Channeling Brangelina
Infertility. It's the elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about until it's over and you can look back, now relieved that it was something you used to deal with. I've always thought about how I can't wait until our bout with infertility is over so I can finally share our story; but right now I don't see a light at the end of the tunnel and I kind of want to talk about it now. It's something that's on my mind every day and it seems weird that it's something I don't share with people. It's a very lonely battle but I think part of that is our own fault for not talking about it.
Brian and I have not been able to conceive, and it sucks. Big time. Especially in the age of social media where it feels like every day someone announces on Facebook that they are pregnant, adding salt to my wounds. Everyone else makes it look so easy. I feel left out, left behind, and inadequate.
Brian and I have had all the tests and all the results have come back fine. "You're healthy. No red flags." It's pretty sad when you almost will them to find something wrong with you just so you can have some answer. Some tangible reason to explain why you never even get close to having a baby... because you can't fix something that's not broken.
At my last annual doctor appointment, it was a new doctor so I had to explain everything all over again and she threw out all the possible issues and when I told her I'd exhausted all of those she paused and said, "Well, it must be your weight then." and she handed me a bunch of pamphlets. I was so mad and frustrated. I have seen women much heavier than me with much worse lifestyles than me get pregnant with no problems. Plus, who likes being told they are officially fat?
At this point in time, I am not willing to go crazy with fertility treatments. At the risk of sounding like a hippy, it doesn't make sense to me to do unnatural things to my body to force it to do what I want. I definitely understand why people do it, it's just not me. I don't even like taking aspirin for a headache and I hate going to the doctor. Therefore, I have tried everything else I can think of. I gave up alcohol and coffee. I've worked out like a fiend and have worked out just a little. I've done acupuncture every week for 5 months straight and have taken a plethora of Chinese herbs. We've tried sex in the morning, the afternoon, and at night. We've tried having sex every day, twice a day, every other day, and every suggested position. I've stood on my head afterward to help the little guys head in the right direction. I took my temperature every morning for 2.5 years so I could track my cycle and know when I might be most fertile. I've used ovulation kits that have given me that little smiley face. Always nothing. Always that wave of getting my hopes up and then we're back to the crushing.
Almost every day I feel highly aware of the fact that having a baby is only going to become statistically harder every month, day, hour, minute that passes and we get older. It's a sincere worry of mine and I know people mean well but telling me I still have plenty of time does not help. Not at all. It just makes me mad at you. In all honesty, you are not capable of making me feel better unless you can magically make me pregnant or if you can hand me a baby so please don't worry about trying to ease my pain-- just let me be in pain and validate that what we're going through is the worst.
A couple months ago I started feeling convicted about adoption. It seems stupid to be mad every second of every day that I'm not pregnant when I could be working towards adopting someone who really needs a loving home. Here's the issue: I've never, ever felt called to adoption. It's never appealed to me. I've never been good with "other people's kids" and bringing a stranger into my home makes my inner introvert shudder. I have said that if someone just handed me a baby, then maybe, but how often does that happen? Let's just say I'm not holding my breath.
Adoption is a sly bugger and keeps popping up everywhere; I just can't escape it. One day I realized that God was probably trying to change my heart so I did the natural thing and got mad. Really mad. Why me? Can't someone else who is good at this kind of thing get hit with God's conviction arrow? I basically told God to leave me alone and that if I couldn't have a biological child, I would just be okay with not having kids. Except that I'm not okay with that and don't see myself ever feeling okay with that. Life without kids leaves me with the question, "Then, what's the point?" So, in a sigh of resignation I decided to at least start doing research to find out more. I know it was probably a good step to take but man-oh-man it did not help me feel better about it at all. I just became more angry. It's so freaking complicated and can cost $25,000-$30,000-- that doesn't even include raising the little human and sending them to college.
Here I felt like I took a huge step forward with being open to looking into it only to have the information make me feel like taking 5 steps backward-- back to "No way. Nuh-uh. I can't do it".
Adoption takes time to process- especially if it's not something you've ever taken the time to think about and I learned that even though I initially spent most of the time being mad, scared, & terrified about adoption it was all part of the process toward feeling okay about it. Right now I am feeling okay about it- some days I'm even excited by the thought.
