Making decisions

We've been thinking a lot about our future in terms of whether we need to turn our back on our wishes to have a second child or not.

The crunch is this - we have no money to try IVF again.  I'm not working, so we don't have the chance to save for another try for the foreseeable future.  We have already borrowed the money to try last time, and we have run out of loan options.

I think this is why it feels so unfair.  It feels like this decision has been made for us, rather than it being a decision we reached together.

So we are looking at our options.  We still seem to be filled with such uncertainty, and I can see that this is where the problems in marriages can start.

Infertility is filled with so much tension, self-hate and jealousy.  There is so much pain, so many questions, and way too much money needed to have a family.  Each partner feels somewhat to blame - even when there is a diagnosis - because the 'ok' partner has added pressure to get it right.

Infertility is both a shared problem and a very lonely experience.

I hate being in this position.  I hate knowing that there are very good, beautiful people out there going through similar feelings.  I despise (yes, a strong word, yet sadly true) those people that do not deserve the ease in which they get pregnant (you know the ones!).  I hate myself for the jealousy and bitterness I feel towards my fertile friends.

Surely it's time they found a magic potion to make all this go away...

Hope of a little person. Thanks DJ

Every day there seems to be a challenge doesn't there?  Some days are way tougher than others; some days the challenge is merely to get out of bed in the morning (especially with this cold weather).

Infertility is such a dominating, and difficult, journey, that sometimes you forget who you actually are...were... without it in your life.

I can tell you that, even though I am so very lucky to have DJ in my life, the 'infertile' me still rules my life on more occasions that I wish it did.  I often loose sight of who I am, who I want to be.  And if you aren't careful, it starts to hide who you are from your friends and your family.

For the last year or so, DJ has become more and more adamant about wanting siblings in his life.  He asks at least once a day when he will get a 'baby brother and baby sister'.  Even to the point of him looking at bunk beds for when the day arrived.

As you can imagine, a few months ago, this was torture for me.  I fought back the tears and told him that babies take a lot of time, and love (I didn't think that a 4-year-old should hear all about the injections, probing and MONEY).  I sometimes had to leave and would hide in the bathroom sobbing until I couldn't cry any more.

It still hurts.  I'm not going to lie.  But what I am starting to take from his love and thought of siblings, is that he will make a fantastic big brother some day.  He has so much hope that a brother and a sister will be in his life at some time in the future.  I know that this hope comes filled with naivity.  But it has made me realise how much hope I have lost.

We can't ignore the fact that more children will come easily to us.  We can't hide away from the pain that losing the babies this year has caused us.  But what we can do is realise that there is hope for us.  DJ can feel it, and so can we.

So this weeks Thankful Thursday is to you DJ, for reminding me to have hope, and for keeping it alive when it had died inside me.

I hate waiting!

Anyone who has been through any aspect of infertility will know that the one thing that you have to do a lot of is waiting!  You wait for this test, and that result.  You wait the infamous 2 week wait, and then (if you are lucky enough to get a BFP) you have to wait another to have a viability scan.  The waiting never seems to end.

So you would think that by now, after so many years of this torture, I would have SOME patience, and tolerance to the occasional delay etc.... well, you think wrong!

Waiting is perhaps the most agitating thing in my life.  I despise it!

Sometimes I think that my patience pot has dried up from being so heavily used over time.  It seems that I have less and less willingness to forgive people when they don't return my call that I am sat waiting for, or for the person to start moving when the traffic lights turn green.  The list is endless of the things that I cannot stand waiting for.

So if you have the (dis)pleasure of having to deal with me - please, please know that I am not very patient.  This is especially important if I am a student at the university where you work and you should be presenting a lecture which I have paid to be at! (Hint, hint)

Rant over, and now back to waiting to see if I receive my important phone call today...  Like I said, it never ends.

Thinking of the next step

You know when things aren't going to plan, what do you do?

Life seems to insist on throwing me curve-balls or just being plain awkward.  I'd like to think that this is to keep me on my toes, but I have a feeling that it is just simply out of spite!

Yes, I do learn from the twists and turns that come up.  I face the challenges that occur - sometimes with a smile and a spring in my step, sometimes with a tear and slumped shoulders - but as yet I seem to have managed to come through the other side with some success.

As I type this, I am faced with a mammoth task of moving forward; of planning the next few years of my life...our life.  In a few months time, my uni degree will be over and I need to be thinking about life after graduation.  I know what my ultimate goal is, I am clear about that at least.  But I am confused about the bits around it.  The bits of life that are more important in so many ways - children, where we live, money!

I am a lover of 'the list'.  I like to organise myself.  I like to know what is happening, and in what order.  I like planning.  But if I have learned anything over the last year or so, is that planning doesn't always go to plan.  Stuf doesn't happen in the order it was supposed to; things happen which aren't on the list (plain rude if you ask me), and stuff on the list sometimes never happens at all!

