Dumbo's Mum.

So how does it feel to be infertile in a fertile world? This picture sums it up better than any words I could muster. I stumbled across this on pinterest and immediately broke down because it sums it up perfectly.

Yep that’s me. (told you I’d be full of self-pity – but please allow me to indulge). And also 1 in 8 couples. I’d like to give you some advice if I may. Be careful what you say to people who don’t have children. You don’t know their story. And if people do tell you about their struggles, think before you speak. I know you care and I know you want to help.

The best thing you can do to help is to do some research. Find out what we are going through and what IVF entails. Ask questions if you don’t understand. Ask us how we are. Remember when our appointments are and let us know you are thinking of us. Don’t hide your pregnancy or your happiness. I’m happy for you. But yes, if I’m honest I’m also jealous. And hurting. But I am still happy for you. Don’t tell us to 'just adopt'. Yes, adoption may well be an option but it does not make up for the loss of not being able to carry your own child. “Once you adopt you’ll get pregnant!” Erm, no actually we won’t. That is impossible for us. And also undermines adoption. If we choose to go down that route then that will be our child, and we will be ready to welcome and celebrate him or her as our own. And if your uncle’s wife’s niece’s cousin had IVF and was successful that’s great. I’m happy for them. But it doesn’t actually help us. Everyone is different and everyone has different issues. Because it happened to them, doesn’t mean it will happen for us. “My husband just has to walk past me and I get pregnant!” Seriously?! “It took me almost a year to get pregnant, so I understand.” A year isn’t bad actually. Try 5, and we are not even close. I get that it is difficult. How can I expect you to understand when you haven’t walked in my shoes? Again, I‘m sure this sounds bitter - well, yeh, because I am.

 I’m also very fortunate to have a huge amount of love and support surrounding me. I’ve always been really open and honest about our struggle for several reasons. Firstly, it is simply who I am. I can’t really keep things to myself. I tell people everything – sometime I think it is a curse and sometimes I think it is good quality. Either way, I can’t help myself. The benefits of that is I have massive network of support – within my family, within my friends and within my workplace. The down side of it is when things go wrong I have to tell everyone. Tell everyone that we failed. I failed. Even with the help of fucking science, we still can’t get fucking pregnant. 

But also because infertility has a silent voice. People don’t talk about it. And why shouldn’t they? I’m not ashamed. It’s not a choice. It isn’t because we lived our lives a certain way. It just….is. By telling people they, in turn, open up about their experiences. The other reason is that IVF is an incredibly gruelling and intensive process. It affects you physically, mentally and emotionally. I knew I would not be able to continue by day to day life without people noticing I was not myself - for example on my 35th birthday, after two weeks of ‘down regging’ (injections which shut down your body in order for the fertility clinic to take it over) I started my period (AF – Aunty Flo in the infertility world – I’ve always quite liked that one and yes, sorry, tmi). I was in agony and my hormones were raging. I sobbed every time anyone said happy birthday to me. Had my wonderful team and friends not known what I was going through they probably would have had me committed. So this blog is also my way of giving infertility a voice, I hope someone, somewhere will read it and find it useful.

Hope and the IVF world.

                                                         Hope and the IVF World.

 I wish I’d started blogging from day 1, but it was only after I have immersed myself in the world of infertility that I have realised what a special community it is and how valuable other people stories have been to me. We even have our own special language. I entered this world in May 2015 not having a clue and was left overwhelmed! Now, I think in acronyms and slang terms. My head is full of BFPs and BFNs (big fat positives and big fat negatives – this is how we announce our successes and failures). POAS and OTD (pee on a stick and official test date – a big debate when you are in your 2WW (two week wait) – to test early or not to test early?) Embies (embryos). Snowbabies (frozen embryos). Follicles and dildo cams. ECs and ETs (egg collections and embryo transfers). And tmi (too much information – because IVF leaves you with no shame. Everything - and I mean everything - from your bowel movements to your cervical mucus and back again -  is discussed and analysed.) Yet these people are so special. I have never known a more supportive group of people. They cheer for your successes even if they have failed. They mourn your losses as if they were their own. They understand the importance of the small steps and celebrate them with you (what size are your follicles? How many eggs did you get? How many fertilised? How many embies will they put back? 3 day transfer or 5 day blastocysts?  Did you get any snow babies?) It genuinely is a different world and without support forums like Fertility Friends it would be a lonely and isolating place to be.  They have given me hope when I felt there was none. I obsessively read peoples stories (infertility blogs) going back years and years and often skipped ahead to see if they had been successful. Some had, some had moved on and some were still continuing in their journey. And what struck me most is how strong these women are. Infertility is about failure. These woman tried and tried and never gave up. They had their hearts broken time and time again but picked up the pieces. When you read their signatures (info at the bottom of their posts telling you their private journey) you cannot imagine how they have been though what they have and are still standing. Not just standing, but cheering – full of hope and possibilities. I say cheers to you all (because I can now drink and hell, yes, I am drinking) I raise a glass and I salute you all. I read a story about a women hosting a conference about infertility. She began by saying "I'm sorry for your losses". Because infertility is about loss too. Every failure is a loss. Eggs that failed to fertilise. Embryos that degraded and died before they could be transferred. Failed IVF cycles because the embryo failed to implant. Chemical pregnancies. Missed miscarriages.  So yeah, failure, loss but above everything - hope. Today I don’t feel hopeful. But I did, and I will again. I hope. 

I has a sad.

Hey. So, I'm writing this blog as a way of coming to terms with our journey of infertility. I'm by no means a writer but over the last few months I have become addicted to following other people's infertility blogs and it has been a tremendous source of comfort and information for me. So I thought I'd try and repay the favour. I don’t have a success story to tell, yet. But, this is probably more about therapy for me and will probably just be an outpouring of grief and anger at this stage. Because that's how I feel today. Yesterday, we received the news that our 2^nd attempt at IVF had failed. I would like to retrospectively lay out our journey trying to conceive (ttc – the first of many acronyms – be warned). And because of how I feel today it will probably be full of sadness and full of self-pity. And I don’t apologise for that. Sorry. Shit. Sorry.