No matter how many times I took my temperature, penciled sex in on my day planner and my husband & I had timed love making where we would try for that long week and would be so emotionally exhausted and sexually burnt out , or visited the fertility specialist, I still couldn't get pregnant, and then when I would FINALLY get pregnant, I'd only make it 10-11 wks and then my pregnancy was over. Then would start this vicious cycle over and over again on TTC for months and months and months which then turned into years and years and years. Until you go through something like this, you just can't understand. This is a sad fact I have come to realize & it's not like you want people to go through this tragic cycle of loss and infertility just for them to understand, but at the same time, that is the only way to truly understand. So then I felt like I walked alone for a LONG time. It's a sad, hard walk when you walk the infertility road alone. When you throw in loss, it's even more heartbreaking, and my one dream of being a mother seemed impossible.
Aaron & I were actually told we only had 1-3% chance of having a baby. We did fertility treatments, I took hormonal medicine, bought so many pregnancy tests and ovulation predictor kits that I should have invested stock in them, I paid yearly subscriptions to fertility tracking website, saw many different specialists, had painful procedures done and spent tons of money on fertility treatments that didn't even yield a pregnancy, did anything and everything to have a baby, and went through month after month, year after year of seeing that negative line on pregnancy tests and then crying my eyes out everytime my period started. This may not sound like that hard of a time to some people, but it was devestating for me. I wanted nothing more to feel a baby kick inside me, to know a mothers love, and to bring a miracle to life.. and for YEARS that seemed like it would never happen. I had many many friendships end over this hard time in my life, because a lot of my friends/family thought I was jealous of them/or couldn't be happy for them. This was never the case, I was ALWAYS happy for my friends/family, but that didn't mean deep down my heart was breaking. So while I was going through this hard time where EVERYONE was getting pregnant, having babies, some even had 3 in the time we were trying to have 1... I was made to feel like being sad was unnaceptable. That I didn't have a right to be upset, and that I was being jealous and selfish to not want to hear about their pregnancy every day. I remember making a few blogs about it back in the day and getting SLAMMED for it. I will admit, that while this was my own battle to face, I was made to feel like a lot of the time I had to face it alone, and that no one really wanted to know how I was feeling. I did have some great friends, but I lost a LOT of friends because they just couldn't understand. For me, everytime I saw a negative test, and then logged on to FB or went to church, or picked up my phone, or went anywhere, someone else was getting their positive pregnancy test, and everyone was pregnant and having babies. Even the doctors could not figure out why I wasn't getting pregnant, because I had PERFECT cycles.
It was hard for me, because I had such perfect cycles, I couldn't understand why I couldn't have a baby, when others that could. Sure I should have never thought who deserved it more than I did, but it was esepecially hard for me because my biological mother had 7 kids with NO issues... so I refused to believe that this was it for me. I have always known in my heart that I was meant to be a Mother, and not being able to be one was so hard. Heartbreaking hard, and it put HUGE strains on my marriage. Infertility has a way of putting this doubt in every little crack of your being, and really makes you question everything. Infertility made me feel less than a woman, unworthy and defective. Infertility has cemented my feeling of being defective. I use to wonder if God thought I didn't deserve a baby, why my womb wasn't good enough for a baby. What was I doing wrong? I'm very Type A, so controlling everything and NONE of it working was HARD. Then you throw in two premature births where my body failed me and man thats a whole lot of feeling very defective. I always felt like I was carrying around a weight around my neck/heart... and I felt like I couldn't be honest with people because either A) they didn't really want to know the truth or B) it was too harsh and it would be offensive. I felt and still sometimes feel like less of a woman because I can't do what women are supposed to be able to do. I hated treating Aaron as a sperm dispenser, but if we missed the schedule we might miss a baby.I'm still bitter at people sometimes. Women that get pregnant really easily that are unfit to be mothers still make me very angry. It's a tough pill to swallow that they get everything for free (pregnancy, doctor visits, delivery, etc.) that's costing us tens of thousands of dollars.. just for them to treat their children like crap and abuse them. For obvious reasons the parents that have kids and abuse them really rubs a wrong spot with me. It hurts. Being abused the first years of my life and watching my brother be murdered, it was rough, and to have gone through ALL of that to feel like I came out on top and then just to turn around and go through infertility/preemie issues, it was HARD. SO HARD. I've learned things that I wish I never had to know. I never got to be that naïve pregnant girl who never had to worry, got to eat what she wanted, got to complain about stupid random things because she just didn't know better, and then have a take home baby that she got to hold right after birth... I never got that, I never will.. so THIS is why it's still hard for me to listen to people complain. I was SICK sick during pregnancy, puking ALL day everyday, had SO many IV's that I look like a druggie with track marks on my arms, have scars all over my hands from blown out veins and most of my viens are shot. With my recent blood patch, I had to be poked 11 times before they could get a vein that didn't blow. I've come to think that instead of my body and I getting along in any way, we are constantly at war and I am on the losing end. I'm pretty sure my body hates me, and well the feeling is starting to be mutual. And the saddest part, is sometimes I have thought I've lost myself completely... I didn't know the woman I saw in the mirror. This person that was stricken with pain, bitterness, heartache, sadness... THIS wasn't ME! But then it was, this was the new me & no one understood me. The me that I hated but that infertility/ pregnancy loss had changed me to be, and I couldn't ever go back from that. Even now that I'm on a different path from infertility, I still hold scars in my heart from that time. Wounds that run deep. I once was told “be proud of your scars, they prove you Won!” I did win, I won the best gifts I could have ever asked for. My two girls, they were worth EVERY SINGLE MINUTE of this hard journey!
