The last few days had been crazy and emotional for me. It all started on Sunday.
Bob and I have had fights about my family. This fight about this particular topic has been recurring. And I feel like there is no resolution unless something or someone changes. Anyways, we had one of those fights on Sunday. I know it was Mother’s Day. I am the greeter at church every single Mother’s Day. This time it was no different. And I dare to say that it was actually not bad at all. I went and greeted people. I didn’t experience the constant bombardment of “Happy Mother’s Day” ringing in my ears like last year. I was fine seeing all the babies that were being dedicated during Sunday service. It was interesting to observe that out of the 7 or 8 families on stage, only one family had a single child. Everyone else was dedicating their third child. I actually wasn’t bugged by that. Just an observation. Bob and I were originally going to have leftovers at home. He suggested taking me out on Mother’s Day. We walked into our favorite taqueria and saw my brother’s whole family with their friends there. It was actually very awkward. We just saw them at church but we weren’t invited by them to lunch. My sister-in-law saw me and mumbled something like oh I thought about calling you. Anyhow, there has been tension with my one and only brother. Mainly Bob has felt that they treat friends better than they treat family. I can see his point and I don’t blame him. Bob didn’t say much about this incident, and we still had a great time having lunch by ourselves. Later on that afternoon, he asked me a question about my parents, questioning why I was opting to do something for my dad. I couldn’t understand why he questioned me. And he kept on pushing me to give him a reasonable answer. It started escalating and became a full-blown fight. I believe that deep down the whole Mother’s Day thing at church and bumping into my brother’s family at lunch triggered a lot of negative emotions and he needed an outlet. Infertility and money is also a part of this tension between us: the constant need to shell out more money, the stalling of the process, the lack of progress, etc.
Needless to say, although we made up, Sunday didn’t go well. The residual feelings spilled over to Monday morning. My eyes were puffy and life felt a little more grim than usual. I went to my saline sonogram that morning at 8:30am. I arrived early, paid my big money, and waited. I was called back in no time. Dr. Director (who is the director of the clinic) did my sonogram. The mock transfer was extremely easy. The catheter went in and came out. Dr. Director went on to do the saline sonogram. The dye went in and I could see my uterus on the big screen. She showed me the big fibroid that has always been there. Then she showed me a smaller fibroid. Those didn’t seem to be the problems as she put it, “They are behaving quite well”. However, she became silent while checking on something for a quite a few seconds. Going in, I didn’t expect anything other than my uterus looking okay because none of my previous scans, saline sonogram, or hysteroscopy showed otherwise. Dr. Director moved the wand and showed me on the screen this area that became dark and then light again, which might indicate adhesions or scar tissues. She asked if I had a surgery before. I did, but it was on the uterine wall, not in the cavity. I don’t know how scar tissues could move into the cavity. She took a few more images, finished the scans, and asked me to sit up. I asked her what this all meant. But she wasn’t willing to say anything. She just told me that Dr. No Nonsense would look over the scans and contact me about the next steps. I pressed further, and she said that he might request a hysteroscopy for me. But she would defer to his opinion.
Let me tell you. I wasn’t feeling well. My mind was immediately going to very dark places. I know that it is not logical, but my first reaction was that this could be a problem that would prevent me from carrying a child to term. I had arranged for a meeting with the donor coordinator immediately following the saline sonogram. While I was waiting for her to come get me, my mind was going wild. However, I was determine not to consult with Dr. Googl.e though. I waited for a very long time, about 45 minutes, before the donor coordinator came to get me.
I requested the meeting because I wanted to learn about the next steps after the precycle checklist has been done. The meeting didn’t go well either. Apparently, we have to wait until Dr. No Nonsense clears my saline sonogram. However, even with all the checklist items being done, we will not be matched with our chosen donor immediately. The donor coordinator will call the donor in July, which is a month prior to when she said she’d be available, to ask if she is indeed going to do the donation. So we really won’t know for sure until July. One point I am not clear is whether or not we will lose this donor if another couple ahead of us on the priority list becomes interested in her. I will have to ask about this in the future.
