Monday, July 26, 2010

Degrees of Infertility

I guess it's silly that I didn't realize it before, but there are so many different groups of infertiles. All infertility sucks, but you realize the deeper you move into it, that people feel completely different about each other.

I am a blog-aholic. I love to read blogs and I love to read people's stories on online forums. But don't be fooled that being an infertile in your mind means that you can be in the same group as another infertile. I noticed on one forum I belong to that people are branching off big time in different directions like never before. People who have done IVF more than a few times now cannot tolerate the conversations of people who are doing it for the first or second time. Then there are people who are using other people's eggs, and that's not even the same as the new group of people who use eggs from another country. On top of that, people who are parenting children from adoption want to be separated from people who are parenting children by birth. If you think about it there are all kinds of other groups too: people who just try for a long time, people who get pregnant by a miracle in between treatments, people who undergo a lap or an HSG and then wind up pregnant, people who decide to live child-free, etc, etc.

I can completely understand this as I have thought about the separation before too. I honestly didn't even consider people who get pregnant from using Clomid as infertile for awhile. Pop a pill and get pregnant? Sounds like a dream to me! Until I remember the day I was told I have issues and need to use Clomid. It felt awful. I cried and cried. Everytime Clomid didn't work (which was 8 for me), I was upset. So then I moved on. When I read of people who got pregnant with IUI, I think they are seriously the most lucky people and I don't want to even hear about it. Until I remember that the worst place I have ever been in mentally was with the 1st and 3rd failure of IUI. I remember thinking how awful it was that I had to resort to IVF, but then soon thinking that I am extremely lucky that it was successful the first try. I even have a little experience with adoption from when we decided we would not do IVF and got licensed as foster parents. I remember talking to a pregnant woman when we had our little foster baby that we hoped to adopt thinking we had something in common as we were both "expecting" a baby, when she made the asshat comment that at least if I didn't like my kid I could give it back but she had to keep hers. Infertility is such a rollercoaster. There is so much pain and jealousy involved, because no matter what, pregnancy is supposed to be free and easy (or so we were all told as teenagers).

I think after all the treatments I just became very desensitized to how hard it is at any phase of treatment after passing each phase. I also have to understand that I truly don't know what it's like to have had to move onto adoption because I naively thought that once you are a parent, you're a parent, and you are now all in the same club. It would be hard to listen to talk of birth and breastfeeding when you didn't experience it. I want to remember where I came from, but being in normal mommy groups without all the scars and pain is so much easier so sometimes it's sad to be a part of the infertility groups that I needed so much while in treatments. I'm trying to now work on the place where I can be sensitive to what others are going through but also not forget to enjoy without reservation every second of the bliss of having my babies. It's a weird place, but I've only been here for 3 months, so hopefully I will get it figured out someday and it did take over 3 years to get here.

Photobucket

Photobucket

10 comments:

  1. Excellent point! It is interesting how rather than coming together and embracing each other's struggle, some people choose to play the "severity" card. And I can admit that I have been guilty of that myself. It's a constant battle with the raw feelings IF brings - enviousness, jealously, "why me"s - to step back and see that any point of IF is difficult. Thanks for this post!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey Ashley,

    I just happened upon your blog. I am also going through infertility and have recently started a blog. I have been going through infertility for the past seven years. After reading blog after blog where the person eventual got pregnant I started my own. Instead of blogging about my journey of getting pregnant, I decided to blog about "keeping the hope" during this journey.

    I created it of couples or individuals as well as their family and friends that want a place to go and just simply "keep the hope" alive. As you know, this journey is a struggle and can be pretty discouraging at times.

    I hope you will stop by. I just started it. If you like it...maybe you can tell others one day. Congrats on babies!!

    Amanda

    ReplyDelete
  3. Totally agree - that was a great post! I find myself forgetting what it was like "before I was pregnant". I wanted so bad to remember so that I would still be able to empathize. Now, just as everyone said, I'd begin to forget that pain...and I feel guilty that I do.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Good post Ashley. I feel guilty sometimes over how "easy" it was for us to get pregnant(our first IVF, no clomid, no IUIs). I do have to step back sometimes and remember how much pain I was in, and realize how much worse it could have been. Thanks for posting.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Well written here, Ashley. I find it hard to read anything past the birth story sometimes, but that hurt is my problem. I do not want others to censor their stories on my behalf; I think this is the part of the process of being human, ya know? I honestly have to say that reading infertile's baby stories gives me hope!!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Great post. I think so often in life, not just infertility, people tend to want to judge pain. Separate people into categories based on what they've gone through. I think everyone needs to remember that pain is pain and everyone handles things differently and sees differently based on the filters of past experiences.

    And, as always, your children are too precious to describe. :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Great post! I've been struggling a little bit with this same issue since my path seems to be even more unusual than most. All along I have felt that I don't really "belong" anywhere in the blog community, but at the same time, being supported by people in the infertility community was so very helpful for me when I was going through IVF.

    It is also so true that once you get past one stage, it is somehow easy to forget all of the pain of the stage before. Funny how our brains do that. :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Great post! I have thought about this as well. We had to jump right from trying on our own to ivf so I can't really understand failed cycles on clomid or iui's. My sister in law got pregnant after two cycles on clomid. She doesn't know we did ivf but it was so difficult to listen to her complain about how horrible clomid was when we had to do injections and couldn't even act like our child was conceived "normal". But I'm sure for her, her pain was alot.

    ReplyDelete
  9. So well said, Ashley...so many degrees of it all. My little one keeps me so busy that I don't have time to think about it all anymore, but sometimes it does come crashing back:(...then I feel bad because I am so happy I am her Mommy and would do it all over again...all of it...for these very same results:). My struggle now is whether or not to adopt again...canwe truly be this blessed twice? Darling pics, as always...they are so precious...Hugs...Lori

    ReplyDelete
  10. I agree, there are so many different scenarios and so many different personalities that all lead to the different degrees of "how I became a mother". Another thing I have found myself guilty of in the past is (silently) rolling my eyes when a mom with one infant complained about how tired she was or how hard one baby was... when I had twin infants. I don't see myself doing that anymore - now, I am more likely to find myself thinking "Those moms with 3 kids are amazing. I have no idea how they do it." So, you find even more degrees of parenting revolving around family size.

    I do think online communities can be wonderful and supportive to be a part of, or other times, very hurtful to try to fit in to. Typing rather than talking makes some people feel more comfotrable saying some pretty mean stuff.

    Cute pics!!!!!!

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for stopping by! Sorry, no anonymous comments, if you can't put your name on it it's just no fun!