To all those with Infertility
13 May 2012 1 Comment
Happy Mother’s Day.
To the mothers without their children:
You are strong, stronger than most will ever have to be. You are deserving, deserving of the children that your heart longs to care for and love, and deserving of the happiness that your child will bring you. You are a mother. You spend every day thinking about your children and you already put their best interests first. You would (and often do) give them everything. You are willing to go to the greatest lengths for them before they are even in your lives. Celebrate yourself, your growth, your spirit, your marriage, your love, your compassion, your dedication, and your strength. Happy Mother’s Day.
To the fathers without their children:
Celebrate your wives today. They are sacrificing so much; often their bodies, always their hearts and souls. Treat them as the amazing mothers that they are and will continue to be once your family is complete. See the woman you fell in love with. Reflect on the qualities you saw when you began trying to start your family, the qualities that assured you that she would be the best mother possible. See her heart and the heavy pain that surrounds it but that she often hides to others. Forgive her. Show her love. Show her your support but more importantly show her your heart.
To your marriage:
Do not dwell today on what you do not have, but focus on the love that you share for each other, the bond that has been formed through your heartache and the strength that you can continue to give each other as you move forward.
To the friends and family of those struggling with infertility:
For just today, do not give advice. Do not fix, do not try to heal, and do not try to minimize. Be a shoulder to cry on, a hand to hold, and an ear to listen. Be encouraging, supportive, and show them how much you care. Treat them as the parents they are, recognizing that they just do not have their family yet. Do not shy away from wishing them a Happy Mother’s Day.
Mother’s Day is just a day, it does not define you as a person and it does not determine your successes or your failures. “Happy” is the part to focus on, today and every day.
Crossing Over – stuck between infertility and “normal”
20 Apr 2011 Leave a Comment
in Infertility
If you have struggled or are struggling with infertility, the pain, guilt, and sadness can often be overwhelming. If you are one of the lucky ones, you eventually find peace through a miracle pregnancy, a god-sent adoption, another form of family building, or an acceptance of your current status, be that with or without children. But are you then out of the club of infertility?
Over the past several months I have struggled with this concept on a daily basis. I tread with one foot in the infertility bucket and the rest of me overwhelmed with the world of pregnancy and all that comes with it. I pray every night for those that I know that have not yet found their happiness and their children, and yet when I turn off the light to go to sleep I feel my baby kicking, I kiss my husband goodnight, and we are now a “normal” family. By day I run an organization dedicated to raising awareness and support for those struggling with infertility. I counsel others on the steps they should be taking. I am their shoulder to cry on and their sounding board for ideas, vents, and frustrations. But in the evenings I’m setting up our baby’s nursery, washing and putting away his clothes, and shopping at Babies R Us.
I don’t want to be out of the infertility club, nor do I feel out. Our baby is not here yet, and even when he is, our family is not complete. I have always been the one to reply with “10!” when asked how many children I wanted. We are sure that at some point we will adopt as well. I want to continue to be a foster parent to the children in this world that need a loving adult in their lives. When we go to build on our family, it will be straight to IVF again knowing that we cannot conceive naturally. The pain that we struggled with for years is not gone, it’s just been pushed aside. We are still infertile.
But at the same time, I am out. I was not allowed to attend a conference held by RESOLVE because I was visibly pregnant at the time that the conference was to be held. I run an organization dedicated to infertility awareness and support, Lenny and I only conceived because of IVF (and our luck in finding a research study so that we could afford the procedure), and we are not finished trying to build our family. But I am not allowed to attend… is this right? I’m not sure.
One of my biggest concerns with that particular situation is that the above organization is one of the largest and most well-known infertility organizations and yet instead of teaching coping mechanisms for the pain those struggling with infertility feel, they are just eliminating the painful factors (i.e. visuals of children and pregnancy) for this one day conference. This is where I want to stay in both worlds to help others find the acceptance we were able to find before we got pregnant so that they can make a stop at Target without breaking down into tears when they pass the baby section, or wanting to punch the lady in front of them because she’s visibly pregnant. Who knows, maybe she’s a surrogate for an infertile family, or maybe she conceived after five years and every procedure out there? There has to be a better way for those in the “norm” and those in the world of infertility to cohabitate, and I do not believe that segregation is the way to deal.
