Baby.

Busy smooshing baby, kissing her, and getting her to fall asleep on my chest three seconds before I have to pee. Really bad. That’s happened twice now.

Realizing more and more that I’m coming to peace with the idea of putting IVF off for a while and focusing on adoption. Babies, or kids of some sort will come to us and we’ll have a family. One day, hopefully, we’ll have children that are creations of Khalil and I. But all will happen at exactly the right time, even if that time is not rightnow.  

Tyra, Tyra, Tyra

Hoo boy. She got an earful from me this morning. Now I need to go get ready for work.

http://tyrashow.warnerbros.com/beontheshow/mom_wannabe.html

But before I do, I just want to say- I so wish she would do a show on infertility: educating and supporting. Instead, she’s do a judgemental show with people telling women struggling with infertility that it’s time to stop. Lovely.

Choice

I was talking the other night to a friend who has struggled with infertility. She went on to adopt, and has never had biological children.

Khalil and I still hope to try for bio kids, but are at the point right now where *now* might not be that time. We’ve always wanted to adopt, but it seems that our Master Plan of bio then adopting may be flip flopping. We’ll see, there’s still time, etc.

The thing that gets me, though is this: the lack of choice. I’m frustrated by the fact that neither of us chose this. I’m thrilled to adopt, or something, at some point. The end of the road is that it is in Khalil and I to be parents, to parent, to grow our family. One way or another.

I just wish we could have had all the options we wanted. I wish we never had to deal with infertility. I wish that money wasn’t an issue when it comes to infertility treatments. I wish that we were never faced with choices like: What’s going to have to wait an extra three years? A kid or a house?

I hear all the time that it’s not fair that we’ve not been able to get pregnant. My mom started telling me, maybe when I was five, that life isn’t fair. It’s also not about deserving. You can deserve something all you want, you may not get it. It can be the most fair thing in the world, it may not come your way. That is even more so true when it comes to parenting. There is no fair, or deserving. 14 year old girls getting pregnant isn’t fair. Neither is it fair when women who are using drugs get pregnant. For the seventh time.

But this is life, not a kindergarten game. More and more I learn, that you have to let go of fair and deserving. Sure, I get angry. I’ve shed my fair share of tears over it’s not fair and we don’t deserve this. But I have to let it be. I also hope that there’s a grand plan out there. That things will be just the way they are supposed to be, whether I think that is fair or not. When Khalil and I adopt, that will be the child that is meant to be ours. When we get pregnant, it will be at that time for a reason.

None of it’s easy though. I am still sad about the loss of choice. The loss of the ability to say, “Hey! Want to have a kid?” and have that actually happen. There’s much to be said about letting go in this whole process, though.

Year Two, Day Five

So yesterday my mom said, “Can I ask you a question?”

I got a wee bit nervous at that and said, “You can ask whatever you want, but that doesn’t mean I’ll answer it” and we both kind of laughed.

She then asked if we are still “trying”. I wanted to be a smart-ass and tell her that no, I am in fact no longer trying to lose weight, I just don’t care anymore. Or say yes, we are in fact both trying to deal with the fact that we both hate our jobs and want new ones. I didn’t though. I answered her and told her yes, we are trying. It is in fact stupid to tell infertile people to not try, no matter what scary disease you’re not sure they have. Khalil and I both laugh about the day we sat at one of our many doctors visits. He more or less told us that we were not going to get pregnant without the help of IVF. After we told him the plan to start IVF sometime next year, when I’m cleared from the scary disease I probably don’t have, he then asked us what we were doing to prevent pregnancy. I wanted to tell him having sex seems to be working great for us. Can we just keep doing that?? I also wanted to tell him that he just. told. us. that we’re not going to get pregnant on our own. Was he listening to himself? At ALL?

So anyways. I told my mom briefly about that, and that yes, we were still trying. But that I had just gotten my period, so it was going- well, as expected, I suppose.

Fast forward to this morning. My mom and I are chatting and she appears to be getting even braver with the questions. She proceeded to ask me (and this is probably the fourth time someone has asked me this, including clients at work) if I put my legs up on the wall after we have sex.

I told her in no uncertain terms that I was not having THIS particular conversation with her, and she then told me that she learned everything she knows from TV. I love my mom so much, and I know that she cares. I know her asking is her way of saying she’s thinking of us and hoping things are going ok. I know it’s her way of telling me she cares what’s going on with me.

But I really cannot discuss intimate details of my sex life with my mother. I cannot. The internet, perhaps. Not my mom.

On a Break

Not of the Rachel and Ross variety, though.

Khalil and I are on a baby-making break. I had a bit of a Hepatitis B scare. It turns out to be 99.9% that I am not Hepatitis B positive. However, the doctor wants us to wait 6 months before trying to get pregnant again.

This feels like quite a switch in mentality. For well over a year now we have been trying each month. Charting when I’m ovulating, or when I’m due, etc. And trying. And being disappointed. This month is the first cycle in seventeen cycles that we have not been actively trying to get pregnant.

I feel a bit disoriented. I feel like I’ve been running towards a goal and all of a sudden I’ve stopped mid stride. Like the water at this point in the race just tastes so good, I think I’ll stop here and have a break, thankyouverymuch. When all I’ve been focused on has been getting to the end of the race. Not first, mind you. Just getting there.

So we’re on a break. In so many ways this could be very good. We can save, and I can work on getting to a healthy weight and a healthy mindset towards eating. We can figure out where we’re going other than to the end of the babymaking race. It feels sad, and hard, but also the tiniest bit freeing. Running is hard, my feet are tired, and part of me is ready for a break.

