On Feeling Alone

I know that there are TONS of folks that face infertility, but damn it, sometimes this path feels so lonely.

• The hormones.
• The feeling less of a woman.
• The weight gain and the realization none of your clothes fit. 
• The money. (You can't even think of buying new clothes).
• The daily meds or supplements.
• The feeling of failure.
• The limitations of what you can eat/drink/do to make sure you have "the best chances".
• The no baby. 
• The doctor visits
• The pretending everything is fine.
• The pretending like you really want to hear and be invited to every baby event.
• People asking "so when are you guys going to have kids?"
• The CONSTANT reminder that you are old (or at least your eggs are). 
• The roller coaster that just won't seem to stop no matter how long you've been on the ride. 
• The worry that wanting to use your own eggs raises the chance of health issues in your child. 
• The worry that I'm becoming obsessive or annoying.
• Worrying about my in-laws
• The invasive procedures
• The worrying over every little unknown pain will cause a problem
• The money (yes, this is big enough to write twice).
• etc...

My BFF is a guy and I don't think he can completely relate. Actually, I take that back. His situation is worse.
Me: "This sucks. I can't carry a baby. My eggs are getting old. And we pay a fortune just to be on this stupid roller coaster ride."
BFF: "I think my MS, being single, no chance of kids, and the eventually that my walker requirement will turn into a wheelchair requirement triumphs. My insurance alone is over $900 a month and I can't work."
Me: "touche. Let's go grab lunch. It's on me."

My second BFF just had a baby, so it's not like I want to rain on her parade or have her feel like she's walking on eggshells. She's so totally awesome and her baby is as cute as cute can be.

My husband, though tremendously patient with me, doesn't alway understand how this physically and emotionally this affects me. And as many of you know, it's a doozy  Nor do I, having been a parent before and not from a culture who puts the highest importance on having children, understand all of his internal turmoil. On dealing with the emotional side of IF, we probably both stuff it down in order to appear brave for the other.

If I tried to discuss things with my mother, then she would be incredibly sad worrying about me. That would only add to my stress. No thanks.

In blog land I sometimes worry that I am offending others. In my posts and sometimes my comments; both farthest from what I am actually trying to do. Just trying to convey my thoughts at a particular moment in time. Or trying to avoid feeling sad. Or trying to be helpful. Or funny.

In work and with friends, I'm limited to what I can say. Sometimes because I'm trying to protect myself (lest I am fired for going through IF like I alluded to here) and sometimes I just don't want everyone knowing my business. Nor do I have the desire to be the discussion of gossip as can happen when you have a large group of friends. Nor do I want to be the person that constantly complains and whines as that drives me crazy. Little bits are fine, but when you run into that person who has had problems for soooooo long, it becomes exhausting to talk to them. I certainly don't want to be "that" person.

Yet life goes on. Everyone is busy discussing their kids, sharing fun photos, and doing fun family projects. I'm sure it's a grass-is-greener type thing (after all, we've had some AMAZING travel adventures over the last 4 years), but if I see one more Luvs commercial on Hulu, I'm going to scream.

A job, a surrogate, and possibly the flu

http://liannetaimenlore.blogspot.com/2012/08/edbp-movie-review-lion-witch-and.html

“All shall be done, but it may be harder than you think.” 
― C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Two weeks ago my husband and I decided that I needed to go back to work. Our funds are greatly depleted and the time had come. This made me more than a little nervous on several counts.

1. I'm rusty in my job field. Not only because I took off 7 months for IVF treatments, but also because my last position had me doing a different area in my expertise. While that's all great and fine, the problem becomes two-fold in that I could either continue in that subcategory (with only 2 years experience) or go back to my old subcategory with well over a decade experience. Going back to the old actually means I have 2 years worth of catch-up to do as you have to constantly stay updated. 
2. Interviewing terrifies me. I don't know why, very few positions have I ever interviewed for did I not get a job offer, but they still terrify me. Like make me want to vomit type of terrify. Like my voice shakes and my mind can go blank type of terrify. Now that I think about it, maybe I have such a good success rate at job offers because I usually go with the one of the first couple. That gets me out of other interviews. Add on #1, and I simply did not feel ready to interview. 
3. Wasn't sure how this would fall inline with our IVF treatments. What if our surrogate here doesn't work out? Then we are back to looking at India. Can't exactly take time off to go there for 3 weeks when I'm brand new at a company. We don't save any money by doing IVF in India, only surrogacy, but I don't have confidence that my embryos will make it to freeze. Need to look at things to increase our chances, not decrease.

As my grandfather used to famously say "Oh well, what the hell" and thus I dived into job search mode. Went on a interview last week, felt like puking (before and after!), thought I bombed part of it, and lo-and-behold, they loved me. Took an online technical test and scored high. Job was offered immediately (like within 5 minutes of me completing the test!)  So here I am getting ready to start my contract-to-perm position next Monday. Have a shit load of studying to do before then. 

In other news, we met with our friends (husband and wife) that are considering surrogacy for us. We have to meet with our clinic here in Atlanta to find out some more answers, but I felt really good talking with them. Made me realize that they had thought it through (at least with the information they had) and wanted to think it through some more after we laid all the heavy duty stuff on them. That's actually a really good sign to me. 

The next day my friend emailed me and said she went through the forms and wanted me to check with the doctor about a medical issue she had years ago. We have an appointment with my clinic on the 30th, so I will have my list of compiled questions then. Meanwhile, I also have a phone consultation this week with another clinic via Skype. 

The only big concern my friends really had was insurance. They've had problems with theirs in the past. If we have to buy insurance, pay for a ton of new medical tests for all 4 of us, plus attorney fees, then that may be too cost prohibitive. Won't really know until we speak with some clinics. Don't even know if they will still take me. 

And if this all seems a bit lacking in the segue arena - it's because I fairly certain I have the flu. Sigh. 

Tickets procured!

Well it's official. We are off to make a baby in India this summer! (I'm already imagining making a "Made in India" one-see.) Plane and train tickets purchased; doctor appts are set and confirmed.

There is a surprisingly great and diverse blog community that have traveled the same route (ie. surrogacy in India.) If you are interested, you can look at my blog links and see the current ones I am reading. Lots of on the edge stuff for ya. Be forewarned: one blog will lead you to 20 more. Eventually you will loop back around, but come prepared with tissues.

It's our first IVF cycle and I'm trying to do everything possible to make sure it is a success. Cut out all alcohol (I miss you dear wine...), cut waaaayyyyyy back on the caffeine (= need for naps), showers instead of baths (this makes me very sad) and tons of other stuff I probably don't need to worry about but am anyway. I even forwent oysters the other night. Amazing how many things we take for-granted. Hopefully it will pay off. I'm taking prenatal vitamins and baby aspirin. Next month I start acupuncture.

Here we go. 1,2,3 JUMP!