I’m really dragging on with this post, because it’s hard to put into words what I want to say. I guess the best way to summarize is that it is really damn hard to walk the line. It’s hard to figure out where I fit in, and how to work with those who have not yet reached their happiness. But I’ll keep trying! I won’t leave the club, even if I have to fight to stay in it.
My Happiest Day is Today
23 Mar 2011 Leave a Comment
My happiest day is today – I think I’ve said that three times in the past week.
Now don’t get me wrong – seeing the sun for the first time in almost 6 months definitely influences my happy attitude. But there is so much more to it! Lenny and I are the strongest we’ve ever been. I have the most amazing son who fascinates me daily (and he hasn’t even been born yet!). And I LOVE what I am doing professionally, I love ICFI. Granted there are a few things that would make my “job” even better… like a paycheck. But I look forward to “going to work” (down the hallway to my office) every day and I am 100% confident that this contributes to this amazing feeling that I now know can be defined as Happiness.
As I continue to move forward with ICFI I plan to incorporate more of it into my blog because it’s so much more than my job, it’s my life. Raising awareness about infertility and providing support to those who need it the most, that is what I enjoy and I what I want to continue doing.
So, I have to ask – when are you at your happiest?
When All You Need is a Sign…
07 Mar 2011 2 Comments
…go out and find one!
As many of you probably already know, last fall I founded a nonprofit organization called the Indiana Collaboration for Families with Infertility (ICFI). It has been an extremely humbling experience, and it has also been 1000 times harder than I thought it would be! There have been many times that I’ve considered giving up or have cried out of frustration with the process. But there are also those days when it is so vividly clear as to why I need to keep pushing forward to make ICFI work.
It’s been difficult because what I’m doing is 100% volunteer right now; I’m not helping Lenny pay the bills at all. It’s been difficult because there is so little already out there for infertility support and awareness that with many things I’m starting from scratch. It’s been difficult because I often feel like I am the only person in the entire world passionate about this cause. And on those days that things are hard (or weeks, or months) and I want to quit, I’ve often looked for a “sign” that I should keep going. I’ve felt sorry for myself for being so alone in the process that I reasoned that if I was supposed to keep going there would be something to push me forward. A sign, a story, an inspiration. Or better yet a grant or a check (and of course I’d take cash as well). Sometimes those stories, those inspiring moments, those “signs” and especially that money never came. But other times, they did.
These signs come in the form of an e-mail from someone I went to high school with who stumbled across my blog and has been in the same boat for years; an old acquaintance that is rejuvenated on their journey because of ICFI’s mission. It comes in the form of an “I’m proud of what you’re trying to do” from my dad. It comes in the form of that sorrow in someone’s eyes when I start talking about what it is I, and ICFI, are striving to “do” and I realize that it hits a little too close to home. It comes from the tears in Lenny’s eyes when he hears our baby’s heartbeat – that reminder that everyone in the world deserves the opportunity to know what that feels like.
Last night I spent my evening dining with Lenny and my aunt and uncle. Towards the very end of dinner I finally mustered up the courage, and found the “in”, to tell them about ICFI. Along with that came a full explanation of the journey Lenny and I had been on for the past few years. Yes, I still have family members who have no idea and it is still occasionally hard to share. But when we had talked for a long time my uncle said, “you know, in 20 years if one person comes up to you and tells you how you changed their lives – it will be worth it.” It was that sign I had needed to push through another week of trying to make ICFI happen.
I learned a very valuable lesson. When you are in need of “a sign” or some validation for whatever it is you’re needing validation for – go out and find it, there’s no reason to wait for it to come to you. I should not need a constant validation that what I am doing is good because I know in my heart (and my tummy) that I have the ability to TRY to make things better. All we can do is try. So why wait for a sign?
Like this:
The Role of Faith
28 Feb 2011 1 Comment
Last week my mom took my two nieces, Hailey Grace and Faith Denise, to church (as they often do). Just a few minutes in she noticed that Hailey was paying more attention than normal. About halfway through Hailey leaned over, and with a bit of frustration, asked “Grandma, when are they going to start talking about me?”
