When the Ribbons Cross

Recently, celebrity reporter Guiliana Rancic announced that she was recently diagnosed with the early stages of breast cancer.  For those followings he public journey with infertility of  her and her husband Bill Rancic (of "The Apprentice" fame), hopes were that this 3rd attempt with IVF would be the time that finally they would have their miracle.  As a result of testing required by the infertility specialist, Guiliana found out that she has the early stages of Breast Cancer.  She is only 37.

Improvements and developments in the media and communication have increased the knowledge and awareness of breast cancer and most recently diagnosis  in younger women (those under the age of 40).  Public figures like Guiliana Rancic, are bringing about the awareness of Breast Cancer into the public eye.  Only now, with both her public struggles with infertility and now breast cancer are we seeing the pink ribbon of breast cancer and the teal ribbon of infertility awareness crossing.  Why haven't we seen this before?  Surely there were others who struggled with infertility and cancer!  Why are people more apt to talking about cancer but not about infertility?

Studies have shown that women with infertility are at an increased risk for breast cancer and ovarian cancers although it's unknown if it's related to decreased or increased hormonal levels or progesterone and estrogen levels.  Controversy still surrounds the risks of infertility medications and cancer as well.  With this knowledge, why haven't ribbons crossed earlier?  Because people aren't standing up and speaking about it.

There still seems to be an issue with individuals coming out about their struggle.  People tend not to want to talk about infertility.  But they will talk about their boobs.  So if the reason is embarrassment, wouldn't it be just as embarrassing to talk about your boobs and cancer in said body parts?  Possibly the cause of hesitation is because of a feeling of being flawed.  While cancer is not generally something that one is born with, many people believe that they were born with infertility, even when that isn't the case.  A man is more likely to stand up and talk about having testicular cancer but not to admitting to low sperm counts or erectile disfunction (no matter how many times a viagra commercial might make you try and think otherwise).

Why should we be embarrassed about our infertility?   Are we afraid of the comments that will be made if people knew?  Guess what?  They are already talking and making comments...what's the difference.  If we don't stand up and start talking about it we can't expect others to become aware and to stand up for us.  But its not just our infertility...its our overall health.  I found myself recently becoming so obsessed with things and overwhelmed with responsibilities and keeping myself busy that I ended up sick.  Severe tonsilities (with a possiblity of Strep...the cultures are yet to be finished...) has now left me speechless in talk but not in my written genre!

Take care of your health.  You are the only "you" that "you" have.

The Fear Factor

When I have the opportunity to be heading down the open road, I tend to think alot.  Yesterday, as I was traveling for work, I found myself thinking alot about my infertility journey.  Instantly a feeling of fear set over me...the kind that knots your stomach, makes you nauseated, and of which you can't shake.  What was the root of this fear?

The fear inside of me is that my biological clock is nearing its end.  The battery is running out.  The Big Ben inside of me will no longer ring.  The alarm won't snooze any longer.  Why I am feeling this way I am not sure.  Could it be that within 2 years I will be 40?  Could it be that no one in my family has conceived past the age of 36?  Could it be that I am seeing so many others that I travel this journey with also getting to this point where they are no longer able to hope for a child of their own but rather have to consider adoption as a possibility?  Yes...it's all of the above.

Fear, however, is something that we must face.  It's something that we must tackle head on.  Sure I can sit behind my computer and say that but I myself am struggling with that fear right now with nausea in my stomach and an extra twinge of pain that hits it when someone asks me my age.  Fear will remain with us no matter how hard we try to avoid or ignore it.  The old saying that the only thing to fear is fear itself is completely true.  I fear fear.  I fear thinking about the negative possibilities of my future as a mother to a natural child of my own.  I am an eternal pessimist.

How do we move beyond fear?  We puke, sleep, scream, and etc.  We do whatever it takes to push the fear out of our lives and we continue to breate.  If we allow fear to control our lives we end up not living at all but rather avoiding situations and people.  How is that living?  When we allow fear to control us we end up living in the pit of depression and sadness that infertility can bring about.

Lets tackle the fear together, you and I.  Continue to believe in miracles.

Define, Destroy, or Strengthen...which are you?

A friend of mine (and fellow infertile) used the following post on her Facebook account today which struck me as really deep and reflective.  It said:  "When something bad happens you have three choices. You can either let it define you, let it destroy you, or you can let it strengthen you."   Which do you choose?

