Feeling the grief

I am allowing the grief over this cycle to wash over me in fits and starts. It seems to come in waves - sometimes it seems more than I can bear, and sometimes it is just a dull ache. Most of the time I have to squash it back down as I need to be at work and can't turn into a blubbering mess at any moment of the day. But when I am alone I am letting it come. I am letting myself heave and sob and gasp for breath with the very effort of it all. I am going to try not to completely numb myself with alcohol (at least, not every night) so that I can work through this grief properly.

Sometimes it just crushes me when I think of my family. About my parents' genes not going forward into future generations. About my maternal grandparents' genes not going forward. Hell, even my maternal grandmother's parents may stop here. Some of that is due to war, to early accidental deaths, and in the present day it is due to mental illness, to the failure to find a partner and to choosing not to have children. But I was trying for them. I was trying to make sure my sweet Granny and my dear Father and Mother carried on into the future. And I failed. I turned out to be infertile because I left it too late.

And I sob and weep and it feels like people are dying all over again.

And then I think about things, and realize that some of this is pure chance and none of us have any clue as to whether we are going to contribute to the future of humanity after all. And I look at my cousins who look nothing at all like my lovely Granny so I think how silly it is of me to grieve her genetics when really it is her sweet nature and loving kindness and history that needs to be carried forward. Who can say what my cousins have of Granny, except that they remember her ways and loved her for it. And that doesn't need a genetic connection at all. And on that I think I am slowly making progress. But it has taken a stopping, a getting off of the train that was propelling me forward to be able to really feel that. I knew it intellectually but I didn't know if I could make the leap to know it in my heart. It is still a feeling that is deeply painful right now but I know that the pain will dull over time and I will be able to move forward at some point. I don't yet know what I will be moving forward into but I know that life, and our family, can go on if I choose.

Sulking

I went to the acupuncturists yesterday morning and told them about the cancellation. I dissolved into tears. I seem to do that a lot at the acupuncturists. I said I was unhappy that we didn't seem to be getting anywhere, that I read in The Infertility Cure of women who seemed to be "fixed" within 6 weeks and I have now been doing acupuncture for 2 years. 2 looong years. I wailed about my unhappiness about potentially having hepatitis C. I wailed about having a cyst when I haven't taken meds for months and months and I was getting frustrated with the constant reply I get from them that my body is still recovering from the last IVF. Which was at the beginning of December, so I feel like I damn well should be recovered from it.

I am worrying more and more about the hep C result, in case it is a real positive and not a false positive. I did some googling, and hep C is remarkably easy to catch. In 10-15% of cases they have no clue how the person got hep C. No clue at all. You don't have to be doing any risky behavior to catch it. Now, I have been living a fairly monk-like existence ever since I started trying to conceive. Sure, I may have shared a towel with my cousin when washing my hands. I may have hugged someone with the disease who didn't know they had it. And that's it. No needle sharing, no razor sharing, no toothbrush sharing. Definitely no sex or full on kissing. But I keep thinking, what if? What if I really have it? It could be a real positive. And then I'm going to have to tell all my friends and family to get tested because I couldn't bear the thought of them having caught it from me. Or vice versa, if I'm being honest. It's just so depressing. AND it would mean no more alcohol, ever. Ever. Ever. Can you bear the thought of never having another glass of wine again, for no reason? For some random reason that one day you had a little cut on your hand that you didn't notice and shared a towel with someone who didn't know they had a disease? That's it, no more vino. It's a cruel and unusual punishment.

And I don't know if anyone would prevent me from cycling or adopting with hep C. I haven't been told that or read it anywhere. But why test for it then? If medical people are supposed to assume that everyone has HIV and be careful of their blood, and if the real main difference with hep C is to require a C-section or something, why test if you are a fertility clinic? Unless you want to refuse treatment? And of course, now I'm worrying about getting deported too. Before I get my green card I have to prove that I have no communicable diseases. Haha, I bet hep C is on the list. I bet I'll have caught it in the States, and the States will throw me out back to England for having it so that the National Health Service will have to foot the bill.