It's easy to focus on all of the negative ways infertility/having a preemie has changed me, but it has done a few good things... Aaron and I are so much closer and stronger both individually and as a couple. I'm so confident we'll make it through anything & we have.We survived years of infertility, and we came out on top, even with two premature births in under a year! I know how special a child really is. If I didn't go through infertility/premature births I don't think I would appreciate a baby. Or as much as I now look forward to a crying baby in the night and poopy diapers instead of complain.. I have more of an empathetic viewpoint. Even when it's not infertility/preemie related that somebody's going through, I feel like it's easier for me to understand people. Many people treated my infertility like a joke or that it was no big deal. Now if somebody I know is facing something that is major to them, I don't just blow it off. I offer support where I can, because everyone is fighting their own personal battle. I am thankful for realizing how important it is to listen to others and never judge. As hard as this journey was for me, I am proud to wear this infertility badge because I BEAT it. One of my most proud moments of being a Mama, had to have been this last July when we walked out of the NICU with our 2nd preemie, my miracle 29wker Presley, and she was graduating from the NICU. It was like a giant fist pump in the air to infertility, because I beat it & WON. I won BIG. This sounds lame, but infertility is like a cancer to your heart, emotionally the scars can be just as deep, and I hate that infertility has to be a silent issue that we have to deal with/ suffer quietly. We shouldn't let it be something that is a disgrace especially when one in eight of us suffer with some form of infertility, it should be something that we can share and learn and teach others about. So the next time someone feels uncomfortable talking about pregnancy with you, or you think that someone doesn't care/doesn't want to hear about your pregnancy, or is “jealous of you because you are pregnant and they aren't” Please PLEASE please, remember my story, and realize that maybe in fact they aren't jealous... just fighting their own battle, and it's HARD. It doesn't mean they aren't happy for you, because they are. I can be over the moon excited for someone, but at the same time feel like my heart is breaking at the same time. Even now with being a Preemie Mama of TWO preemies, some forget that I won't ever have a normal pregnancy or a normal birth, or a normal full term pregnancy and make hurtful comments. They aren't meant to be hurtful, but oh sometimes they really sting. Does this mean that I am not happy for all my term Mama's? No I LOVE that you have a full term baby, I'm happy for you that you didn't have to walk the hard road I did, and your baby is healthy! Does this mean I'm resentful to the termie after preemie Mama's... NO. To me, I feel like it is a HUGE preemie mama victory when this happens, and it makes my heart swell with pride for them. I love seeing the pictures of ALL my friends babies whether they are full term or termie after preemie, I LOVE it. Of course I LOVE all my preemie mama's and their preemie babies, there are some that I hold near and dear to my heart, and they are SPECIAL, because they are TRUE miracles. Please do NOT judge me as being someone who doesn't care or is resentful to term moms or termie after preemie moms, because that is SO far from the truth. Sure I talk a lot about preemie's because well, I have TWO. This is ALL I know. So of course I'm going to relate more to preemie than termies if that makes sense. Does that mean I love them any less? No. This is my personal story, and the reason why I feel the way I do..... hopefully some of you now understand my viewpoint.
4 comments:
Amen momma. Love you. You are an amazingly strong woman. Thank you for sharing your story. (((hugs)))
This is amazing! You should never feel bad for things you have done or said or felt! I think anyone who has been through what you have is more than qualified to speak their mind. One of my favorite quotes is Say what you feel, those that mind don't matter, and those that matter don't mind!
I Love you girly. And I always will.
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