Tag Archives: infertility

Ultrasound Parties.

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Today, I find myself at nine weeks. That is one day longer that my first pregnancy which ended so abruptly and tragically on the table, with my feet in stirrups, and a wand in my vagina. I have my last ultrasound with my RE tomorrow at 3 pm, and I am hoping, praying, wishing, yearning, longing that everything will be okay. That the baby will measure at about an inch or so, the heartbeat will be in the upper 100′s, that the yolk sac will be small, small, small. These are the things I hope for before an ultrasound.

On the other hand, apparently, there is a movement afoot to celebrate the ultrasound. To treat it as a party centerpiece. I can’t even imagine. Have these people never faced tragedy? Grief? Pain? They must think that all pregnancies end in childbirth and a beautiful baby. I suppose that most do, really. Here on the other side of the statistic, where pain and grief are more common than parties and celebration, to think such a thing is outlandish. The hubris. The arrogance. Unbelievable, really.

Going in to this final ultrasound, I’m convinced that it will end poorly. I call this ultrasound PTSD. That damn wand rarely brings good news. Why would I be so lucky this time? The statistics tell me that the there is a good chance that I won’t be lucky. That this won’t be it. I guess I won’t know until tomorrow, and until tomorrow I will wait. I will wait to hear about our future, and about the life path we will be on.

Know this: I am not celebrating. I will not be Skyping the ultrasound with my nearest and dearest. I will not be wearing a party hat and singing with joy and exaltation. Instead, I will be shaking with fear and anxiety. I will be clutching Big Guy’s hand with trepidation and longing. This is the ultrasound of an infertile and a miscarrier. It isn’t a party.

Surly and Sour.

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I won’t lie. I have been exceedingly surly and sour. That’s why I’ve been a bit quiet on the blogosphere, as of late. When I get in these moods I try to temper the pain, anger, and grief just a bit as to not spew my nasty vitriol all over the blogosphere. We all have enough to deal with on a regular basis. I don’t need to add to our collective pain and grief by spewing angry diatribes all over the place. The least I can do is let it all build for a while before I erupt like Vesuvius. Continue reading →

Validation.

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Validation: to recognize, establish, or illustrate the worthiness or legitimacy of.

I haven’t felt validated in two important parts of my life these past twenty months. I’ve lacked validation as a social scientist, scholar, and analyst because I haven’t been able to leverage my skills and abilities to gain a foothold on the career ladder. It doesn’t matter how successful I was as a graduate student. The awards, the accolades, the papers, none of it matters if I can’t parlay it into a career. This is incredibly invalidating, making me question my self-worth, my skills and abilities, and my choices in life.

Continue reading →

ICLW Bingo Icebreaker.

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I did a lot of extracurricular activities as a teenager. You name it, I did it. I also was a fan of camps where we played a lot of analytical games, took fun courses, and learned new things. I was a cool kid, I promise. After years of organized group activities, I became intimately familiar with everyone’s favorite icebreaker: The Bingo Icebreaker.

Were you ever asked to participate? A group of strangers are presented with a sheet that contained a grid of unusual and unique characteristics. For example, it would include squares for someone that grew up on a farm, spent time in jail (I was the key signer for this one. Hangs head in shame.), plays a musical instrument, lives in a city, is the first born, etc. Individuals were then instructed to introduce themselves to each other in order to find someone that matched each characteristic. Each person can only sign once requiring participants to meet as many individuals as possible while learning about each other.

Well, for August ICLW, I came up with the ICLW Bingo Icebreaker. Of course, this is a bit different. I filled out a sample grid about myself so new readers can get a snapshot of myself and my journey. (However, as I’m typing this I realize that this would make for a fun ICLW activity, though I’m not sure how it would be organized.) I’m always looking for new ICLW introduction posts! You can learn more via my old ICLW intro posts (April, May, June, and July) or through my About Me or TTC CV pages.

Welcome and Happy ICLW!

The Happiness Factor.

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I’ve returned from the netherlands, otherwise known as Nebraska. I’ve been feeling quiet and contemplative in light of the funeral, and I’ve been trying to work through my thoughts and feelings on life and happiness.

Prior to hearing the news, Big Guy told me that I should work to disentangle my happiness from either starting a family or starting a career. First, I was angry. Since I have not yet reached enlightenment, I haven’t managed to figure out how to derive my happiness from outside the normal sources that everyone else gets to experience – so it seems. I’ve been in the mind-fuck of a lifeless purgatory for well over a year now, and trying to find and derive happiness has been tricky.

Trying to disentangle all of this has been hard. Right now I am frustrated. I’m getting ready to pop the fourth dose of Clomid for this cycle knowing full well that a dark veil of depression is going to fall on my shoulders in the next day or so. It is going to be a dark and lonely place for several weeks as I ride out the emotional effects of this drug. Just when I feel like I’m returning to an even keel, to a happier place, I’m going to have to do it all over again.

I don’t have any distractions. I don’t have any friends here. I don’t have a job or duties to perform. Trying to volunteer has been almost as hard as getting or staying pregnant. I tried to start a support peer-led support group through RESOLVE, but they won’t return my emails, either. Day by long day I am faced with my reality and everything that it is not. It is the first thing I wake up to and the last thing before I fall asleep. My days are long and slow, my friends.

I was the kid that took 20 credit hours in college because I wanted a challenge and I wanted to be busy. Without either of those I was stagnant. I lacked motivation, and I didn’t work to my true potential. Well, now I don’t have any challenges, and I don’t have much to keep me busy. Things haven’t changed much. Because of this, I lack motivation and am quite stagnant. This doesn’t help the happiness factor, either.

But then my friend’s mom died. She was 54. Once again I was witness to the true fragility of life.

I want to be happy. I would love to shake off the pain, grief and disappointment of the past 20 months. Or, I would love to be happy despite it all. But I’m just not, and I can’t quite figure out how to be. I want to be happy because this is my life. My one shot. I don’t want to look back and think, “Wow, why was I so unhappy?” More importantly, I don’t want to die suddenly and unexpectedly and leave memories of a sad, shattered, and disillusioned woman that didn’t manage to do much of anything.

That’s where I’ve been in this past week, friends. Mired in a pool of unhappiness and self-reflection. Clearly something needs to change. I don’t get to change the obvious things: career, family, location, volunteer activities. The Universe has consistently barred me from walking down any of those paths. The only thing I can change is my attitude. If I am to be my only source of happiness, well, that is a grim thought. This brings me full circle. How does one disentangle happiness from career, from family, from life events?

(That isn’t a rhetorical question. If you have ideas, please do share.)