Anyway, back to the acupuncturist. I ended up in a meeting with both the assistant acu (who I heart) and the main acu (who I don't heart). As usual, the main acu made me feel bad because she implied that I'm looking for a child to fill a void in my life, that my life is devoid of joy and that I have to change that first before a child will choose to come into my life. I said she was judging me unfairly, that the fact that I was miserable as sin was no reflection on me as a person. That I'd been pretty damn upbeat and positive most of last week. But it always cuts like a knife, because in a way she's right. I don't have the most joyous life. I don't have a wide circle of friends. I don't know how to have fun really without drinking or going out late at night, and I've cut all that out, partly because of TTC'ing and partly because of moving to the States where you have to drive everywhere. And I'm not into drinking and driving. I mean, don't get me wrong, I have friends. I go out occasionally. I do stuff. I try to find joy in walking along the beach, or looking at the flowers. I really do. But I feel trapped in my job, so there's a lot of angst too. But, I feel that she judges me because I'm single. I don't think she'd do this to me if I was partnered. Which pisses me off mightily. She said her intention wasn't to judge, but really it all just leaves me more depressed.

Anyway, I could go on. But they recommended a therapist who works a lot with infertility patients and who went through infertility herself. So I'm going to go and see her if I can, because after all, therapy is about the one thing I haven't tried yet. We'll see if it will help.

And finally, to wrap up the litany of woe, I checked the schedule of Big New Clinic, and of course if I wait two months the lab will be closed. So it will definitely be 3 months. Which means I won't be cycling until July/August. Which makes me want to scream in frustration. And hit things. But mostly makes me leak tears. I am doing a lot of that. Leaking. Oozing. With an occasional sob thrown in for good measure. Even Rescue Remedy isn't helping much this weekend.

What's the bloody point, eh?

I don't know if someone can enlighten me, but I've spent the night wondering what the bloody point of life is if you can't have kids. I just don't see it.

I'm very down. This is hitting me, in some ways, harder than the previous IVF failures. Even though it's not a failure - it's a postponement, I hope. But it could be a permanent postponement. And even if it is just a short hiatus, is it in fact a sign that I shouldn't be trying this at all. Why do I have roadblock after roadblock put up in front of me? Is the universe trying to get a message through my thick skull?

I just don't see the point any more. If I'm not meant to have kids, what on earth am I supposed to do with my life? Oh sure, Mother Theresa led a great, giving life. But I am not Mother Theresa. Far from it. I'm not sure what I could contribute to the world without providing children. I have always had a desire to have children. To reproduce, if we're going to get basic. I don't have that much of a desire to nurture. Especially not other people who are not related to me. I'm not an earth mother that wants to take in children to love them. I want my own children. Yes, I know it's terribly politically uncorrect to say that. Adopted children are the adopted parents own, because they were meant to be together. I get that intellectually. I don't get it viscerally. I want my own, biologically, genetically related children. To me, adoption IS a second best option. I am not one of the wonderful people that naturally turn to adoption. And I don't know if I ever could. Would I always be wondering that I'm giving a child, who deserves to be someone's first option, a second class chance at life, if I try to adopt as a consolation prize? People tell me I'd be a great mother, that I'd love any child, that I wouldn't have a problem loving an adopted child. But in order to get to that point, I have years worth of grieving to get through. Grieving the lost opportunity to have a child from my eggs. It's not something I can turn to easily.

But anyway, that is all academic musing. Because if I really have Hep C I doubt whether any adoption agency in the land would allow me to adopt. And I doubt any IVF clinic in the country would allow me to do IVF, or to do DE. So I'd be done. Forever. Childless. Barren. Pointless.

See, I'm back to pointless. I don't see the point of life without having children. I really don't. Any life without children in my future is a shadow life. A hanging on until death. Biding time. What's the fucking point?

At the crossroads of indecision

Thank you for the hugs and comments. It means a lot.