As I sat and thought about that statement I realized how easy it would be to change that to say, "When Infertility happens, you have three choices:  you can either let it define you, destroy you, or let it strengthen you."  While we don't have the opportunity to choose infertility or even allowing it to happen to us, we don't have a choice in letting bad things happen to us either.  If we let it completely define us, we lose sense of what we have to offer and our entire life focuses around only the infertility and it's defining us.  If we let it destroy us, we are no better off and many times have lost things or people that were precious to us, not to mention we lose ourselves. We must let it strengthen us!  If we allow infertility to strengthen us it doesn't mean that we are going to let go of the issue altogether.  Rather, it helps us to find a new part of ourselves that we may have never otherwise encountered or come to know.

Infertility is a part of me, but it's not who I am or what I am.  Sure there are times I refer to myself in the sense as, "Yes, I am infertile," but it doesn't have to make up who I am.  I have a life outside just the infertility but I still can live the infertility 24/7 and it be a big part of me.   I am more than infertility.  I am a musician, an artist, a lover, an aunt, a daughter, a co-worker, and a teacher.  We have to find balance in our lives.  If we can find some sense of balance in our lives we can make it through even the toughest times.  That's not to say that I won't grieve, pout, be jealous, or even walk out of a room at the site of a baby or someone pregnant.  What it does mean is that I am open to the opportunity of growth in my life.  When we let it define and destroy us, we can never move beyond that hurt and the bitterness that accompanies it.  We must make sure that the yin and the yang are together and complete as one.

I chose to let infertility strengthen me.  Why?  Because the other options suck.  (Sorry...for the slang, but was there really any other option of a word?) When I started to let it define me in the past, I lost site of everything else in my life.  It nearly destroyed me.  My life was about nothing but infertility.  I had lost the balance.  I no longer did my artwork, played guitar,or even wrote. All I did was stare at infertility information, cried at the site of a baby, and felt hurt towards my husband because he didn't feel that same way I did....or at least he wasn't communicating it.  I couldn't live life knowing that I could lose everything for just the one thing I wanted more than anything.  I realized I needed a balance.

For me, the infertility struggle has strengthened me.  I have begun writing again.  Writing has always been a huge part of who I am and has been something I have always loved to do.  I found a new me in the writing and found it to be therapeutic.  A new me emerged!  I was now much stronger than ever before.  In reflection I looked back at the last 8 years and realized that even thought I really really wanted a child of my own, I was not completely ready in my life.  Would I have made myself ready? Sure.  I was just so caught up in the desire to have a child that I hadn't really made myself ready for the reality of a child.  We hadn't made "us" ready for a child.  The craziest thing is that I am okay with that.  I know I am more ready now than in the past, as is my husband.  When the time comes, I will know it was the right time. Until then I will have faith that it still is possible.  As I have said before, I won't stop believing in miracles.

So...when bad happens I chose to let it strengthen me?  How about you?

Courage

Courage as defined by Dictionary.com is the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, pain, or danger, etc. without fear.  It also states that it focuses on the heart being the source of the emotion.  A couple of weeks ago, someone came up to me at an event and told me that it took a lot of courage to talk about the roller coaster of a ride that we call infertility.  I had never thought of what I was doing as courageous. 

Throughout my life I was always told that you were to deal with the hand that life dealt you and you were to accept that there was a reason for everything that happened in life.  As I have gotten older I have had such difficulty understanding why I got dealt the hand I got from life and also why things happen.  (While I would like to throw religion and faith into the discussion here, I know that others going through this too don't see it necessarily in that same way so I will refrain from religious talk for now.) Maybe today is one of those bad days I have talked about, but for some reason, I continue to think about this concept.  Why was I dealt the hand I was?  What am I supposed to do?  Wait around and just hope that I get a different hand sometime or do I fold and walk away?  Sometimes it would be easy to walk away, but even then, you remember that you walked away from something and you still continue to hurt and it still affects you.

Let me give you a visual picture to think about.  If you are not an infertile person, look at your life now.  Now look at your life without your children, spouse, partner, etc.  While you may at first think that your life would be different, and you'd be right, 9 out of 10 of you would realize that in your life you'd feel there was a large missing piece.  How do you continue on?  Courage.

So why can't I see myself as courageous?  Is it because I feel a slight bit of selfishness or guilt in my desire to have a child?  Why can't I just accept the hand I have been dealt in life?  Because I believe.  I believe that miracles do exist.   I believe that there is a higher power (darn...there goes not bringing faith and religion into the conversation...).  And most of all I believe that if that higher power  (aka, GOD to me...) is an epitome of complete love for his creation, then I have to believe that my God wouldn't allow my heart to hurt for my entire lifetime.

