A Breakdown At Work

Posted on August 16, 2013 by imfluffyowl

You know what guys and gals? I’ve been having a rough week.

It’s been a rough July and a rough start to August if I’m being truly honest, but it seemed to hit its brink the other night.

I’ve been quite proud of myself lately. I’ve been able to detach myself from our struggles with infertility. I’m in another six week wait while I wait for the time I can go through my blood work again to see if my thyroid has finally gotten its act together and went back to normal. So really there’s not much I can do.

I’ve transitioned out of my bitter, angry infertile stage over the past year. Four years of being constantly angry and bitter was apparently my breaking point and I’ve transitioned into a calmer but still frustrated infertile. I like to think about it by comparing it to waxing. Waxing for the first time is a bitch and you are red raw afterwards. But the more you do it, the more you build up a tolerance for it. I’ve developed a thick skin at this point. Not just with the waxing, but with infertility in general. I’ve let other things keep me busy. I have less bad days. I can handle reading about pregnancies and I can even congratulate people now. I’ve spent a lot of my summer so far doing couples things with another IF couple and its been great to have kid free stuff to do. But when I do have a bad IF day, its BAD. I guess thats the down side to this transition. I passed in all my slightly bad emotional days for a handful of really, really bad breakdown days. One of these days happened at the worst possible time. At work.

Generally work is fun (believe it or not). We have a great group of people who laugh and joke and get along wonderfully. We range in age and lifestyle. Some are moms and grand moms, the lone male in our room is so young he’s fresh out of university and we refer to him as “the puppy” or “Justin Beiber” even though he looks and acts nothing like the crazy Canadian pop star (yeah, as a Canadian, sorry about unleashing that on the world, we didn’t really have a say in it.) A couple of the woman, I’ve grown particularly close to and tomorrow is the last day of their casual cycle and they are off til the new year. Another girl, closer to me in age is staying in her spot while I’m moving over to the other building with the rest of the remaining team. When I say that we’ve gotten close, I mean that we added each other on Facebook, are on the lookout for things we mentioned to each other, and I’ve told them that we are dealing with infertility after they inquired why we don’t have kids yet and they haven’t treated me differently and in some cases, have asked about it.

But yesterday, as I was joking with some of my coworkers over something silly during lunch, I was scrolling through my Facebook news feed to pass he time and all I see is nothing but parents complaining about their children. Earlier that day and earlier this week, I listened to other staff in the building complaining about their children and for some reason, at that moment during lunch, it was like a tidal wave of pain hit me. I had no warning. Tears streaming down my face, trying not to sob or draw attention to myself, I couldn’t get up and go cry in the bathroom because there would be no way to hide my face and if my coworkers saw me in that state, they are the type of people to follow me, concerned, to make sure I was ok. I was embarrassed by the breakdown. I went from giddy and laughing to emotional mess with absolutely no warning. I felt the emotional toll this was having on me along with the financial toll as wave after wave of pain hit me. Ever since, I’ve been somber, depressed and completely scared of what may never happen. It’s been making work…difficult at best. My concentration is absolutely shot and I’m fighting to get through the work that is normally a breeze for me. My mind is suddenly entirely focused on one thing, our infertility.

It’s been 4 years and we are still doing basic testing. I don’t even know my treatment options yet. How much longer do I have to wait for those? Let alone treatment and the possibility of it actually working.

And now? My period is late. Like 15 days late when I know with absolute certainty that I’m not pregnant because 1. According to tests, I haven’t been ovulating for awhile despite getting my period in the past. 2. It’s been a long time since we last had sex. 3. I’ve been so stressed with everything that I’ve lost my sex drive. (If found please return to me directly, thanks.) 4. Did I mention that its been a long time since we last had sex? Cause I actually don’t remember when unless I check my iPeriod app.

I’m just tired of the pain, of all of this. I just want the only thing I ever dreamed of doing in my life: being a mom.