We all want to have biological children, to see what the manifestation of two people will be like. Who will the baby look like? Will they be athletic and have business-sense like Brian or a band geek who likes Star Trek, like me? It kills me to think I'll never get to know. However, God loves the orphaned children and wants to answer their prayers, too. My mom talks about how Christians are anti-abortion but then don't want to help take responsibility for the children who are then born into bad situations and are put up for adoption. I hate to admit that I've been one of them. I am working really hard to focus on feeling blessed that God has called us to be an answer to prayer for a child and I'm hoping like hell I can handle this waaaaay better than I think I can.
The majority of the process starts with a home study and seeing that we have nowhere to put another person in our loft, we can't really start much of the process until we are able to move into a home. I will admit I'm relieved to know we still have the time to think and process and prepare for this before we have to take the plunge. I continually remind myself that if I did get pregnant I'd probably immediately think, "Wait, can I do this?" or "I don't know if I'm ready for this" so in that sense, adoption is much the same and I'll probably never feel 100% ready.
In conclusion, thank you for letting me share all of that. We'd love any prayers for this process and if you have or know of any spare babies lying around please do let us know.
P.S. I seriously read in a book that it does help to broadcast that you are looking to adopt because someone usually knows someone, somewhere who is looking for an adoptive family.
{Any talk of infertility involves being open and honest about sex so if that makes you uncomfortable, you've been warned.}
Brian and I have not been able to conceive, and it sucks. Big time. Especially in the age of social media where it feels like every day someone announces on Facebook that they are pregnant, adding salt to my wounds. Everyone else makes it look so easy. I feel left out, left behind, and inadequate.
Brian and I have had all the tests and all the results have come back fine. "You're healthy. No red flags." It's pretty sad when you almost will them to find something wrong with you just so you can have some answer. Some tangible reason to explain why you never even get close to having a baby... because you can't fix something that's not broken.
At my last annual doctor appointment, it was a new doctor so I had to explain everything all over again and she threw out all the possible issues and when I told her I'd exhausted all of those she paused and said, "Well, it must be your weight then." and she handed me a bunch of pamphlets. I was so mad and frustrated. I have seen women much heavier than me with much worse lifestyles than me get pregnant with no problems. Plus, who likes being told they are officially fat?
At this point in time, I am not willing to go crazy with fertility treatments. At the risk of sounding like a hippy, it doesn't make sense to me to do unnatural things to my body to force it to do what I want. I definitely understand why people do it, it's just not me. I don't even like taking aspirin for a headache and I hate going to the doctor. Therefore, I have tried everything else I can think of. I gave up alcohol and coffee. I've worked out like a fiend and have worked out just a little. I've done acupuncture every week for 5 months straight and have taken a plethora of Chinese herbs. We've tried sex in the morning, the afternoon, and at night. We've tried having sex every day, twice a day, every other day, and every suggested position. I've stood on my head afterward to help the little guys head in the right direction. I took my temperature every morning for 2.5 years so I could track my cycle and know when I might be most fertile. I've used ovulation kits that have given me that little smiley face. Always nothing. Always that wave of getting my hopes up and then we're back to the crushing.
Almost every day I feel highly aware of the fact that having a baby is only going to become statistically harder every month, day, hour, minute that passes and we get older. It's a sincere worry of mine and I know people mean well but telling me I still have plenty of time does not help. Not at all. It just makes me mad at you. In all honesty, you are not capable of making me feel better unless you can magically make me pregnant or if you can hand me a baby so please don't worry about trying to ease my pain-- just let me be in pain and validate that what we're going through is the worst.
A couple months ago I started feeling convicted about adoption. It seems stupid to be mad every second of every day that I'm not pregnant when I could be working towards adopting someone who really needs a loving home. Here's the issue: I've never, ever felt called to adoption. It's never appealed to me. I've never been good with "other people's kids" and bringing a stranger into my home makes my inner introvert shudder. I have said that if someone just handed me a baby, then maybe, but how often does that happen? Let's just say I'm not holding my breath.