I may be courageous for finally standing up and speaking out about infertility and raising awareness, but it takes more courage to live the life of an infertile woman.  Couple who deal with infertility have a greater strain on their relationships than most.  Not only do they deal with the struggles of not being able to conceive naturally or for some at all, but they are faced with the financial difficulties that occur when they are going through treatment after treatment.  It does take courage to stand up to people who criticize you when you speak about the cost and struggles with infertility treatments.  Especially when they say things like, "If you can't afford this how are you going to afford having a child?"  or "This is God punishing you for something you must have done wrong."  It takes courage to stand in a room and see friend after friend or family member after family member announcing their pregnancy...especially when they follow it up with the phrase:  "we weren't even really trying."  It takes courage to walk into the grocery store, dollar store, or pharmacy to purchase a pregnancy test every time you have to take a test (or because the "monthly visitor" has yet to rear her ugly head), knowing the likelihood you will see two lines is slim and yet have the cashier look at you and offer a "congratulations...do you think you are pregnant?"

I can't call myself courageous even though I walk this walk.  I can only see myself as an advocate and someone struggling with infertility.  While I thank the person who offered my the compliment of "being courageous," I impose this charge to everyone reading this:  don't sit back and only read this.  Be courageous for those like me.  Stand up and be an advocate.  Only through more people spreading the word about infertility awareness will we get the word out and differences be made. 

I don't know if I make that much of a difference with this simple blog, but I promise to not stop writing.  Not until there are more people standing up and speaking out and making a difference.  We have the opportunity to make a difference.  If not you, then who?

Are you there God? It's me....

The sun was shining through the windows of the motherhouse chapel at the Ancilla Domini Convent, a place I knew well from my time as a Sister with the Poor Handmaids of Jesus Christ.  As the sun shown through that stained glass window adorning the south side of the sanctuary wall, the light ever so brightly shone on two items on the all wood alter; the right hand of the Angel Gabriel  pointing to Mary the mother of Jesus and on Mary arms as she crossed them over her heart.  As I knelt there, witnessing this almost visionary moment, I was struck with the story of the visitation in the Bible.  For those of you who are Catholic or read the bible may recall the story of the visitation of the Angel Gabriel to Mary to tell her that God wants her to bear his son.  Mary's response?  Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord.  Be it done to me according to His will.  With my eyes still fixated on the statues raised high up on the altar I couldn't help but feel a bit of  jealousy towards Mary, the mother of Christ.  Not because I wanted to be the Mother of Christ.  Rather, I was jealous of her opportunity to be a mother.

Religion or choice there of doesn't affect ones fertility.  Just because I am Catholic, it doesn't mean I am closer to God and therefore less likely to be infertile.  What religion does is that it give us direction and support in dealing with our infertility through programs, etc.  However, it is our sense of spirituality that helps us make it through the times that are the most difficult.  A study (by Domer, Penzia, et al) even showed that in an evaluation of 200 infertile women, high levels or religiosity and spirituality were significantly correlated with low levels of psychological distress.

What I do find, is that I many times associate God with the reason for my infertility.  I know that I haven't done anything wrong to cause my infertility, so who can I blame?  My sense of spirituality helps my to be angry and God and to place blame on God.  What I have learned, is that God is okay with that.  God wants me to lean on him and seek his help.  It's not why I experience the infertility.  I highly doubt God would cause the one in order to have the other.  Rather, because I am human it exists and it is a possibility.  We can not assume that just because we have a belief in God or some sense of Religion that everything would be okay.  This isn't heaven.  This is Earth.

Everyday I find myself praying. I pray for my family.  I pray for others.  I pray to become a mother.  I know that prayer works.  14 years ago, as I prepared to leave the convent, I prayed to meet my husband.   I literally, everyday, prayed to find the man that I would spend the rest of my life with who shared the same faith and values as I did.  Within a month after leaving the convent I met Jeff.  5 Years later we married.  Now, please note that while I prayed for this, God made sure it was in his time, not my time. The same is with our fertility/infertility.

While for many this post is anything but comforting.  I didn't write it to only be a comfort or a blame for what we experience.  And I didn't write it as the answer to our infertility.  Rather, I wrote it to help others have a starting point.  So many of us feel alone, confused, hurt, etc., as we deal with our infertility.  Spirituality can give you some support and a lot less of a feeling of being alone.  It all depends on how we choose to use it.