So for now, you might from time to time hear my musings ramblings about what the Hell I am going to do with my life.  But I promise that this is nothing more than me thinking aloud - perhaps you might be able to say something that makes me look at another option, perhaps you might be able to push me in the right direction when I am just scared to look that way (in a nice way of course ;0) )

Thanks for being there!

New toys!

This weeks Thankful Thursday is my thanks to my gorgeous hubby and various people at uni to make it possible that I got a new laptop!

This is the first time I've had my own computer, and not had to use the family laptop.  But as I have started to work extra hard on my dissertation, and hubby has become more and more a fan of online shopping, then it was time to get a new laptop just for me.

So my thanks this week is for the miracle of technology and the excitement (yes, I am really that sad) that I got from having my laptop and various other gadgets delivered this week!

This is tough

First off I just want to ask that you don't judge me too much for this post.

As I have mentioned before, hubby has a degenerative bone condition which means that he suffers a lot of pain in his lower back and hips.  From time to time this pain reaches a point where he cannot get out of bed - sometimes for a day, sometimes a few days, sometimes weeks at a time.

I know that this is tough for him, but sometimes I think people forget how hard it is for DJ and me.  We are the ones that are left to care for him, and still live the normal life of being a family.

Recently, there has been more and more occasions of hubby being in bed than being with us as a family.  This usually happens once or twice a year, when he is bed for at least a week, but it has been more like 4 or 5 this year so far.

And here is my confession - each time I am feeling more and more angry.  I'm not angry with S as such; I'm angry that I am feeling more alone with each passing time.  Alone and isolated.  But I take it out on him.  I hate myself for saying this, but I feel so much anger towards S it becomes painful.

DJ is amazing with his Daddy when he is poorly.  He tries to understand (as well as any 4 year old can) how much his Daddy hurts and needs to rest to get better.  But I hate this for him.

I really admire those people that care full-time for a loved one.  I desperately wish I had more patience and tolerance for the pressure and strain disability places on me.  I think that the unknown is what causes me to not cope with it when it does happen... I never know from one day to the next when and for how long it will be like this.

All I do know is that this is likely to become more and more frequent as time passes.  Selfishly this makes me furious - doctors can cure so many diseases, yet this is beyond their remit.  Instead, they drug him and hope that he can manage the pain.

I hate me for this.  I have to learn to cope, but how?

A long awaited Thankful Thursday...

I know that I haven't managed to bring myself to blog for a while, and as such my Thankful Thursdays have been a victim of neglect, but let's see how this goes...

This week seems to have passed in a little bit of a blur of uni, school runs and emotions.  Yet sat here now, just back from DJs first harvest festival, I am reminded of the words of the Reverend a few moments ago - 'let us be thankful for what we have'.

I'll be honest, I'm not what someone would describe as a practicing Christian.  I live my life good (or try to) and I think that is more important that visiting your local Church and playing lip service to the meaning of the messages you hear... I hope that makes sense, and doesn't offend.

Anyway, as we sat in quiet prayer, the soft voice of the Reverend spoke a beautiful prayer.  Intended for the children about how we should be thankful for the plentiful food we have, but as he spoke, all I could think was how terrible I have been in the last few months.  I haven't truly celebrated what I DO have, and focused on the injustice and things I have lost.

I suppose sitting in the middle of a packed church, silently crying wasn't the intention, but still it was a little moment when I thought about getting myself in forward gear.

I don't ever think that you let go of your grief.

I don't think that you should forget.

I don't want to ever forget.

But I know you have to move forward.  I know that you have to learn to live with grief in your life, but not with grief being your life.

In so many ways I feel guilty for moving forward.  As I've been living in a state of autopilot much of the time, I have avoided the feelings, but as I am trying to fight the emotional battle of moving forward, I am fighting the guilt of leaving a life that should have been and isn't.

Back after a desperately needed break...

Hello Blogger-verse

Hope you are all ok.  I know I have been missing for a little while - I decided I needed to have a break from a lot of things, and just focus on one or two bits of my life.

I've done that as well as I can.  I'm not sure I've been 100% successful in my 'break'...  I've sneaked peeks on Twitter and then had to hide away again; I've tried to blog and then had to delete it; I've tried to log onto Facebook and then regretted it.  BUT, I have limited my access and I am feeling better for it.  I'm not sure I'm ready to throw myself back into everything all at once, but I am hoping I am stronger.

So during my break, life has gone on as it always does.  I'm back at uni full-time, DJ is doing really well at school and I'm just trying to find some organisation in this chaos.

I have used the time to make some decisions - about uni, my future career, extending our family.  I will share these with you over the next few days and weeks.  Some are still in their early stages, some are very exciting, some are too hard for me to finalise as yet.

But we have made decisions.  We have managed to think beyond the day/week.  We have thought, and talked, about things we have been avoiding for a long time.

I hope that you are still around to share this next stage of the journey with us.  I hope you don't feel neglected.

See you soon, I promise
x