I'm Scared.
Tomorrow is the all dreaded and all revered Lupron shot. It marks the start of something, and in my most hopeful moments, I call it the start of pregnancy. I think the Lupron shot symbolizes that our lives will never ever be the same again. Sometimes you know how you think you need a shot in the ass to get going? Well, literally, we're getting that shot in the ass. Something will start; something will change.
But what's starting? Pregnancy? Maybe not. I can't quite put my finger on it. While we've been "trying" for over a year, this is the first hard try, so to speak. This is essentially the first time I will have ever actively attempted to get pregnant. Actively. And even that's not the right word because we certainly have been actively trying to get a baby in the belly for 14 months. See how hard it is to nail this down?
So this Lupron shot tomorrow has become highly symbolic to me. As I said in the last post, I am unduly excited for this drug that I am pretty sure is going to make me feel like shite. But still, I can't wait.
Do I need to tell you that we've been talking about names for months now? How I can imagine vividly how it will feel when a baby first moves in my uterus? I want desperately to buy clothes and nursery furniture. Little booties. Hats. A sun-shade tent for visits to the beach house. I feel like by just having the shot, I'm qualified to buy this.
But I know I'm not. Sure, I'm excited, but the deeper part of me that has trouble getting out is deathly afraid. I threw up this morning. Flare-ups of my GERD. I'm tense in my shoulders. I am so nervous that the myriad of things that could go wrong will. And that's just worries about the cycling stuff: will the drugs work? Will Partner yield a good crop of eggs? Will my uterine wall bulk up? Will there be healthy embryos at all? What on earth will we do if any step along the next few weeks is missed and the cycle tumbles down the narrow, steep set of stairs we've been climbing for the past year?
This is the pretty honest part of me. I'm so excited about it working, but can't shake the fear I don't even like to admit I have...
I'm scared.
Coming home from camping this weekend, Partner and I had a talk in the car, driving home under the full moon from the most glorious weekend. I told her I was also afraid we pushed to the IVF option too fast. When Dr. BusyBusyBusy told her she couldn't have children, did we accept his diagnosis too fast? It's true, his partner who gave Partner the HSG said the same thing: no babies for her uterus. Did this count as two opinions? Did we give up on Partner as the birth parent too quickly? Did I push it because of my own desire to have a baby? "No, no, no," said Partner. She didn't think that was case.
But then I looked over at her--tears again. She told me she couldn't ever answer the gift I was giving her by agreeing to have children this way: her eggs, my body. And she said she didn't know what she'd do if this didn't work. That it would mean another whole period of mourning for her.
And it was an honest and wonderful conversation that put many of my fears to rest, but gave me a new set: What if it doesn't work? What if my body betrays not only me, but her too?
Christ. Am I neurotic or what??
So I am sooooo excited for the gross Lupron, but I'm deathly afraid too. I wonder how normal this is for IVFers? How in the world am I going to calm down?
So the Lupron is starting something different in our one year of trying-- a new set of fears and hopes. And even if we don't have a baby or babies from this cycle or future cycles, we will be changed and nothing will ever be the same again.
But what's starting? Pregnancy? Maybe not. I can't quite put my finger on it. While we've been "trying" for over a year, this is the first hard try, so to speak. This is essentially the first time I will have ever actively attempted to get pregnant. Actively. And even that's not the right word because we certainly have been actively trying to get a baby in the belly for 14 months. See how hard it is to nail this down?
So this Lupron shot tomorrow has become highly symbolic to me. As I said in the last post, I am unduly excited for this drug that I am pretty sure is going to make me feel like shite. But still, I can't wait.
Do I need to tell you that we've been talking about names for months now? How I can imagine vividly how it will feel when a baby first moves in my uterus? I want desperately to buy clothes and nursery furniture. Little booties. Hats. A sun-shade tent for visits to the beach house. I feel like by just having the shot, I'm qualified to buy this.
But I know I'm not. Sure, I'm excited, but the deeper part of me that has trouble getting out is deathly afraid. I threw up this morning. Flare-ups of my GERD. I'm tense in my shoulders. I am so nervous that the myriad of things that could go wrong will. And that's just worries about the cycling stuff: will the drugs work? Will Partner yield a good crop of eggs? Will my uterine wall bulk up? Will there be healthy embryos at all? What on earth will we do if any step along the next few weeks is missed and the cycle tumbles down the narrow, steep set of stairs we've been climbing for the past year?
This is the pretty honest part of me. I'm so excited about it working, but can't shake the fear I don't even like to admit I have...
