It's Not a Freak Show, Folks, It's Just My Life

Step right up, folks. Step right up. It's cycle number twenty-four! That's right. Come inside the freak show and watch as Ali and the Husband attempt to get pregnant and STAY pregnant for the twenty-fourth time!

As an added bonus, if I can't guess your weight within five pounds, you'll win great prizes—like a used ovulation predictor stick! Or one of a dozen empty bottles of prenatal vitamins! Or perhaps fifty or so prenatal, postnatal, child-rearing, how to conceive, what-to-do-once-you-are-knocked-up-books, pamphlets or articles I have piled up next to my bed!

How long have we been trying, you ask? Two whole fun-filled years! What? Oh, right, you know someone who went through infertility, too? Your cousin's cousin who couldn't get pregnant for six whole months while trying for number three? That is awful. Really. Oh, then they took a vacation and bam! Pregnant? Yes, I've heard of that phenomenon before. Oh, right, another friend of a friend started adoption proceedings and then got pregnant? Right. Yes. Not sure why I hadn't thought of doing that previously.

Needless to say, feeling somewhat disillusioned. And fed up. And tired.

When I was in my early twenties I went backpacking solo through Ireland. There were moments of great bliss. I could get up whenever I wanted (pending the rules of the particular hostel, bed and breakfast, etc.), get tea where I wanted, visit museums and plays of my choosing, stay in a town I liked longer than initially planned, wander the streets taking photographs with my trusty Pentax K1000 at my leisure. No one becoming impatient. No one yelling that we would be missing the train.

However, there were also plenty of moments of utter and absolute nausea of spending another moment with myself. By the end of the trip I was completely, utterly, and absolutely sick of myself and my own company. Sure, there were many occasions where I met people, mingled, struck up great conversations. But there were just as many times when it was just me and me and well, me. Which generally is fine. I don't have to be around others at all times. I enjoy a little me time. But when it stretches on for weeks at at time, it becomes a bit old.

This is happening to me now. In that I am just sick of myself. And sick of this. Sick of what is going on or not going on. The continuous uncertainty. The worry. The vortex that is infertility. With that in mind, I made an appointment with my Reproductive Endocrinologist, a.k.a., "Magic Man", in the hopes that we can move on to the next step. Back in January, the next step (after trying on our own with the daily administration of Super Folic Acid!) was the fertility drug, Clomid and then, possibly In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) - do I understand why a recurrent miscarrier without any evidence of chromosomal deficiencies, issues, etc., needs IVF? Notwithstanding the recent dry spell? No, I do not. At this point, with the not getting pregnant at all, not sure where we might be headed.

So, that's me in a nutshell. Crabby. Sick of myself. Tired.

I did hang out with a friend last night at a great little restaurant (that she and her husband recently opened here in NYC). I banned her somewhat since my first miscarriage. Insensitive comments and all that. In all these many months since the first miscarriage, I have not uttered a single word to her about any of my fertility issues. Never discussed going to an RE, the many lovely tests, or the subsequent miscarriage(s). However, last night, she brought it up. She wanted to know if we were still trying. Perhaps because I'm not as raw as I once was, I just told her like it is (except that I said we were actually NOT trying). I explained that we are not trying, that I've had a chemical pregnancy and a miscarriage since the first one, that from what they've found, they think I have a type of blood clotting disorder and that although fairly benign for me, it is not benign for my offspring. I didn't really care what she said about it. I'm not going to feel like the pain of miscarriage/infertility is any less just because SHE doesn't think so. I was blindsided, however, by her reaction. She was very sweet. And she got a little weepy. I do not need her reaction to validate how painful this is, has been and will continue to be. It's just the path my life has taken. A completely, utterly, unexpected path.

But here we are.

And I say, onward, ho.