Time to get uncomfortable. Ready to feel some feelings? Let’s talk about Mother’s Day. I’ve discussed this with a few other women in my support group who have struggled with infertility and have completed their journey – either through stopping treatment, or achieving success through IVF, adoption, or surrogacy. And a common thread among us is extreme difficulty reconciling your feelings about motherhood when you have closely identified (and lived) as an infertile person for a long time. You mark days like “Mother’s Day” and “Father’s Day” on your calendar and make a mental note about how that will be a day...
No, this is not an album title…though now I feel like I should use it (so dont steal it!). This is something that has been on my mind to share for a few days, but it seems appropriate now because well… I had a little bit of a meltdown yesterday. Okay, okay…maybe it was a big, ugly crying breakdown. I have received a lot of compliments about how ‘strong’ I am, or remarks about how much courage it takes to write down our experiences like this. Truthfully, because I am terrible with compliments, I laugh or minimize these comments because...
In case anyone has forgotten, and I haven’t said it in a while – IVF is really, really, really expensive. Even more so, because our insurance does not cover any of the prerequisites that we needed to have done to proceed with IVF. In one week, between our consult, Dean’s semenanalysis and my sonohysterogram, we’ve spent $1,230 of our modest personal savings. We knew from the beginning that we would need to get some sort of financing, because we (like most people) dont have $17,200 just lying around. Oh, I’m not sure if I mentioned this – in order to begin treatment, we have...
Before I even get into the details, let me just say two things – 1) This blog is going to include all the less than pleasant details (including medical terminology), so if that is not your thing, you may not want to read. 2) Holy crap, what a ridiculous amount of information that was thrown at us today. Complete overload. Dean and I arrived for our appointment ahead of time and had filled out all of our paperwork ahead of time (because, planner). The ladies at check-in were very nice and accommodating. When I advised that they should have received a...
After being together for almost 10 years, my husband Dean and I have officially been diagnosed as an infertile couple. This means that our only option of conceiving a child together is through In Vitro Fertilization (IVF). It has taken a long time and a lot of consideration for us to decide whether or not we wanted to share our story publicly, but the situation has changed in such a way that we cannot (and should not) remain silent any longer. Ever since I was a little girl, the only thing I ever dreamed of being was a mother. In...