All Anyone Needs Is Respect & Support

Posted on April 28, 2013 by imfluffyowl

All this week, I’ve been sharing information about infertility. It’s one of the few weeks out of the year where I’m actively using facebook as a way to get information out there. I normally use facebook in a very superficial way. I update my daily photo for project 365, I have a couple of ongoing chats with a handful of friends, I check in on our private group for the parents of our Brownies, I stop by my secret girls night group to check in with my girlfriends and laugh at some racy cartoons or photos that either my dad or some of the ladies from darts decided to share or share something funny on a friends wall. I just simply don’t have much use for facebook. Many of my friends will share pictures of me from stuff I do with them, I let them tag me in whatever they want because I never do anything racy enough to garner any negative feedback from anyone. And other than an occasional article on infertility that I share with the heading “for those that might be interested” knowing that I have a handful of friends on my feed struggling privately with infertility, I generally keep quite on facebook. I like to leave most of my ranting for other social media.

Prior to the start of NIAW, I shared a status update to let everyone know I was taking part in social media activities for NIAW and apologizing upfront for any news feed spamming through the week. While many in the past have shared their dislike in my posts or have come to me with questions wondering why I can’t simply be happy with all that I already have, I still ended up shocked (in a good way!) by the response I received. Many applauded me for sharing and expressed their eagerness to learn more. One person in particular, someone I went to high school with no less, was the most supportive. She was saddened by the fact that I felt the need to preface my participation. But she was also the one to understand more than anyone else. She has opted not to have her own children because she is a step-mom to her husband’s two children from a previous relationship. She shared with me her frustration at people questioning her decision to not have biological children. Her own frustrations helped her to have empathy and understanding for my own struggle, even if we were on opposite ends of the family building spectrum.

The reason that I’m sharing this information with you is because my response to her comment received a lot of positive comments and really gave me my direction for this week:

“If I learned anything over the last 4 years, it’s about respecting everyone’s decision on family building. It’s not for everyone and not everyone will fall into a perfect cookie cutter idea of a family. Some have step children they adore and don’t need to add to their family. Some want to adopt. Some choose to live child free. Some want to have many children. Some prefer to go the foster care route. Others need to pay for expensive treatments out of pocket for just a chance. Many of those people dealing with other conditions that are causing their infertility. And no matter what, every single one of those people and their choices need to be respected and supported.”

And that right there is the point of everything we are doing. Everyone’s family building choices need to be respected and supported. Whether you never wanted children in the first place, you are infertile and choosing your family building options or anyone else in between. All any of us want is to be treated as equals. That it be the same for everyone. That we have access to whatever resources we need to reach our goal. To have those options available to us regardless of how much money we have or don’t have. To have access to treatments without it costing an arm and a leg.

We just want to be treated with respect and want our choices to be respected and supported.

Such a simple request falling on deaf ears…

Pretend Pregnancies Are Not Funny In Any Situation

Posted on September 4, 2011 by imfluffyowl

You know what? I find it funny that people out there have no problem coming into infertility support groups and websites telling us that we are whining and no one really cares about our infertility and we should just deal with it. No, I won’t just “deal with it”. I also won’t deal with people posting pretend pregnancies on facebook under the guise of “supporting breast cancer”. Sure, maybe it was done in good fun. But it definitely wasn’t done in good taste. Not for those dealing with breast cancer, not for those dealing with infertility and definitely not for those dealing with infertility because of the treatments they went through because of breast cancer. Guess what folks, the Cancer Society does not back up this stupid, fucked up facebook meme. Its stupid and insensitive. And no money is going to any cancer foundations because of your post.

You wanna know what is being passed around on facebook? Through quick deduction: your birth month and day. And a quick search on most of your facebook profiles and the groups you like (especially if you have your school reunion group, and elementary, junior or senior highschool groups)? That gives them your birth year along with your name and in some cases a phone number, an email address, and a current address. Which in my very limited knowledge of identity theft, is enough to steal your identity and wrack up a ton of debt in your name and take out a couple of insurance policies on your name. Why? Because there are probably no privacy settings set on your facebook. Or limited at best. Cause smart people don’t do these memes and dumb people don’t protect their online information.

