I got up just past three o’clock this morning to take a pregnancy test. I had tested earlier in the week, freaked myself out over a negative test, and finally rationalized that it was WAY too early to test. So I waited. I’ve done this enough to know that being surprised by “the call” sucks, so I promised Mike I’d wait until the day before the blood test to pee on yet another stick.
So here it is, 3am, and I just can’t take it anymore. The past 10 days have been a total fucking roller coaster filled with a confusing mix of very real pregnancy symptoms and very real doubt. I had originally planned to pee on the stick and leave it in the bathroom for Mike to look at. I just couldn’t bring myself to tell him, yet again, that it was negative. But when the first line started to show up immediately, I knew. I brought it into the bedroom, still dark. Always the optimist, he said, “don’t the instructions say to wait 3 minutes?” I left it in the bathroom and got back in bed while Mike diligently waited the additional two and a half minutes. I called in “you can stop staring at it now.” He came back to bed, silent.
Less than 5 hours before this, before we went to bed, I had this very real “holy shit, I’m pregnant” feel. I wish I could describe it. I think it was my brain deeply compensating for the pangs of doubt and consequently, guilt, all week. After spending tens of thousands, putting my body through SO much, and worst of all, giving my amazing husband, who wants this more than anything, false hope.
I wish I could tell you it doesn’t ever get any easier, but it does. Easier to accept the disappointment. Easier to imagine this will never happen for us.
I’m not sad. I’m angry. Really, really angry. How much more of this can we do? How much more can we handle? Why must my body decide, over and over, that this isn’t it? The embryo couldn’t have been more perfect. It’s me.
I’m angry that we don’t get to have what so many of our friends have. There, I said it. The one thing you’re never supposed to say. We watch them all with their children, many of them having 1, 2, or even 3 kids since we started trying six years ago. And for so many that have expressed gratitude that their child chose them – please tell me what we’re doing wrong. Please help me see what I can be doing different in order to have a child “choose” me. I beg you. Because I’m doing everything I know how to do, and clearly it’s just not enough.
See? I told you this was an angry post. I’m usually so careful to explain, over and over, how happy we are for our friends who do get to do this, and we are. Genuinely. But frankly, I just don’t have the energy to keep it together long enough to convince anyone, so please just take my word for it.
No, this isn’t over, and no, there is nothing you need to say or do. Thank you for reading, even if it was uncomfortable. Knowing you care enough to take the negative as it comes, alongside us, is so helpful. Too many people are going this alone, and it’s important to me that you know what the reality of infertility actually looks like.
This is it. Immense pain. And yes, so much gratitude. But right at this very moment, it’s pure torture.