Infertility Has Rewritten My Life’s Story
Longing for a child is deep and painful. And it changes you forever.
Read one woman’s story below.
“I don’t read novels much anymore.
When I was younger I used to love it. But the problem is that I find if I start a book I can so easily get immersed in its world of drama and fantasy it can be hard to climb out from underneath it.
These days I am so busy with all my responsibilities that I find it difficult to find time to enter such an alternate reality; as exciting, fun, and relaxing as it may be; because I don’t have the luxury of the time to spend and enjoy the experience of it.
A few weeks ago I had my sixth IVF transfer.
My pregnancy journey to me is like a novel of drama, deep emotions, and uncertainties.
A book with an alternate reality of fantasy and wishes.
A book that once open is hard to break out from.
Each time I start a new journey, it's like opening the first page of that book. The pages are blank and ripe for creativity.
As I lie in my bed at night I wonder what the pregnancy will be like - the delivery, the first few weeks, the first year, the next many years together.
My mind immerses in this world of hopes and dreams and wishes.
Until someone abruptly interrupts it.
The words take on different forms each time. But the endings are always the same; devoid of the creativity and brightness that came before it.
“There is no heartbeat anymore.”
“Unfortunately the transfer has failed."
"The pregnancy hormone is zero.”
They are a harsh and abrupt conclusion to a world that began full of endless possibilities.
I now vow at each transfer to no longer open the first page of the book.
I ask my physician to hide the picture of the embryo before the transfer. I request that they don’t show me the ultrasound pictures at the first few visits in a valiant attempt to not feel connected until the first trimester passes.
I have had experience with too many abrupt book closures to know better than to open the first page with the looming possibility of such a rude and shocking interruption in the story.
Each transfer that crisp shiny new book with blank white pages stares daringly at me to open it. I try so hard but at times like a petulant child, I quickly take a peak. My mind wanders and my strength wanes and I falter. I open the first page and then I force it shut.
I open it again due to the flicker of hope that I feel in my heart. This yearning and dream fill my mind and body. This overwhelming sense of wanting it to be ok this time. The deep unexplainable desire for this time the book to stay open. The yearning for the luxury of the time to continue to read the story.
Infertility, recurrent miscarriage; it has taken so much from me.
It has rewritten my life’s story.
I hope one day I will feel free and at peace to open its first page and begin to read it.
For now, I don’t read novels much anymore.”