A little cute story to start a subject that’s not always so easy to talk about. They were talking about Faith… which, while lying in bed unable to sleep because of the storms last night, I decided would be the next thing I wrote about. Everyone has their own beliefs. Everyone is entitled to those. But since I have started working so closely with a subject that often goes hand in hand with religion, I have become very familiar with the role that faith can play during tough times, whatever/whoever that faith may be in. Infertility has caused people to curse God, lose faith in His existence, and to turn their back on religion. It has also strengthened relationships with God and created new faith.
So last night while lying there I was thinking about how to gracefully (there you go Hailey…I got in your middle name) approach this subject. I do not want to stir up a debate, I do not want to offend, and I do not want to push my beliefs on others. But it’s important to occasionally talk about the role that faith has played in our lives over the past few years and how strengthening my faith helped me to make it through the toughest of times. So while lying there a song kept going through my head: “unanswered prayers” by Garth Brooks.
Sometimes I thank God, for unanswered prayers,
Remember when you’re talking, to the man upstairs,
That just because He may not answer, doesn’t mean He don’t care,
Some of God’s greatest gifts, are unanswered prayers.
It really makes me think of all those prayers that went unanswered for so long for us, and all those prayers that have gone unanswered for so long for so many others. And is the reason I wanted to write a “short but sweet” piece on faith, because I want you to think about the role it plays when times get tough for you. People often “thank God” when something goes well; do you thank Him when things don’t? I am a firm believer that we struggled with infertility in order to start ICFI and to be advocates for a subject that needs more awareness. I also believe that we were waiting to be parents because we are supposed to be parents to this amazing little boy that we’ll finally get to meet in June. An unanswered prayer that was a gift in disguise?
How to Continue the Blog?
21 Feb 2011 2 Comments
I have been so torn over the past few months about my blog – when we were going through our IVF cycle it was the absolute best coping strategy I had and it was the best way to share with others our experience; I only wish I had started the blog when we started our journey back in 2008! But once it “worked” and I was pregnant, what did I write about? I’ve spent a long time thinking about it, have tried a few new things (the photo posts lasted one post…) and I think I’ve finally settled on what to write about – Life.
When I was writing about our journey I was sharing our life because I wanted our experience to help others. Just because I’m now pregnant doesn’t mean we can’t still help others. It doesn’t mean our infertility journey has ended, either. Nor does it mean that I can’t continue to share what we’re going through. So, here’s my first post getting back to what I enjoyed blogging about – life.
So, I’m 24 weeks along tomorrow – 6 months. We’re having a healthy (and huge) baby boy. We couldn’t be happier. But I would be lying if I said that the last 24 weeks have been “easy”. Pregnancy wise I have been very lucky; never really feeling too sick or too much pain, healthy weight gain, etc. I used to cry to Lenny that I couldn’t wait until I was throwing up, well that day never really came (and that’s okay with me!). The first trimester was the scariest time of my life; we were pregnant but would it stick? Would the baby be healthy? Would we be good parents? Every ache, cramp, or unusual feeling filled me with fear that something might be going wrong. Unfortunately when you become more familiar with infertility you also become more familiar with the intricacies of a pregnancy: how much it takes to happen, how much it takes to work, and how much can go wrong. I am not saying this to scare anyone! I am saying this because it is a reality.
After the first trimester we were able to relax a little bit – a little bit. We didn’t start on the nursery, we didn’t make purchases for the baby. We celebrated every day of our little one’s life and the joy that they were bringing to us and our marriage, but we weren’t taking anything for granted. At 20 weeks we relaxed a little more, have started on the nursery, and finally started making purchases for our baby. And it has been so amazing to be able to celebrate! I never end a day without a prayer and a thank you for the amazing gift that we have been given. And he reminds me pretty regularly with a swift kick that he’s in there and that he has been worth every single tear and day of angst. I can’t wait to meet him!
P.S. It feels great to be back to blogging! 
Is it a Boy or a Girl??
19 Jan 2011 Leave a Comment
We’re interested in what everyone else thinks… cast your vote!
http://wp.vizu.com/vizu_poll.swf
We find out on Monday!!
