It isn't just all the hormones and drugs that cause side effects. Just having an infertility diagnosis has side effects all its own. The worst of which is the loss of the ability to be happy for couples who have the amazing fortune to be able to get pregnant easily and naturally. Once you hit your late twenties to early thirties everyone around you starts getting pregnant. In the past two months alone I have known 10 people who announced they were pregnant. Five people at work, four friends on facebook, and one kid I used to babysit. I can't even bring myself to type the number of people who have gotten pregnant around us in the two years since we started trying.
Every single one gets harder. I wish more than anything that I was big enough to be able squeal and clap and hug everyone that told me they were pregnant. But I just don't have it in me anymore. I can't even properly fake it anymore. I am lucky if I can force a smile on my face when I hear the news. More often I have to excuse myself quickly and find a quite place to cry.
Being stripped of the ability to feel happiness for other people and having it replaced with jealousy and bitterness is one of the most demoralizing things I have ever experienced. And that is coming from a girl who was stalked by an ex-boyfriend, emotionally neglected by a boyfriend, and constantly bullied in school. It feels like I am in the middle of a NASCAR race, stalled in the middle of the track with everyone else zooming by at break neck speeds, while I just stand still and watch. And there is nothing I can do about it.
I wish I could be like the Boy in the Bubble. I wish I could hide in a sensory deprivation chamber with a sign hanging on the door that says "Do Not Disturb, the slightest hint that you could be pregnant and this woman could crack for good." I wish everyone with a properly functioning repoductive system could just leave me alone until I can start my IVF cycle and get some hope back.
Ugh... OK enough whining for now. Hopefully the next post I will have something more pleasant to talk about.
Feel free to vent all you want - you have every right to feel the way you do. Know that we are all here sending supportive vibes your way! IF just sucks...plain & simple! Huge hugs hun!!!
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