I'm scared.
Coming home from camping this weekend, Partner and I had a talk in the car, driving home under the full moon from the most glorious weekend. I told her I was also afraid we pushed to the IVF option too fast. When Dr. BusyBusyBusy told her she couldn't have children, did we accept his diagnosis too fast? It's true, his partner who gave Partner the HSG said the same thing: no babies for her uterus. Did this count as two opinions? Did we give up on Partner as the birth parent too quickly? Did I push it because of my own desire to have a baby? "No, no, no," said Partner. She didn't think that was case.
But then I looked over at her--tears again. She told me she couldn't ever answer the gift I was giving her by agreeing to have children this way: her eggs, my body. And she said she didn't know what she'd do if this didn't work. That it would mean another whole period of mourning for her.
And it was an honest and wonderful conversation that put many of my fears to rest, but gave me a new set: What if it doesn't work? What if my body betrays not only me, but her too?
Christ. Am I neurotic or what??
So I am sooooo excited for the gross Lupron, but I'm deathly afraid too. I wonder how normal this is for IVFers? How in the world am I going to calm down?
So the Lupron is starting something different in our one year of trying-- a new set of fears and hopes. And even if we don't have a baby or babies from this cycle or future cycles, we will be changed and nothing will ever be the same again.
posted by Katie at 2:40 PM
11 Comments:
You're both in my thoughts and prayers.
Kt and Laura,
It has been wondeful to read about your experience.. I feel like I am apart of it. You are going to make amazing parents... You are ment to do it... It sounds strange but much like your wedding I can feel it. I have been in what seems like 5 million weddings and the energy in the room left me high... it is that "energy" that will carry you both through this stressfull situation. I can't wait to meet this young life...and watch my good friends grow with it. It has been a wonderful trip thus far... I am just along for the ride.
I love you both,
Duffers
You have every right to be excited--this sounds like a big step for you two. Think of the wonderful potential lying ahead of you and try to allow your body to just relax. Welcome all the new additions and keep your faith...i think things will work out just fine for you. i'm crossing my fingers on this end. :)
You probably know all this, but I think you just very eloquently described entering what anthropologists (and probably others as well) call a liminal state. The space between one life state and another. The liminal is the dangerous: undefined and potent, a state in which power for change can take its own path. You enter liminality thinking you're transitioning into one thing, but once there can end up anywhere. Further, liminal people can affect others as well -- forcing them into change whether or not they were prepared (or thought they were prepared). Pregnancy is one form of liminality, but it is still not the same, because our society has made it into its own fixed state (though pregnancy is in reality still a very uncontrollable and precarious thing, as any woman who has had a miscarriage or still birth or child born with birth defects can attest). Though you are still traveling through immense change, the liminality of pregnancy has been named and contained somewhat by society. However, infertility -- and its processes and treatments -- has not been claimed from the liminal. Therefore, the process of getting pregnant through medical intervention is a powerful and frightening one -- that some people find untouchable at best and threatening at worst. Those in the liminal -- who become powerful and frightening, untouchable and threatening, who become the embodiment of unpredictable and uncontrollable change -- have a hard journey during which they can become very isolated.
Society has attempted to make liminality a bit easier to bear by creating rituals and rites of passage to provide social entries into and out of liminality, and that's what it sounds like your shot has become -- your doorway into liminality, though emotionally and mentally you may actually have entered it some time ago with the decision to use IVF. Here's hoping that you have a door out through a pregnancy test...
(this is my way of saying good luck and that I'm sending you and your partner lots of white light and positive vibes)
You have my prayers that your journeys (to motherhood, through grief) are peaceful and meaningful. And as short as they can healthily be.
If you're neurotic, then I am too. Do we get a prize??
We've been talking about having kids for years, and the actual process is just beginning for us. I think that going to the doctor appointment next week will be a turning point for us. Instead of talking to each other about it... and blogging about it... and talking about it vaguely with Katie's family, this will be real. A real conversation with a doctor who can hopefully help us. Calling the sperm bank to place our order. That's going to be a big moment. I totally understand what you mean. Take it step by step... you'll get there and so will we. :)
Oh, and by the way, I got my FertiliTea from early-pregnancy-tests dot com. Hope you like it!
Good Luck!
Good Luck!
Good Luck!
Good Luck!
You guys make my heart warm... :D Plus good luck to the fourth power from Trey!
I love the liminality. If I wasn't at work, I'd comment more on this, but I think that was a really nice explanation I can put my hands around. As much as one can do with liminal things. ;)
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