Archive for the ‘Joy of Infertility’ Category

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One of My Nemeses

October 17, 2008

One of my nemeses, infertility grief, has reared its head lately.

And it isn’t all to do with adoption-related things: like having to spend lots of money (although it is much less than many people spend) or waiting for someone to decide to place their baby with us.

I noticed it a couple weeks ago, when I read the blog of one of T’s former co-workers, but also our friend, who is a natural childbirth advocate, a doula and an aspiring midwife.  Granted, I don’t read her blog very often for that very reason but every now and then, I’ll click on it to see what she is up to, since they moved away.  She writes about the experiences of pregnancy for herself, for others (with their permission), making choices and the intimacy of childbirth.  I thought about how much I long to experience the intimacy of birth, sharing in those moments with T.  Even if we were to be in the room when one of our children is born, at that moment, it won’t be OUR child until paperwork is signed.

Then I noticed the feeling again, when I saw, on facebook, PH tagged in a photo of someone who had just had a baby.  I thought he’s my doctor, I know this is his FAVORITE thing about being a doctor, and yet, it is an experience I won’t have with him. 

Yes, I can have the experience of motherhood, of mothering a child from hours old to adulthood.  I can have the experience of loving a child so much I can’t even imagine how I could possibly love her any more, and then, I do.

Yes, I have had other different experiences with my doctor.

And yes, I have much to be thankful for in terms of my health, my life, my family, my faith.

But I’m realizing that while I can resolve most of my feelings about infertility, I can’t make it disappear forever.  Every now and then, it is going to rear its ugly head and I just have to manage the best that I can.

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There is No Going Back, Only Forward from here

September 14, 2008

I woke up this morning, after about 4 hours of sleep, because I have to write an application essay for our grant application to the SAMFund (this time we are applying for adoption fees).  Now, I had written one which I sent to my sisters to be edited but for some reason, my mind was churning a different essay and I couldn’t fall back to sleep.  So I got up and this is what I wrote:

APPLICATION ESSAY

 

It is 5 AM.  The deadline is fast approaching.  All the rest of the paperwork is done- the financial information, our taxes, medical releases.  The easy stuff.  Done.  Most of it completed within days of hearing I could continue on in the application process.  Now, I sit and stare at the computer screen, wondering is it even possible to put words to the tumult of emotion that greets me when I reflect on my life as a cancer survivor?  How can I summarize the bittersweetness of the journey to motherhood I am on?

 

Do I write about the diagnosis of cancer my parents heard when I was five years old?  Hearing those words after weeks of unexplained fevers, lethargy, back pain.  We see a mass on her left kidney.  We think it is what is called Wilms’ Tumor.  You have to leave your other children and go, tomorrow, to the children’s hospital two hours away.  For treatment.  For surgery, chemotherapy, radiation.  You are about to enter a world, no parent, no person wants to be a part of but there is no other option if you want your child to live.  We go.  In a whirlwind, I have surgery, start chemotherapy, have my abdomen irradiated to rid it of cancerous cells.  There is no going back, only forward from here.

 

Or do I write about finding out at the age of 17, that yes, you have acute ovarian failure? And, no, there is no chance of pregnancy on your own or even with your own eggs.  They are gone.  Shriveled.   Dead from the radiation.  Maybe you can do in-vitro fertilization with donor eggs but we don’t know if even that will be successful.  After I’m home, I cry to my boyfriend, “what man would ever want a woman who knows she cannot have his children?”  In his 18-year-old way, he comforts me, tells me “Any guy who would leave you for that isn’t worth having.”  Three years later, we get married.  Three years after that, we attempt IVF with donor eggs, my older sister going through egg donation just so we could have a chance.  We try three times.  One embryo transfer.  Negative.  A second embryo transfer.  Negative.  A third and final transfer. And a final negative.  Our reproductive endocrinologist looks at us and says “There isn’t any more that we can do.  You should consider adoption.”  There is no going back, only forward from here.

 

Do I write about the depression that begins to envelop me?  The failure I felt about not even being able to become pregnant.  That I wouldn’t have gotten cancer if there was not something inherently wrong with me.  That maybe I wasn’t meant to be a mother, despite dreaming of it for as long as I could remember. An internal dialogue that repeats itself over and over for the next seven years.  My doctor puts me on antidepressants but, otherwise, I attempt to ignore it, push it away but it festers underneath.  I begin to lose my faith in God.  I tell myself, “There is no going back, only forward from here.”

 

Or do I write about beginning the adoption process?  We choose domestic infant adoption.  We want our child to have a connection to his or her birth family.  We choose an agency.  We save money for the fees.  We complete the homestudy.  Create our profile.  Wait. There is no going back, only forward from here.

 

A year later, we have feel the joy of being chosen.  But then, the devastation of a mother changing her mind.  Keeping her baby.  How did we come to love something we never really had?  It was a miscarriage but the baby still existed, just not in our lives.  With trepidation, we continue waiting.  Praying that, in the end, there would be a baby, a child for us to love and raise.  There is no going back, only forward from here.