There is a reason I wear a wristband that says "Believe in Miracles."  I wear it because it reminds me I am not alone in this journey.  It reminds me to depend on others and on God to help me through each day. It reminds me that I do believe that miracles can happen.  While sometimes I may wake up and wonder if my higher power, my God, is there,  I know that He is.  I just need to do my part and not stop believing.  If you are dealing with infertility and need some support, spirituality can help. 

Remember...don't stop believing in miracles.

(For any of my friends reading this post today, I apologize if I am not covering anything but Catholicism/Christianity.  Spirituality and Infertility is more complex then the amount of information which I can cover on this post today. I currently am in the process of writing a more thorough book on the subject of Spirituality and Infertility in which I will be covering various religions as well as what spirituality is.)

Change?

His bright blues eyes stared back at me.  As he smiled, I could feel myself smile too.  With his tender hand in mine, I stroked the back of his hand with my thumb.  For the first time in a very long time I found myself not aching inside.  Here in my arms was a 7 week old little boy.  A total stranger.  A young mother who came into our office to schedule an appointment had brought in her little newborn with her.  With her hands full, she asked me if I'd like to hold him as he had been smiling at me and "cooing." 

"He likes you," she said.

"Thank you.  Sure...I'd love to hold him. I love babies."  What was I saying?!?  Was I crazy?  Even the smell of a child would normally bring that intense aching and almost a feeling of anxiety about my infertility rushing into my heart and stomach.  I would even get dizzy and lightheaded at the site of one.  But for some reason, today was different.  Something had changed.  This time I found myself longing to hold this little one in my arms...if even for one second.  No, I wasn't planning some baby heist or even giving up.  Something had definitely changed in me.

As many of you may have read my last post last week, I was preparing to attend my 20 year class reunion.  Nervousness, fear, and anxiety plagued my thoughts and actions.  I planned on going in there and being strong as people flashed pictures of their children.  Instead, something different and unexpected happened.  I didn't have to try to be strong.  The support was immense.  Classmates came up to me not to show me pictures of their kids, but rather to tell me that they were reading my blog and that they enjoyed it and thought it was good.  Then they did something I never imagined.  They asked questions.  Now, these weren't the types of questions like, "Have you thought about adoption," or anything of that nature.  Rather, they dialogued and offered support.  They listened.  They had changed.  More so, I had changed.

Infertility sucks.  Plain and simple.  What I have learned about myself and this journey of infertility is that I am not alone in it.  If I open up to seeing the support that others out there are willing to give, it makes this journey a little easier to walk.  Society isn't out there to intentionally hurt those of us struggling with infertility.  Rather, it provides for a diverse arena for living.  People are the ones who hurt other people. Not society.  Sure there may be commercial after commercial for baby diapers or formula plastered in the middle of the day on TV and almost everywhere we look almost everything is geared towards families.  We as individuals have an opportunity to change how we perceive something.

Last month when that Breast Cancer awareness joke came around and I posted about it and how it affected me and others that I share this journey with, some of my friends quickly took it off their Facebook account and showed support to me and others.  If we expect others to always change for us, without providing change in ourselves, we are not truly growing.  Rather we are staying stagnant and are likely to become bitter individuals.  I was reminded by a classmate this weekend that this reunion was the true marker for if people would stay the way they were in high school or if they would change.  There were some who were truly snarkie and never even said "boo" to me unless I was the one to go and greet them first and even then the only words they spoke to me were "hi.".  Then there were the ones who not only changed into better people, but came up to me as soon as they saw me and said, "It's great to see you.  I am glad you came."  Clearly, change was good.

My lack of aching in my heart and womb was not because I no longer felt the longing to have a child of my own.  Rather, the lack of aching was because I realized that the feelings I was holding inside were actually alienating me from my true instincts to be a mother.  I had begun to forget what it felt like to hold a baby in my arms or how they smelled.  I had pushed myself away for fear of the hurt inside and for the fear that it would hurt too much. Likewise, I had held my infertility journey in for so long because I felt that to talk about it would hurt to much.  Instead, when asked this weekend about this journey, I opened up and talked about it, answering openly and honestly anything they asked.  It not only changed them, but it changed me. 

For all my infertile friends I give you one piece of advice:  Don't give up on others completely.  There may be people you have to de-friend but remember that you are not alone and there are others out there who have changed and will walk this with you.  Most importantly, you have to be willing to change. I found that out this weekend.  Not everyday is going to be easy but we just need to keep taking it a day at a time.