I’m a bit angry over it because there are websites out there for people suffering from infertility, where they can go to find support. There are prominent bloggers that have the amazing ability to post in a way that speaks in some way for all of us. They just get it and understand and they were born writers. Yet “outsiders” are coming in and calling our applause to these people speaking out as childish or telling us that we are up tight and just let it go.

If someone makes a joke about AIDS awareness, is that OK? What about Autism? or cerebral palsy? I have an Aunt who has cerebral palsy and I would choke a fucker if they ever made a crack at her or at her condition’s expense. Even if it was something not even remotely related to me, I’m the person who would take the stand and say, “I’m sorry but that’s inappropriate.” That doesn’t make me uptight, I’m simply aware of other people’s suffering and willing to step up and voice when I feel that they are being treated or spoken of unfairly. I’m not uptight, I’m human and I have a heart. I don’t like to see people suffer in any form. I originally planned on becoming a social worker but when funds ran out and student loan refused any more funding, that dream disappeared. But what bit of training I had, has clearly carried over into my life. I will stand up for the people who don’t have the courage to.

I suffer from infertility. I cry myself to sleep. I cry when I hear pregnancy announcements. I talk with my friends about it, at least the friends who clearly support my struggles. I do not burden anyone with this that doesn’t know how to handle it. I have only recently came out about it. Many family and friends had no clue. We cannot have children naturally, we cannot go through this process without help from doctors. We will pay thousands upon thousands of dollars for fertility treatments that MAY NOT WORK. And I think fertile people take that for granted. They don’t have these feelings. They wouldn’t cause they have never been through this.

This, of course, is not meant to take away from your happiness. But just like engagements and weddings and buying a house, its most important to you. You don’t take us into consideration when you post about it, yet we are suppose to take you into consideration when we post about our struggles? I know not all people think like that, but many are attacking the infertile community about this because of our outrage about this new “meme” going around. I’m sure if I posted “I’ve just been diagnosed with ______” (insert your choice: AIDS, Cancer, Autism, Cerebral Palsy, other disease or condition that affects millions) and then when the sympathy comments come in with “Oh I’m so sorry”, “Pull through it, you’re a fighter” and then I say “ahhh I fooled you, we are doing this as a meme to promote something not even remotely related to this topic, heads would roll. In specific, my head would roll. People would come out with their pitchforks and axes calling me everything under the sun and demand an apology to that group in particular. And if it got enough movement, it would become viral and people would want to interview me. And when I told them it was all in good fun for a good cause, people wouldn’t care. They would call it a cruel joke done by someone looking for attention.

But you wanna hear something funny, and really a true testament to the type of people that are out there? I have a rather small number of people on my facebook. After getting rid of toxic people out to cause trouble and people I simply don’t talk to, I cut down that number by 1/3. Then, I came out of the closet (of sorts) about our infertility. From there, I started promoting infertility articles and resources on facebook. Nothing in your face or rude/offensive, simply information about PCOS awareness month, funny jokes about infertility, great infertility bloggers worth reading, important info from Resolve.org about resources. Stuff that some of my “silent infertile” friends would not know to look for without someone sharing a link. And I figured that if people are allowed to post about their pregnancies in any way, shape or form, then why can’t I post about our infertility? My goal was for every pregnancy announcement or pregnancy related post or profile picture change, I would post one thing about infertility. But this makes people uncomfortable. People have started to remove me on facebook without telling me. I laugh cause I guarantee you that that same person has a friend who posts about their cancer treatments and they are supportive, but me talking about infertility and getting a voice out there for people suffering and trying to rid the stigma and taboo stuck to infertility will cause so much discomfort in people that they would rather remove me without telling me then deal with the possibility of supporting us during our trying time. At least 7 people so far have removed me like this and all since I started posting about it and like I say, its not even personal information, its just links to official Resolve articles and blogs about the topic.

After such a heated post, I don’t really know how to end it. I’ve simply run out of steam…