Heavy

I had a dream last night that I had a baby girl, and was trying to nurse her. I ran out of milk and I had to take a milk bath in order to get more milk to come in. Then I had my baby girl back again, and was nursing her.

I had a baby girl. In my dream.

I woke up today and I was out and about on errands. I thought, “Wait! Grandma should need to go grocery shopping this week!” Then it hit me.

The check on dad’s life insurance policy came today. It says: In settlement of your claim under contract ### on the life of WLB (my dad’s full name) DECEASED.

I know I’ve gained some weight, but I’m walking around today feeling like I am carrying 100 extra pounds with me wherever I go. The weight of the truths of my life are heavy today.

Adoption. Foster care. Foster care. Adoption.

A blogger I love, who is an adoptive mom who adopted through foster care, wrote a post about adoption.

It’s a wee bit presumptious of me to try and say more. It’s very good. Go on and read it. Then come back here and laugh at how I try to say more. No, really.

Khalil and I, yeah, we’ve been trying. And it’s not been going well. I have always known that I want to do foster care. The grand plan is to have a few of our own kids, then when they’re a little older to do foster care. I like that plan on many levels. For one, it involves at least one biological child. Which is turning out to be more important than I thought it would be. Another reason I like this plan is that I would like our biological children to be old enough and mature enough to handle adding to our family through foster care and adoption. This is not always an easy task. Lastly, it gives us time to grow as a couple and as parents in order to be ready to parent a foster child. But last night Khalil and I had a talk about what we would do if. What would we do if we couldn’t have our own. Just you know… if.

I already know. I know I would adopt through foster care. There are soo many ways to adopt- international, domestic, foster care, infant, toddler, older child… and combinations of those. I’d love to adopt or foster some babies, I don’t know. We’ll see. We’ll see. One step at a time. I know where my heart lies though. I’ve worked in international adoption, and I have just always felt that for me- for me, foster care through our country is what I want to do. Through foster care. I just… have to. I don’t disagree with Angelina, who looks at the world as one and feels that all children everywhere deserve families. And they do. But I look into the faces of children almost every day who at some point in their life have been desperate for families. And I cannot turn my back on this need.

All that to say. To say what? To say- there are so many myths about foster care and adoption. And I LOVE the way Baggage addresses them. The biggest being- if I do foster care, I will have to give the babies back. I get it- most people, many people- that’s a huge job. It’s not something everyone can do. When you foster, you get attached. You spend a lot of time fixing the broken, picking up the pieces and attempting to glue them back together. You finally get them somewhat glued, the glue is drying, and then the children go back to their parents. When you see the child again, the pieces have fallen apart again. It’s not easy. It’s not. But it’s not the only way to foster.

Again. I’m going to refer you back to Baggage here. She explains the differences in foster care well. If I try to do it I’ll try to explain all of the differences in foster care and there are alot of subtle differences. These also vary state to state and in some states, county to county. I will get overly detailed and confusing, trust me. So go see her.

I don’t know what we will do, altogether. Given my job, I know some of the things we won’t do. I know some of the things I will look for, and some of the things I would like to do. I’m also not the only one making these decisions, and so Khalil has say as well. These are decisions we have to make together. They aren’t easy. Regardless of whether my grand plan works, the decisions will need to be made at some point.

I know what warms my heart though. Hearing a foster mother I know has struggled with infertility, almost lost her marriage through it, say something like this, “This is my calling. It’s what I was meant to do.” She was talking about foster care. And adoption. She has adopted four of our foster children. She is in the process of fostering and likely adopting another. She cares for her niece. If we’d let her, she’d take more. (We can’t. There’s a six child limit. We try to stick to it.) Hearing that- knowing that, despite the pain of infertility, she has found a way to be at peace and do such an amazing job with those children- it reminds me that no matter what or how, Khalil and I will have children. And we will love them and raise them well.

Day Seventeen: Seven

I am the bearer of all kinds of terrific news around here.

My mother had something like 6 or 7 pregnancies. (Granted, she had 4 miscarriages.) My sister had three pregnancies (but I am not implying all went well with all of those). Suffice it to say, neither of them had any difficulty getting pregnant, though they both suffered after that in other ways. I have been told all of my ever-loving life how easy it is going to be for me to get pregnant. My mom told me that the first time I had sex I’d probably be pregnant. She bet my sister I’d be pregnant in my first year of marriage. I was conceived while my mother was on birth control, for crying out loud.

I have many fears about pregnancy. My mother’s and my sister’s experiences have taught me that it is not all chocolate and roses. The results can be devastating at worst and while so joyful at best… there is that worst. When Khalil and I were talking about trying to get pregnant, we talked about the histories. We also talked about all I had seen while I worked for nine months in a NICU, doing social work. I was very scared.

My first fear, of course, was that I would have difficulty getting pregnant to begin with. I hoped against hope that it would happen quickly. I have several friends who got pregnant as “oops!” and another who had no problem getting pregnant. It was easy for them, and will be for me, right? Riiiiiiiiiiight.

I’m not naive enough to think that my measly five* six months of trying and six seven cycles are drops in the bucket in the infertility world. I know. Many women and couples go through alot more than that. I’m well aware.

But I’m so scared. I’m so scared that it’s going to be longer. So scared it will take too long or not ever happen. I’m nervous I’m going to let my husband down. I’m going to let me down. Our families. I very much want a child. I know I’ll be a good mother and GOD what an amazing father Khalil will be.

What if this keeps going? What if I get my period every month of my life for the next ever?

*I actually first wrote this post last month. I felt weird posting it… like I don’t have the right to complain, almost? Not that one more month gives me a “right” or takes one away- but this is how I feel, and why else do I write?? But then to talk about how I feel? Today we move on to cycle seven. yeehaw.