I Would Die For That Too

Today is the day I found out a few things.

I found out that I will have at least one more month of giving myself injections, that in the next few weeks I will have anywhere between 5-7 hospital visits and that my life will once again revolve around hormones.

I found out that for the next three to four weeks I’ll once again be fighting mood swings, side effects, food cravings and emotional tidal waves I’ve been living with for the past three months.  That I’ll spend at least one more month with people telling me just not to think about it, to relax, to go with the flow, think positive and all the other things they try to say to help without realizing that none of that is possible.

This isn’t a flow, it’s a monsoon, and I’m an ant.  I’m being picked up, flipped over, smashed down and spun around and there isn’t a damn thing I can do to control it.  I can’t outrun it, I can’t pretend it’s not there and even if I don’t try to fight it, I still get thrashed about all the same.  I wonder how many people could stand in the middle of a busy highway and just not think about the possibility of being hit… or swim with sharks and just not think about the odds of getting bitten. That’s what it’s like to try not to think about babies, pregnancies, periods, eggs, ovaries, fallopian tubes, sperm counts, cramps, implantation, insemination, hormones, needles, doctors, ultrasounds, medications, and everything else that barrels through your mind day in and day out.

Could they get kicked in the face, stand up, get kicked in the face again, crawl back up, get kicked in the face again, pull themselves back up, get kicked in the face again and the stand up smiling and thinking positive thoughts about how this will be the time that they actually won’t get kicked in the face?  I’d like to meet the person who could do that.

The best part is, that’s just the internal stuff.  The things that go on in the privacy of your own life and mind… that’s not including the feelings and experiences that come up every time you watch a TV show and some teenager is getting pregnant by mistake, log on Facebook to see an ultrasound photo and pregnancy announcement, sit in the waiting room for yet another test while surrounded by swollen pregnant bellies and happy couples or have friends make hurtful comments without even realizing they are doing it, because they’ve never been where you are.  I can’t even begin to explain what any of that feels like.

I am so happy for the people around me who are having children and are getting to experience that joy in their lives.  I hope that any friends who read this who are pregnant at the moment or have recently had children don’t think that my excitement for them isn’t genuine, because it is.  That doesn’t mean I’m not envious though, or that I don’t wish we could have the same.  It’s always hard to see others having or doing something you desperately want, and when it comes to infertility it’s an entirely different and much more difficult experience.

Anyway… sorry, I had to put in a little disclaimer because I didn’t want people to be hurt or think they can’t share their happiness with me, because they can and one day I do hope to share mine with them.

So, in one or two days I will have to start giving myself the daily hormone injections again.  In a week I will have the first of many hospital visits for this cycle.  In about ten days I will spend an evening going to emergency so a stranger can give me a needle in my ass and in almost two weeks I will have my fifth IUI.

That’s not even when the fun begins, because after that is the wait.  The 10-12 days of side effects from the drugs, food cravings due to the hormones and stress and the anxiety that all of it creates.

I’m pretty sure that in 22-25 days I will be sitting right here, feeling the same way I’m feeling right now and dreading the month to come yet again.

In between all of these things, I will be spending time with my husband and trying not to talk to him about it too much and put too much strain on our marriage.  Spending most of my time hidden on chat programs because I don’t feel like chatting, posting on Facebook too much and wishing I could just ditch it and avoid the babies, pregnancies and people who are getting to do something I so desperately want to do too, and going out to see friends, while trying to appear somewhat more stable and normal than I really am at that moment.

I know I haven’t spoken about this much on here and it’s quite new to many of you.  I know I’ve only been doing the fertility treatments for almost three months (almost 5 cycles)… and people could easily think, pff it’s only been three months!

It’s not though…

It’s 11 years of marriage while never trying to prevent having children.

Four years previously of dire hard attempts, doctors visits, stress and tests.

Almost 12 years together without it ever happening for us.

It’s been 12 years of me feeling broken and empty… a feeling only another woman who has never been able to have a child could ever understand.

It’s been 12 years of wondering why I am the only woman in my entire family, as far back as I can look in either direction, to have any problems getting pregnant.

12 years of frustration and pain, wondering what we could have done so wrong that we don’t deserve that kind of happiness.

So yeah,  I’ve only been having fertility treatments for three months but this has not been only three months for us.  For us it’s been our entire lifetime together.  This issue may have gone on the back burner at times, for the sake of our sanity, but it has never gone away… and we’ve never stopped feeling that missing piece in our lives.

I’m going to stop ranting now, because I’m giving myself a headache… but I saw something today (on Facebook of all places) that really hit home with me.  A video of someone singing about infertility and the desire to have children.  I could do without the wind machine dramatics of the video, but the message is close to my heart.