I'm still here. Don't know what to say, really. I'm very very sad. Well, let's face it, I'm crushed. I really, truly don't know if it's ever going to work for me. If I'm ever going to have that child. And I don't know if that's a truth that I can face. I'm still not ready to move on to adoption or DE, and frankly, don't know if I ever will be. There's a third choice that we don't talk about enough in the IF world, and that's living child-free. It's all very well to say "you WILL be a mom, one way or another", but that's only if we choose to continue. If we choose to get off the rollercoaster and go in another direction entirely, that's another perfectly valid choice.

But how on earth do you do that? How do you make the decision to let go of the dream entirely? I just don't know at this point. I feel like a part of me is dying inside. I just feel so heartbroken to take that path, but right now it is calling to me more than adoption or DE is. Well, partly it's the ease factor that is calling me. Stopping is just that. Stopping. Sure, I might have to do some therapy, but therapy may be in my future anyway, and at least insurance will pay for that. Adoption is so so difficult to contemplate, particularly as I can only do domestic adoption and the thought of a birthmother changing her mind after going through everything to get to that point is way too scary. And DE isn't a guarantee. Many women fail a DE cycle, and that must be so crushing, I can't even imagine it. Both adoption and DE seem to be very difficult and expensive paths to take, and I don't know if I have the energy for those journeys.

My current thinking is that I may do one last IVF cycle. And then if that doesn't work, try the FET with the one frozen embryo that I have, and then call it quits. For good.

I know that thinking may change, but that's where my head is at. I honestly don't know at this point in time whether I have the strength to go through another IVF cycle, and I feel a bit like a freak for even considering another one. I mean, who does 5 IVF's? I haven't come across that many people, and most of them are Australian where the government will pay for the IVF's. Who, apart from rich celebrities, pays for this many cycles out of pocket? It just seems like the utmost foolishness - throwing good money after bad, doing the same thing again in the hopes of a different outcome.

And how do you keep the hope alive? How do you pick yourself up and do it again? I know it's too early for me to be trying to conjure up hope, and I know that in a couple of months things will be different. But, god, it's so fucking hard.

So fucking hard.

But, I have made an appointment for a post-IVF consultation with my RE. I want his honest opinion of whether there's any chance with my own eggs. I know he'll tell me I have a better chance with DE, but I also know he'll cycle again with my own eggs if that's what I want. The appointment isn't until January 9th, so it'll give me some time to get my head together a bit.

We'll see.

Uh oh, there's been poetry!

I started feeling pretty sorry for myself yesterday. I know I've got to guard against sliding down into a BCP-induced pit of bitchiness and self-pity, but then again, I figure it's healthy to let some of the feelings out. Because they could be real, and could just be IVF#4 anxiety rather than hormone-fuelled rantings.

I even wrote a poem about the pain of infertility. I thought of posting it here, but as I haven't written any poetry since I was an angst-ridden 15-year old, it's probably just as sucky as my previous attempts. I think the internet is, on the whole, better off without my poetic attempts. Maybe if this drags on into IVF#5 and I end up with a small volume of sucky poems, maybe then I'll "treat" you to one or two of them. But maybe not, eh.

But, you know, it keeps hitting me. Wow, this is my fourth fucking cycle. My fourth! Although I've "only" had two that went to ER and ET, I'm still going to count the cancelled cycle because the drug protocols and build-up were the same, and the crushing pain of cancellation is pretty nasty. Who'd have thought that it would get to this? I know none of us multiple-IVF'ers ever imagined it not working the first, or maybe the second, go-around. I know that none of us infertiles ever imagined that we'd have problems getting pregnant in the first place, so it's just that continued "not surprised but devastated all the same" feeling every single month which just builds and builds until it takes over your life. So, how did it end up like this? How is it that I am still plowing on, still getting ready to shoot up, still not pregnant? How is it that I even resent people whose first IVF worked, and think of them as fertile myrtles. When I know they're not fertile myrtles, because the whole having to do IVF thing is pretty much a dead giveaway, don't you think? And let's not get started on the "finally" issue, which I always told myself I'd never ever harp on about, but some of the people out there really have no business saying "finally" when they get their positive pregnancy test. I know, I know, at the time it really feels like "finally", and probably I'd have said it myself in my naïvety if I'd got knocked up on the 5th IUI, but looked at from the perspective of where I am now, and where so many women before me and around me have been, some women just don't have a clue and it really hurts to see anyone say "finally" when it's been less than a year. Or two. I'd like to be above such pettiness, but you know, jealousy trumps logic, so my brain can't quite stop my heart from being wrapped up in its own pity.

