Have you ever stood in the ocean, facing the shore? The water is calm around you and you feel good. Then all of a sudden you're hit by a wave out of nowhere - you weren't expecting it and it knocks you off your feet.
The emotion of infertility and treatment can be like that - hitting you all of a sudden, out of nowhere when you think you're fine. You might be tossed around in the wave, losing your bearings, everything is intense as you're churned around... or you might be pushed down, deeper under water where it's dark and cold and you don't know how long it will take you to swim back up to the surface or how long you can hold your breath for.
I got hit by that wave last week and it took me a couple of days to find my feet and get back up to the surface. I've been in an ok place as we just tick along, taking my DHEA (or forgetting too many times) and waiting for our next cycle. I've been trying to re-calibrate my brain and my emotions, inspired by some of the things said about a friend at his funeral recently. If someone fighting cancer can manage to lift himself out of the 'it's not fair, why me?' mentality, then why can't I, when I have so much to be grateful for?
The wave hit me out of nowhere when we were at dinner at my parents, getting their advice on a potential business opportunity for J. We were talking about how tight things are at the moment after all the fertility costs, and some other big expenses and joking about how our baby won't have any money spent on them once they're here because of what we've already spent, or alternatively they'll be the most spoilt baby ever. It was all chuckles until that wave of emotion hit. I can't even say exactly what brought it on. Maybe a little voice saying 'it's not WHEN the baby arrives but IF you ever have a baby'... reminding me that the little bundle that I know would be SO loved, may never exist. Maybe it was just all the sadness and the grief that builds up every month. I don't know... but all I could do was put my head in my hands and cry.
Sometimes, the further we go into this big fertility mess, the more treatment we have, the more sustained grief there is, I feel like I have less to say when I'm in those emotional places. Every thought and feeling that I cry over now, has been spoken about before. I have nothing new to say and so I'm just filled with a heavy silence.
The next night J and I sat on the floor playing with our dogs. J grabbed our Labrador's paws and started singing ‘when you’re happy and you know it clap your hands’. It filled me with a deep sadness knowing that he should have been doing that with a baby, not a dog. He is such a wonderful father to E and I want to give him the gift of being a full time father to our baby, I want to be a part of that journey and see him being a father from birth all the way through, I want us to be parents together. Later we sat on the couch and I cried silent tears again, unable to say anything new, J unable to say anything whilst he just held me. I feel so guilty in those moments because I know this mess hurts him just as much as it hurts me but I feel like he is the one holding me above water, not the other way around.
A few days later we had a great day. We exercised, we went out for breakfast, we pottered around the house and we laughed and hugged and enjoyed each other. Then the next day we were both in a funk again but today we are back in a good place again. We're not dealing with this fertility crap in isolation - we're dealing with financial difficulties and emotional stresses - both because of the fertility treatment and because of legal issues trying to protect our time with E, we're dealing with work and housework and trying to get fit and lose weight (me anyway!). We're fighting off bugs during cold winter days when we both crave the outdoors and sunshine. We have taxes to do, cleaning and gardening. We're no different to any other person or couple dealing with fertility treatment amongst all the other complexities of life.
I don't know when the next wave will hit or how hard it will hit, but I guess I'm just learning to enjoy the calms and really appreciate them. And maybe, instead of being pushed under, I'm slowly learning to surf the waves.
The emotion of infertility and treatment can be like that - hitting you all of a sudden, out of nowhere when you think you're fine. You might be tossed around in the wave, losing your bearings, everything is intense as you're churned around... or you might be pushed down, deeper under water where it's dark and cold and you don't know how long it will take you to swim back up to the surface or how long you can hold your breath for.
I got hit by that wave last week and it took me a couple of days to find my feet and get back up to the surface. I've been in an ok place as we just tick along, taking my DHEA (or forgetting too many times) and waiting for our next cycle. I've been trying to re-calibrate my brain and my emotions, inspired by some of the things said about a friend at his funeral recently. If someone fighting cancer can manage to lift himself out of the 'it's not fair, why me?' mentality, then why can't I, when I have so much to be grateful for?
The wave hit me out of nowhere when we were at dinner at my parents, getting their advice on a potential business opportunity for J. We were talking about how tight things are at the moment after all the fertility costs, and some other big expenses and joking about how our baby won't have any money spent on them once they're here because of what we've already spent, or alternatively they'll be the most spoilt baby ever. It was all chuckles until that wave of emotion hit. I can't even say exactly what brought it on. Maybe a little voice saying 'it's not WHEN the baby arrives but IF you ever have a baby'... reminding me that the little bundle that I know would be SO loved, may never exist. Maybe it was just all the sadness and the grief that builds up every month. I don't know... but all I could do was put my head in my hands and cry.
Sometimes, the further we go into this big fertility mess, the more treatment we have, the more sustained grief there is, I feel like I have less to say when I'm in those emotional places. Every thought and feeling that I cry over now, has been spoken about before. I have nothing new to say and so I'm just filled with a heavy silence.
The next night J and I sat on the floor playing with our dogs. J grabbed our Labrador's paws and started singing ‘when you’re happy and you know it clap your hands’. It filled me with a deep sadness knowing that he should have been doing that with a baby, not a dog. He is such a wonderful father to E and I want to give him the gift of being a full time father to our baby, I want to be a part of that journey and see him being a father from birth all the way through, I want us to be parents together. Later we sat on the couch and I cried silent tears again, unable to say anything new, J unable to say anything whilst he just held me. I feel so guilty in those moments because I know this mess hurts him just as much as it hurts me but I feel like he is the one holding me above water, not the other way around.
A few days later we had a great day. We exercised, we went out for breakfast, we pottered around the house and we laughed and hugged and enjoyed each other. Then the next day we were both in a funk again but today we are back in a good place again. We're not dealing with this fertility crap in isolation - we're dealing with financial difficulties and emotional stresses - both because of the fertility treatment and because of legal issues trying to protect our time with E, we're dealing with work and housework and trying to get fit and lose weight (me anyway!). We're fighting off bugs during cold winter days when we both crave the outdoors and sunshine. We have taxes to do, cleaning and gardening. We're no different to any other person or couple dealing with fertility treatment amongst all the other complexities of life.
I don't know when the next wave will hit or how hard it will hit, but I guess I'm just learning to enjoy the calms and really appreciate them. And maybe, instead of being pushed under, I'm slowly learning to surf the waves.