturally in these times, no? And that's what I expected. I made sure I knew the optimal time as determined by temperature charting and body 'clues' and proceeded to inform B of our 'date nights'.

The first, second and third optimal days came and went... no lovin' ensued... I just couldn't get there.. and now I'm simply angry.

I'm so angry at this crap. I'm so angry at how it invades my every thought and my emotion. And I'm pissed at how it's affected my sex life with B.  I feel sad, I feel like a failure to him, but this month, I just couldn't do it... I feel robbed of a sense of wonder, intimacy and naivete that so many couples have when trying to have a baby and I feel robbed of the spontaneity of having sex with your partner when you WANT to and not when you HAVE to. I know that many people experience this on their infertility journeys. But I want to express here to those who don't have to go through this how much it affects so many different aspects of your life. And you simply feel broken.... in so many ways.

So screw you infertility! Screw you for invading the intimacy with B. Screw you for making me feel guilty and like a failure in more than one way. And SCREW you for making me waste a egg.

Anyone near Minneapolis going to this???

RESOLVE's Midwest Family Building Conference

Exploring Paths of Hope: 27th Annual Infertility and Adoption Family Building Conference

Saturday, March 12, 2011
7:30AM - 5:00PM
Golden Valley, MN

If you are going, let me know! B and I are considering attending. It would be great to meet some of you in person.