 

A second year of waiting begins.  All around us, family, friends begin to announce pregnancies.  We wait.  We wonder, ”Will it ever be us?”  We decide to check out other adoption agencies and talk to a couple different ones.  Find one we like, one that needs families because it does not have enough.  Holding our breath, we switch.  And another phone call comes.  We’ve been chosen again.  We meet the mom and we wait.  Three weeks later, we are holding our daughter in our arms.  But what a juxtaposition of joy and grief.  The pain for our daughter’s birth mother is tangible.  The seed of love we have for our daughter has already been planted.  There is no going back, only forward from here.

 

Or do I write about the fact that for me, the love I have for my daughter and the joy of becoming a parent, does nothing to alleviate the depression hovering below the surface of my life?  It begins to creep out, to permeate my life.  But still I refuse to see.  Then when my daughter is eight months old, depression’s black hole sucks me in entirely.  I stumble through the days and nights, in tears, confused.  Shouldn’t I be happy?  I am a mother.  Isn’t this what I wanted?  Is there no going back? How do I go forward from here?

 

I talk to my family doctor.  He refers me to a counselor.  I go for a few sessions and quit.  I converse with my doctor for months by e-mail.  We talk about everything under the sun, including God.  He is in over his head but he invites me to his church, helps me rediscover God.  But still I am depressed.  Through his church, I connect with a new counselor and I change antidepressants, hoping that will help.  Instead, I fall further down.  I think about suicide.  I think too bad I didn’t die from cancer.  Life would be better without me.  In the midst of the swirl of suicidal thoughts, I cling to God.  I e-mailed my doctor.  Help. I’m scared.  I call my new counselor.  I am referred to a psychiatrist who checks me into the psychiatric unit of the hospital.  We change antidepressants again.  I begin to stabilize.  I check out of the hospital.  Then comes the hard work.  I see my counselor, my psychiatrist, my doctor regularly.  I begin to talk, to verbalize the internal discussion I have been having for the last seven years.  I connect with my counselor and he guides me through my emotions, thoughts, patterns from my childhood to the present.  I begin to really work on my grief and loss related to being a cancer survivor, the resulting infertility.  There is no going back, only forward from here.

 

Soon, between the new medication and the counseling, I find myself coming out of the depression.  Some days, it is like I see my life, my daughter, my family for the first time.  I remember what it is like to be happy, to have joy.  The depression begins to dissipate, not just get pushed away.  Two years and many long hours later, I can truly say it is gone.  I live each day, remembering that I beat cancer and depression.  There is no going back, only forward from here.

 

Now, it ends up that this doesn’t really work for the essay I need to write because there is no way to work the rest of the questions into this format.  So I think I will submit the original essay, but figured this was as good a place as any to share the other.

This after I said I don’t need this place as much any more :-P  

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A Long Way

August 12, 2008

I had an appointment with #5 yesterday morning.  I’m seeing him about once a month now, give or take with vacations and whatnot this summer.

He had to write a letter to our SW for our homestudy stating how he feels about my progress, stability etc.  He showed me a copy of the letter (he’s also supposed to e-mail it to me but hasn’t yet) and we ended up spending much of the time discussing said progress.

And I really have come a long way in the last two years.  I can see how far I’ve come when I read through my blog archives.  I know how far I’ve come when I realize how well, for the most part, I’ve handled dealing with my parents and their divorce. 

Some of it has to do with less stress overall, having sorted out our finances.  But most of it has to do with finally working through the deep-seeded feelings I had from being a childhood cancer survivor and its resulting infertility.  I needed good counseling but I was terrified to get it.   Yes, there are things that happened as a result of NOT dealing with this issues I wish I could undo or redo differently but I think a lot of different pieces had to fall into place to land me with #5, who I was able to make the connection with to get through this stuff. 

My life is hundreds, no, thousands, of times better now.  It isn’t perfect but whose life is?  I feel blessed with what I have and look forward to what is to come.

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Today was not such a good day….

March 11, 2008

First of all, last night we found out the “oops” baby of our friends made his grand appearance yesterday morning.  I am very happy for them,  considering the complications at the beginning of her pregnancy but at the same time, I still get those infertility twinges of sadness when I see my friends and family having babies, talking about who they look like, the amazing miracle of pregnancy and birth.  Bleh.

Then I found out the house is out.  We got some weird random reasons as to why they didn’t want to rent to us.  First, she told me it was because they weren’t sure what they were going to do- it needed a new roof because it had leaked in a corner near the basement over the winter, so they weren’t sure they were going to rent it until that was done because they didn’t want to bother the renters with it happening .  Then, when T called her to say we didn’t mind as long as the roof was going to be fixed, she told him well, they didn’t want to rent to us because we had asked, while walking through the house, if we could change out the dishwasher and, maybe, put up a fence in the yard- both things we would pay for and do at no cost or time to them- and they didn’t feel that they wanted us doing those things.  They didn’t seem opposed to those things when we asked, and besides, that was all we were doing- ASKING if we could.  We would have been fine with them saying no right then and there.

