Trying to explain the pain of infertility to someone who has kids requires more than just saying "imagine your life without your kids". Others in your life probably didn't have to fight for their kids, so they were just another thing that happened in their lives, like getting a career, getting married, etc. Not that they don't love them, but the kids were a given. Of course they would have kids. Why wouldn't they?
The pain of infertility is more than just wanting children. It includes:
- The fear that you'll never be a Mommy.
- The anger that you can't have what comes so easily to others.
- The constant reminder of what you lack. Babies and pg women are EVERYWHERE.
- The anger that your body is useless and broken.
- The fear that you'll never be able to continue your family line.
- Constant news from the media that there are people out there who don't give a rip about their kids and even HURT them intentionally!!!
- Anger at God (or fate or nature) for putting you through this with lots of "WHY??????" questions.
- The sadness that you are letting your partner down or they got a "bum deal" getting an infertile partner.
- Fear of judgment from the world for considering different options
- The ache for a baby. I think this is what the general population thinks is the only pain associated with IF, but even then, they don't GET how strong this ache is, and how desperate. You don't know and can't know unless you experience it.
Each person can feel some of these more strongly than others or move in and out of why they are sad or angry. Right now, I am strongly in the "my body is useless and broken" place.
ANGER, SADNESS, DESPERATION, WORTHLESSNESS, FEAR, HOPE, DASHED HOPE, DETERMINATION. You go back and forth through all of these feelings over and over. As each piece of bad news is delivered by a doctor that, like the rest of the world, doesn't get the depth of your pain, you are pushed down further and are forced to fight harder, despite your fear and loss of hope, and dwindling options. Fighting when you want to crawl in a hole and die is the hardest thing, but is necessary if you want to make your dream come true.
Instead of making love on a beach and conceiving a child, we are forced to conceive (or TRY!!!) on a hard table in a cold room while a doctor does painful and humiliating things to us. And when you go through all the tests and procedures and STILL get that call that it didn't work, you worry. Will you ever be a mother? Is your body so messed up that you'll never carry a baby? Did you do something wrong in your past that you are being punished for? Why do other women, including teen girls, drug addicts, and abusers, get pregnant at the drop of the hat while you have to fight so hard? Did your embryos hate being in you so much that they would rather die than grow inside you? Does God hate you? WHY? WHY? WHY?
And then, with more hope stripped away, you have to try again. And again. Until it works or until all the life and hope are sucked out of you, leaving a hollow shell of a person with empty eyes and internal rage aimed at pregnant women, God, and of course, yourself, for being such a loser that you can't even get pregnant - one of the basics of being a woman.
And hopefully, one day, there is a light on the horizon in the form of two little pink lines. Dare we hope? Dare we dream that this can happen? For some of us, it does. For some, it ends in another heartache of the worst kind... having something promised then taken away.
And for those of us who achieve the impossible: we NEVER take our gift for granted. We hold our child or children close and revel in being called Mommy. But we never forget. Birth does not cure infertility. We are ever cautious about our interactions around other women, in case they are experiencing the pain we know so well. We remember the pain we went through to get to this place and wear it like both an ugly scar and a badge of honor. We are all too aware that our child came into the world IN SPITE OF the failings of our bodies. And that God's plan is determined and that our babies came to us exactly when and how they were supposed to.
For in the end, infertility is a story of HOPE and TRIUMPH against all odds. And for it to end successfully, it takes strength when you are weakest, and it takes determination when you feel hopeless. And it takes faith that no matter what happens and no matter what you have to go through, you will be a mother, dammit. Nothing will stop me. Nothing will stop me.
Crystal
