The Perks of Being an Infertile (Part II)

Hold on to your asses, it’s about to get positive in here.
(Yes, you are reading the same blog.)

The other day I came across a MSN column on infertility and how damaging it can be to a marriage. Right off the bat it struck me as odd. The headline reads: “We Can’t Get Pregnant and It’s Driving Us Apart.”

http://lifestyle.msn.com/relationships/couplesandmarriage/articlelhj.aspx?cp-documentid=6506501&page=1

It then struck me as odd that I thought of the article as odd. An article. On infertility. Causing stress in a marriage? Noooooooo. That's madness, isn't it?

But it seems that a lot of people don’t talk about this end of infertility. What a horrible person you would be if you were constantly arguing with your husband while trying to bring a new life in the world! Oh the horrors!

If you’re a lurker out there, you must admit - out of all blogs you’ve read discussing infertility, this one here, baby – THIS one will take you deep into the depths of my dirty laundry, no doubt to the chagrin of my husband. I have no problem letting out all my pent up anger at him, at family, at friends, at random strangers, at the circumstances that makes this blog even exist. This is my place to vent. This blog, in all its awful, detailed painful glory. I shudder to think how much more insane I’d be if I didn’t have this outlet.

In joining the blogging ranks, I have discovered there are some truly amazing women out there going through the same things, losing their minds over this roller coaster. Falling off, getting back on – some incredibly strong women who have pulled themselves through much worse than my pitiful little story and doing it all with a smile and grace. Some truly moving and inspirational stories are floating around out there and I’m so thankful people have chosen to share them.

On the other end of the spectrum, I don’t think I’ve ever read anybody’s postings about how much their husbands test their nerves when they’re on day 7 of stimulating meds. Or how – on day 12 of insomnia from Lupron – they were tempted to beat the hell out of their husband snoozing soundly beside them at 4am. Or when, during the second round of IVF their husband accidentally poked himself with the needle (not even drawing blood) and threw a tantrum for 20 minutes about how much it hurt, when you’ve already endured three weeks of injections (yes, that actually happened).

Could it be part of the Infertility Secret Society? Maybe infertility has more of a stigma than I give it credit for. Maybe people are too embarrassed to talk about this stuff. It's bad enought to be deemed infertile, but my GOD, what if people knew how hard it was on your marriage? Maybe they’re afraid people will judge them. Maybe they’re just scare of all the Skeet Ulrich fans of the world. Who knows. Clearly I am not one of them. I look Skeet in the face and I say “whatever man.” Given a glass or two of wine I have been known to tell my Tale of Two Stirrups to random strangers - internal exams, marital issues and all. No doubt my name and the abbreviation “TMI” has been used in the same sentence more times than I’ve been on the receiving end of a needle (that’s a lot by the way).

The Little Black Fairies will no doubt be knocking on my door at any moment for leaking this information to the public. Or maybe not, because I’m about to make a pretty bold LBF statement:

It may shock the hell out of you to learn that despite all my bitching there isn't a thing on this infertility journey that I would change (well, except for the not having a kid part). The entire experience has dramatically changed us individually and as a couple. Sometimes in the heat of the moment, it's not in a good way. But overall I am thankful of how much this has forced us to grow as people and as a couple. I'm madly in love with my husband, even though he still doesn’t quite grasp why I don’t attend baby showers.

Let’s face it - infertility blows, plain and simple. It flips your world upside down. It makes you doubt yourself, your body, your marriage, your friendships, your own mind sometimes.

BUT, if I’m being honest (not my usual pissed off self) I think there are upsides to experiencing infertility. For instance (and don’t interpret this the wrong way), but I imagine that women having gone through painful and scary procedures to get pregnant are probably more thankful (and maybe that’s not the right word – maybe grateful? appreciative?) when they do get pregnant and have kids. In fact, wasn’t there just something in the news recently about women who went through ART have happier pregnancies?

Don’t get your panties in a bunch – I’m not saying the fertiles love their kids less. I just think for most things in the life – the harder you have to work for it, the more it means to you, the happier you are to finally have it. It’s my (untested) theory anyway.

But it’s more than that. There is a part of me that thinks that once we get pregnant (oh my god, did you see how I used positive affirmation there?) we’re going to look at all the “fertiles” of the world and think:

“Ha! So what! You had a kid. Look at us, we worked our asses off for 5 years, and we became three (oh god, don’t let it be twins or triplets). WE went through ‘this is your marriage at its worst boot camp’ and we came out the other side. And THEN we had a kid. We kept at it even on a bad day when we knew in our own hearts it was never going to work. We dusted each other off, we got back in the stirrups and we did it again. We cried, we screamed, we fought, we drank entirely too much, we cut ourselves off from real life, we laughed over ridiculously insensitive comments that people we love made, we turned this entire mess into an inside joke that only we got, we loved, we healed, we broke again and we healed again. And you…you, you poor fertile…you had a night of passion and then you had a kid. How can you possibly be prepared?”

Maybe it’s just me, but I’d be terrified if I were them.