I'm going to refrain from asking the "why me?" question, because I know there's no answer to that. Or at least no answer that I can either comprehend or am ready to hear.

But seriously folks, how much money is this going to take? How much time? How much pain? What really is my chance of success? They say the success rate doesn't go down with each cycle, but you hear of so few higher-order IVF cycle successes that it's hard to keep hope alive sometimes. I mean, don't get me wrong, I am hopeful. I don't see any reason why it can't work this time. I'm still in my thirties. I have good FSH levels. Everything pretty much checks out OK. If my egg quality is failing, then surely at some point if we throw enough eggs at the problem, we'll find a good one. Surely?

I used to feel sad for older women who went through fertility treatments and were only able to have one child. I thought about how they probably wanted siblings, and how they weren't able to have the family that they wanted, and how sad was that, how sad that their kid would be an only child. Now I think they are lucky, lucky women. I have rearranged my idea of what type of family I want. I used to think I'd be devastated if I could only have one child - now I know I'll be ecstatic. Sure, I'd like two. Sure, if this IVF miraculously works I'll be thinking about trying again for a sibling. Sure, there'll be sadness if I can't have that sibling. But honestly, after all this, just to get one healthy child would be so wonderful and so miraculous that if that's "all" I get, that's going to be enough. I don't want to deny the pain of secondary infertility, especially when there was no primary infertility, because I know I'd have felt it probably just as badly as this. But I think after primary infertility, secondary infertility takes on a different hue, because you expect there to be trouble so you're more prepared for it not working. Maybe. I'm talking out of my arse here because I really have no clue. But here I am, I'm staring in the face of living without children in my life at all. I'm staring right at a future that involves being the crazy cat lady and the dried up old spinster and that's just not funny. And I don't want that for myself. So please, universe, please can this IVF work?

I hate everyone (except you, of course)

I'm having one of those "I hate everyone" days. Is it just me that has them or is this normal? It's like I'm PMS'ing, but given that I am most definitely not PRE-menstrual, who knows why I'm so irritated? Well, actually, as I was writing that I just remembered that I had a very disturbing dream last night, so I'm probably suffering from lack of sleep which is what's causing the bad mood. It was just a stupid "everyone can see that I'm having my period and more embarrassingly, using a pad, which no-one over the age of 13 should use" type dreams, which somehow evolved into someone going postal and shooting me. Bizarre. Maybe I need to work on some issues there!

But seriously, ignoring the effects of the lack of restful sleep, I hate everyone. My friend K. came back to work (part-time) from maternity leave (yay!), and her and the boss have just had a meeting deciding how the work is going to be portioned out. Which is fine, except they don't feel a need to tell anyone else, so I have to force the boss to tell me so I know what the eff is going on. And, K. is going to be part time, so it just doesn't make sense to have her responsible for everything she was before, because she's just not going to be here every day. I wish they wouldn't concoct these little schemes between themselves because frankly there's not much logic going on between them.

I hate people on fertility message boards that are so wrapped up in themselves that they don't listen to what anyone says, and repeat the same damn questions over and over again. There's one in particular that is about to go on my "ignore" list that was previously reserved for the certifiably insane. Well, maybe she is certifiably insane, I don't know, but I am so tired of her. I wish she would just go to another RE so she doesn't have to keep complaining about how the RE doesn't do what she wants him to. Hello? He's the one with the MD and the years of specialization in this field. And you want to do what you want, based on information you haven't even properly understood from an internet message board?