Adoption is a sly bugger and keeps popping up everywhere; I just can't escape it. One day I realized that God was probably trying to change my heart so I did the natural thing and got mad. Really mad. Why me? Can't someone else who is good at this kind of thing get hit with God's conviction arrow? I basically told God to leave me alone and that if I couldn't have a biological child, I would just be okay with not having kids. Except that I'm not okay with that and don't see myself ever feeling okay with that. Life without kids leaves me with the question, "Then, what's the point?" So, in a sigh of resignation I decided to at least start doing research to find out more. I know it was probably a good step to take but man-oh-man it did not help me feel better about it at all. I just became more angry. It's so freaking complicated and can cost $25,000-$30,000-- that doesn't even include raising the little human and sending them to college.
Here I felt like I took a huge step forward with being open to looking into it only to have the information make me feel like taking 5 steps backward-- back to "No way. Nuh-uh. I can't do it".
Adoption takes time to process- especially if it's not something you've ever taken the time to think about and I learned that even though I initially spent most of the time being mad, scared, & terrified about adoption it was all part of the process toward feeling okay about it. Right now I am feeling okay about it- some days I'm even excited by the thought.
We all want to have biological children, to see what the manifestation of two people will be like. Who will the baby look like? Will they be athletic and have business-sense like Brian or a band geek who likes Star Trek, like me? It kills me to think I'll never get to know. However, God loves the orphaned children and wants to answer their prayers, too. My mom talks about how Christians are anti-abortion but then don't want to help take responsibility for the children who are then born into bad situations and are put up for adoption. I hate to admit that I've been one of them. I am working really hard to focus on feeling blessed that God has called us to be an answer to prayer for a child and I'm hoping like hell I can handle this waaaaay better than I think I can.
The majority of the process starts with a home study and seeing that we have nowhere to put another person in our loft, we can't really start much of the process until we are able to move into a home. I will admit I'm relieved to know we still have the time to think and process and prepare for this before we have to take the plunge. I continually remind myself that if I did get pregnant I'd probably immediately think, "Wait, can I do this?" or "I don't know if I'm ready for this" so in that sense, adoption is much the same and I'll probably never feel 100% ready.
In conclusion, thank you for letting me share all of that. We'd love any prayers for this process and if you have or know of any spare babies lying around please do let us know.
P.S. I seriously read in a book that it does help to broadcast that you are looking to adopt because someone usually knows someone, somewhere who is looking for an adoptive family.
Suckballs.
ReplyDeleteIn other news, I like the title of this post. And where your heart is. These are tough things.
My friend Melanie did a series on dealing with infertility for Babble a while back. Babble has since changed some things on their blog site so things are a little hard to find. Melanie links to her first few posts here (http://www.youaremyfave.com/2011/05/05/reality/). Spoiler alert: they have a baby now, so some of her more recent posts are about preparing for baby. Maybe some of her words can help with the aloneness feelings.
Go team Stoess!
Hey Jamie
ReplyDeleteIt's Becky from high school! Remember me?
Thanks for sharing your story. While we have not struggled with conception, I seem to not be able to carry a baby to full term. I just had my second miscarriage this past week. I can relate to your pain, it is devastating and incredibly lonely.
While I still don't know if anything is wrong, I begin to feel that perhaps I will not be able to have my own children.
I've never had any issues with adoption, and I was completely overwhelmed the first time I looked into it, too. Especially the cost. However, I have recently met someone who has gone through the process and feel like it is a lot less scary when you know someone.
Best of luck to you!
Hi Becky, of course I remember you! I'm really so so sad to hear that you are experiencing another miscarriage. I really wish you guys all the best. Thank you for your kind words.
DeleteI want to say SO many things to make you feel better but I know it won't help. The "you've got plenty of time" thing comes to mind but I get why that would make you mad. (although a friend of mine had her first kid at 41... just throwing that out there!)
ReplyDeleteI'm in a weirdly sort-of opposite place. I don't want kids. I've never felt like I wanted to be a mom or couldn't wait to get pregnant, etc. Other little girls talked about wanting to be a mommy & I never understood it. I have felt pressure from all over the place to have kids. I finally had to say the words, out loud, "I don't want kids". It still feels weird when people ask me WHEN (never IF) I'll have kids and I say those words. It's awkward & makes me feel like there's something wrong with ME because I don't want kids. I love kids, don't get me wrong, I just don't want my own.
I don't know why I'm telling you all that... I guess we all have our struggles/issues/whatever. But I feel for you & really REALLY hope it works out for you & Brian. You are a very special person, Jaime. Whatever child comes into your life, however that happens, will be a very lucky kid.