This totally sucks. There is no guarantee that we will get this donor until right before she can start a cycle. The donor coordinator’s explanation is that even if the donor says yes right now, she may still change her mind due to external factors like career change, trips, or other things. I can see that point, but it still sucks. Another thing is cost. If somehow the donor does not respond to the stims, the recipient will be out half of the donor compensation fee as well as the cost of the medication. Half of the donor fee is a lot of money. I guess it’s nice to have a proven donor so you know that she did respond well to drugs previously. But still. I can request a meeting with the donor, but my clinic does not assist the donor to take part in the Donor Sibling Registry. This is very surprising to me as this is a large clinic.
I walked out of the clinic feeling defeated. The fight the day before, the unknown about my uterine cavity, and the delay of being officially matched with a donor made life grim for me. I still had to go back to work and put on a happy face. Before that, I went to my jeweler to tighten the diamond on my engagement ring that apparently came loose over the weekend. My jeweler looked at it carefully and declared that he would have to keep the ring for a few days to fix it. I don’t like parting with my ring, but I had to. I said, Can you believe it that this ring is almost five years old? Jeweler said, Still no babies yet? And I said, I am not going to lie. We’ve been trying but it’s been very hard. My jeweler remained silent. I guess there is nothing to say when you give a brutally honest answer to these sensitive questions.
I hid in my office at work, with the door closed. I just couldn’t interact with anyone. Luckily I didn’t have any clients until the afternoon. I was worried about the saline sonogram results and had my phone close to me. Then, one of my FB secret group ladies, who had been trying for her second child for a few months, posted her BFP. I normally would not react strongly to this, but after all the not-so-good news, a pee stick picture was too much to bear. That was a perfect day for hiding under the blanket. But of course I had no way of doing that. I had to put on a happy face for the kids.
After my last client, my coworker, who knows nothing about our struggles, came in to show me the new Playmobil toys that she just purchase. My first thought was, You’ve gotta be kidding me. This is what she showed me:
I can’t even escape a pregnant lady when I am shown a toy. I am quite sure she is pregnant because the other Playmobil mommies all have flat tummies, although Aramis speculated that maybe she hadn’t lost her pregnancy weight yet. The only two things that I commented on this to my coworker were 1) She definitely didn’t have any problems conceiving, and 2) the kids are possibly from different dads.
The only silver lining the whole day was that I got street parking right away all three times I needed them. Small mercies, yeah?
I was exhausted when I got home. Mentally, emotionally, and physically. Dr. No Nonsense still hadn’t contacted me after a whole day. I really needed a mental health day to recuperate from all the things that happened in the past couple of days. I arranged for a day off on Tuesday and was going to do something that I would enjoy. I finished my last blog post, pressed Publish, then went to bed.
Wow. I was so surprised when I woke up at 5:45am and read my first comment. A comment not from an unknown troll, but from someone who had commented more than a dozen times in the past year. Someone who had been supportive and repeatedly cheered me on and offered her prayers. I actually had never received any negative comments before. This was the first time that I felt like someone had yelled at me very loudly for the choice that I am so carefully making for myself, my husband, and my future children. I was stunned that I was criticized for such a personal choice. And I was even more flabbergasted that this person did not voice her opinion in a respectful way on my personal blog, but used strong language to attack me. I am thankful for all the friends who commented and called this person out. I was actually not mad. But this whole incident left a bad taste in my mouth on a day when I was supposed to rest mentally, physically, and emotionally. I don’t see the need to explain my choices and my finances, but I will write another post to clarify the difference between frozen eggs and fresh eggs, as Julia so eloquently explained in the comment section.
I woke up this morning at 5:10am having the similar feeling that I had when I was banking embryos. I was feeling overwhelmed, stressed, and helpless. I need of strength and peace that could only come from the Lord. I prayed for Him to sustain me, and give me strength to get through the day. I got through today okay. Still no phone call or email from the clinic. I eventually emailed my nurse to ask for an update on the scan results as well as to ask whether it is a big problem for me to be having breakthrough bleeding 14 days straight (yes, today is cycle day 14 and I am still having light bleeding). So disappointing that nobody has gotten back to me. So I continue to wait. Jane Allen maintains that it could be good news if the doctor hasn’t contacted me, which means that it’s not a serious problem to begin with.
There you have it. My crazy few days. Sometimes I just feel that I should go back to see a therapist to talk through all my feelings. Unfortunately, mine is on maternity leave. But it may be worthwhile to see someone new in the mean time. I thought I could do it all, but I can’t. I need God’s help. And possibly another therapist.
In Quest of a Binky Moongee 