I hate people that whine and moan for days on end about how their second IUI failed, and how god damned awful it is that it is taking sooo long to get pregnant. I'm sure I did the same when I was a naive newbie, and I hate myself for that, but I wish they would realize that while it IS god damned awful and they have every right to complain, there are others of us out here who have been trying for far longer and who might be ticked off by the fact that there's no recognition going on that it is god damned awful for all of us and that some of us might be feeling worse than they are.

I hate everyone that can start a diet like The Sonoma Diet and drop 10 pounds in 10 days. Seriously, were you living on Big Macs before? Because I'm doing this thing right and the scale is not budging. I am the Queen of healthy eating this week, and nothing is happening. Sigh.

I hate people that don't procrastinate and don't spend far too much of their day surfing. I wish I could concentrate so I could do the work I'm paid for and move on instead of having to work late to finish up.

In other words, I need a vacation, damn it, because I'm clearly stressed to all hell. Deep breath. I can do this. I can get through this crazy pile of files. Somehow. I will recharge my batteries, have my abdomen pulled and prodded and come back a new woman. I hope.

The disappointment

Slowly, I am sinking into a fog of disappointment. It is not as bad as the pit of despair, but it still takes up my waking hours in wondering why this is happening. I know that there's really no answer to "why" in the grand sense of "why is the universe doing this to me?", at least not an answer that can be given to me by a live human being. But I've been looking for an answer to the small "why?". The thought that maybe there's still a hormone imbalance, or an immune system imbalance, or a physical issue like adhesions that is preventing me from conceiving a healthy baby. And then I wonder what those problems might be, and then I wonder how I might "fix" them. What more supplements I can take. What other acupuncture points I can have stimulated. What other Chinese herbs I can take. What other dietary modifications I can make.

And then I wonder why on earth I am wasting so much of my freaking life going over this again. And that's when the disappointment really hits. The disappointment that I am still stuck. I feel like I am stuck in the movie "Groundhog Day" where I have to keep reliving the failed cycles over and over again until I can get it absolutely perfect and end up pregnant, so that at last I have a way out of this nightmare. The disappointment that I am being left in the infertility dust by more and more people who have finally managed to get knocked up, and that the circle of my non-pregnant internet and real-life friends shrinks all the time. I hate it for all of us that are still here, wondering "when is it my turn?" I mean, I'm happy for those that make it out of the darkness, but oh so jealous at the same time.

I'm so disappointed that I didn't get knocked up quickly. That I don't already have a child and the life I envisaged. I'm disappointed that two IVF's have not worked. I have thrown my money and the best of modern medicine at the problem, and have come away empty handed. I'm disappointed that other people seem to do 3 months of acupuncture, and presto! Everything fixed! Why have I been doing it for 16 months through three acupuncturists (two of whom are supposed to be fertility experts) and am still only making baby steps of improvements? I'm so disappointed at the energy this has sucked out of my life.

I'm so disappointed that I have failed my body with the wrong choices in life, and yet still have no information as to which choices they were, precisely why they were wrong and how I can rectify the situation. It's odd that infertiles are supposed to feel that our bodies have failed us. One of my meditation CDs exhorts us not to think of words like "broken" to define our bodies. And yet I feel completely the opposite. I have always felt that my body was a great ally to me, and will do exactly what it is supposed to based on the choices I make. If I exercise, it gets toned up. If I eat ice cream, it gets fat. If I drink caffeine, I stay awake and don't sleep. If I eat bad food, it throws it up. So, I feel that any part of my body that I'm not happy with is entirely due to my own stupidity and lack of willpower to resist the siren call of chocolate. My body gives me what it is supposed to. So maybe that's why I run around in my head constantly trying to find out how I failed it so it can't orchestrate everything for conception. If I could find the key problem and change it, I have faith that my body can heal. However, there's that old disappointment thing again. I am disappointed that I can't find the damn key to unlock myself.