For all my fertile friends here supporting me I'd like to say one thing:  Thank you.  Thank you for walking with me on my journey and never giving up on me. 

My journey is not over.  I am not yet a mother.  I still hope to be someday.  I'll never stop believing in miracles.

What Goes Around, Comes Around

My palms are sweaty.  I'm a bit lightheaded just thinking about it.  I can't find a thing to wear amidst the 10 thousand things I have in my closet and dresser drawer. I am even going and working out this afternoon till I can't stand anymore in hopes that those extra 20 lbs I wanted to lose would drop off miraculously.  Yeah...that means its time for my high school class reunion.  But it's not just any class reunion...it's my 20 year class reunion. 

Some days I find it hard to believe that I have been out of high school for 20 years already.  They say (even though I still haven't figured out who "they" is...) that your high school years are the best years of your life.  Well, when I figure out who "they" is, I plan on showing "them" what my high school was like.  I was one of two things at any time.  I was either invisible or bullied.    Bullying didn't have to be words back then only.  It could be glances, sneers, comments overheard, etc.   You were placed in one of several groups:  the preppies, the heavy metal rockers, the jocks, the nerds, or the nobodies.   I was a nobody. There were times I wanted to die.  There were times I wanted to run away.  But then there were also times that weren't so bad.  Either way, I didn't always feel I fit in with everyone.  I had to work hard to make friends, and yet what few friends from my high school that I did "hang" out with, I don't even have that kind of connection with now.  My self esteem sucked to say the least and I didn't like myself or my body.  As a youth, my parents had convinced us that what goes around comes around so I had told myself that when I got older, things would be okay...that I would have a great life and be better off than I was when I was a teenager.  I had this idea that I would have a ton of really awesome friends, a great body, the perfect family, the beautiful house and lots of money. 

The way my life has turned out has not exactly been what I had envisioned.  My body?  Yeah...definitely no where near great.  Not even mediocre or fair.  And while I have quite a few awesome friends, (at least 412 according to Facebook...) I really feel only real close to only a couple handfuls of people.  My house is, well, in the ghetto in South Bend and while its not a total mess, we constantly have things in need of repair.  I work in the social work and health field so obviously I don't make the big bucks.  Regardless of the friends, the house, or the money, I would be totally content if only I could have the family.  Not even the perfect family...just a family.

As I think towards the events of this weekend, I can't help but think about being placed in a "group" again: the childless.   High school reunions are about being able to see people that you haven't seen in years in order to catch up and about being able to show how far you have come in your life.  For some of my classmates, they will have children in high school (or for a couple, a little older yet).  Some will even have newborns.  I will be in the "married for awhile and still childless" group.  While others are showing pictures on their iphones and droids of their kids, what will I have to show?  Nothing.  Not too many people get as excited about seeing pictures of our two dogs as we may be proud of showing them.  

So...some of you will say, "Why go then?"   And here is my answer:  I have come far.  I may not be a top attorney or a doctor, have the half a million dollar house or the money to go with it, or even have the body of a model or top athlete.  And for sure I don't have the perfect family.  Why would I want to put myself throughout his emotional roller coaster?  Sure I could make up some amazing story of having invented something like the post-it note.  (okay...not really.  But do you like the reference to the movie Michelle and Romy's high school reunion there?)  But with the invention of the social media sites like Facebook, anyone who has internet access can see I am just an average person. 

Why I am going is because I don't want to let infertility be my bully and keep me from being proud of how far I have come in my life.  I may not have the body of a model or even fairly good looking, but I am me and I know what I have gone through in my life to get where I am now.  I may not have the best house in the world, but in today's economy I am happy to have a roof over our head and to not be on the verge of foreclosure as so many are.  I may not have a lot of money, but somehow the bills (well..most of them) get paid every month and we haven't starved yet.  I may not have tons of friends, but the close friends I do have, I know would be there in an instant if I needed them.  While I don't have the perfect family, I have a husband who supports me enough to be by my side this entire weekend...even through the dreaded high school building tour!  We may not have children, but I won't let that get me down this weekend.  It may be hard and at times I might feel the jealousy towards others who have their perfect family with the 1.2 kids.  I know that I am no longer a nobody.

What goes around doesn't always come around.  I am okay with that.  I can't live my life thinking how unfair it is.  I am the only one who can make a difference in how I see my life.  And I see that no matter what, I am not giving up hope.  Bring on the pictures.  I will survive.