Whatever.

I think it is because we were upfront and honest about having filed for bankruptcy.  Even though they wouldn’t have known because they didn’t ask for authorization to run our credit, we felt they should know.  We could have afforded the monthly rent payments without any issues and we were willing to provide them with whatever they needed to show this.  And if this was the case, I don’t know why she didn’t come right out and say that instead of making excuses.

Probably better that we don’t end up having to deal with them as landlords.  But I’m still sad because the house was perfect for what we wanted over the next couple of years until we can buy a house on our own.

Now maybe I can fall asleep!

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Why??

November 11, 2007

Why am I angry to discover that I was randomized into a group that received double the abdominal radiation than the other group during my treatment?

I mean it was 25 freaking years ago.

It can’t be changed.

The infertility can’t be undone.

But, you see, I just found out if I had gotten into the other group, my fertility odds may have been much better.

Why do I torment myself by looking over my treatment records and then looking up research to see just what might have been different??

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Protected: Finding a new path

September 12, 2007

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Prayer Request

August 26, 2007

I just talked to my friend, the one with the surprise pregnancy, and she may end up having a miscarriage. There is a scratch on the amniotic sac that is growing as the baby grows instead of healing.  She already thought she miscarried earlier last week while they were on vacation.  Fortunately they were only a couple hours north of here and she could get into see a doctor in her OB’s office, where they did an ultrasound showing that the baby still has a heartbeat.  But the doctor said the only thing they can do is wait and take it easy.

We’ve been through a lot together as friends with many ups and downs. Oddly enough, we had a long (e-mail) discussion earlier this year and things have been really good between us this spring, despite how my emotions surrounding infertility have been affected by the recent birth of their son and then the news of this pregnancy. My heart is just breaking for them, that they might end up having a miscarriage.

So if you are the praying type, would you please say a prayer for her and her family?

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Battling

August 2, 2007

My mind and emotions at war today.

My emotions are playing the “Pity Party at Erin’s house cause her friends are having another baby and she can’t.  Adoption isn’t an option at the moment since finances suck and we might have to file for bankruptcy.” card

My mind is trying to stop my emotions by repeating to herself, “There is a plan behind all this.  You haven’t a clue about what it is.  This has nothing to do with you as a person.”

Blech.

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Shock

August 1, 2007

I’m in shock…

My friends that had the baby 3 months ago are, um, having another baby, quite by accident.  They just found out on Monday.  They weren’t quite as careful as they should have been but they figured they were safe since they had to use multiple cycles of Clomid for their first two (we knew this and were kidding them about getting pregnant.  Guess that’s a little foreshadowing, isn’t it?!?)

I can’t quite wrap my head around it.  I don’t quite know how I really feel about it all since I’ve had a hard time processing their previous pregnancies against my infertility.

Whew!

Irish twins, anyone?

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Warning, self-centered whining ahead

July 8, 2007

I want another baby.

Not in couple of years.

I am ready to get up in the middle of the night.

I am ready to attempt to juggle two kids and life.

Now.

I hate infertility and having to go through the adoption process, praying, wishing, hoping for what is also one of worst grieving in the world for some other woman so I can be a mom again.

I hate having been such an idiot with our finances that we can’t adopt at the moment.

I hate it when everyone tries to convince me I’m “lucky” because I don’t have to go through pregnancy and birth.  Everyone being those who have no issues with getting pregnant like my sisters and my sister-in-law.

I hate the fact that the reason I struggled more with one couple in our group of friends’ pregnancies than with my sisters’ is because they had to use initial fertility treatments to get pregnant both times and I, underneath it all, actually wished they would not be able to get pregnant, so I would have someone close to me that understood.  Pathetic, isn’t that?  To wish the thing you wish you didn’t have on someone else, just so you could have someone to share the pain with.

And you know what?

It isn’t the biological connection I miss with Widget.  Even if she were biologically related, she would be her own person- not a Mini Me.  It is that every time I hug her, kiss her, watch her sleep, share a moment with her, I wish that I had been able to share life with her from the very beginning.

Plus, I will admit I was so self-absorbed in depression for much of her first two years of life, that I know I missed out on so much anyway.  Moments I can’t get back.

Even though I know another baby would not be reliving Widget’s babyhood, I am just living so much more in the present than I have in years.  The past is a part of me but it isn’t all of me.
Maybe all this is because physically I feel like crap- it is either allergies or a cold/flu deal (neither allergy stuff nor cold stuff have helped, particularly with the crackling going on in my right ear).

In any case, I have survived my 3 weeks and unless I’m unable to get out of bed tomorrow, I am going to see #5.