So many thoughts; so little inclination to write anything.

I felt a bit gung-ho about the DHEA thing for a day or so, but it’s not something you can just start buying over the counter and swallowing. Well, you can actually, but I don’t think I should do it without guidance.

The way I’m thinking at the moment is, as I said in my last post; another cycle will most likely get the same results. My eggs just don’t have the goods at the moment. Therefore, the only option is to try to improve them. As I’m sure many of you know all too well, SOME people have got results from acupuncture, dietry supplements, herbal remedies etc.

I’ve been using “alternative” treatments my whole life. Big H and I both went through 3 months of herbal treatments prior to starting IVF but with no discernible results for either of us. So I don’t really feel very hopeful about that approach either. When I think logically about it – it’s not going to be that expensive compared to IVF, and it would surely have beneficial side effects for our general health. But the thought of finding a naturopath and doing more tests and answering all the questions and starting over,  just makes me want to get into bed and pull the doona over my head. Then there’s the whole can’t eat this, can’t eat that routine; as if I’m not suffering enough. I guess I’m not ready to make a decision yet.

In fact this week I’ve finally acknowledged that I’m grieving. There’s such a taboo about infertility isn’t there? I feel like I’m making a fuss by saying I’m grieving. Like I don’t fit the profile of a person who is allowed to grieve. But the fact is that grief is not a lifestyle decision, it’s a documentable emotional/ physiological process, and it’s happening to me whether I like it or not. I’m angry and tearful. I find myself bargaining with the universe about what I’ll do if I’m allowed to get pregnant. I have moments of denial where I block my mind to the reality and pretend it’s not happening. This is all part of the five stages of grief. The last one is acceptance. I don’t see that happening any time soon. The only “meaning” I can come up with for being infertile is that I’ve been deemed faulty by some higher power who has decided to switch off my reproductive capacity in order to save the human race from any further unnecesary suffering. Probably not the case, but as you probably have noticed,  infertility is a great antidote for self esteem.

Lost

It’s been two weeks since my last entry. I was ignoring my blog. I was even considering erasing it and never thinking about it again.

After the disappointment of only getting two embryo’s my confidence took a bit of a knock. But they both seemed to be growing so who cares, like I’ve said before, we only need one.

So the day 5 transfer was arranged and compared to the collection it was a breeze. When the doctor arrived she had our report and before she said anything I saw that our embryos had been downgraded from “good” to “poor”. One of them had stopped moving and the other was a day behind where they would want it to be. I don’t think think I was a very easy patient to deal with for the embryologist because I got so sad at that point I could barely hold a conversation. I think I probably said what I was feeling, which was, “what’s the point?”.

When we got into the surgery my doctor said that it looked like the better embryo had started to move a little bit, which sounded hopeful. And so in it went. I made a mental note of the fact that my doctor, who is pleasant enough but tends to spew forth statistics rather than empathy, was already talking about “next time” and what they will learn from this cycle. Almost like this one was an experiment.

After that I didn’t know what to say. I was lurking on other blogs but wasn’t really able to connect with what was happening for me. Except that after a week a sense of excitement had started to develop, along with a realisation that I really wanted this to work. That probably seems strange but if you’ve read some of my earlier posts, I’ve had trouble working out whether having children is the choice I really want to make. Well, maybe biology took over because my body seemed to think it was a good idea. I loved having sore breasts (and bigger than usual too, which if you’re an A cup, I’m sure you’ll sympathise with!)  and I found myself fantasing about family outings and all the wonderful things Big H and I would do with this beautiful child born of our love and devotion to eachother.

Blood test day was the 24th. On the 23rd I woke up and knew it was all over. I was bleeding and sobbing on the toilet within half an hour. The clinic said I still really had to come in for the blood test to confirm it. I noticed that the nursing staff made no mention of where I was at in my cycle. I don’t think they would have known that it was already clearly a negative, I think it must be policy not to mention it in case people are in exactly my position. It felt weird and cold, but I guess it’s a sensible way to approach it. Definitely my least favourite clinic visit.

I’m exhausted from bleeding and crying. I don’t know what we will do. I want to thank you for posting comments – it’s why I am writing now. I opened my inbox and you were there. After a good sob I decided to put this down.

I’m sorry I have no words of hope right now. And I know I’m not the only one going through this, it’s only my second cycle. I don’t know if there will be any more. I’m back to not knowing how I feel.

The meaning of it all

I was interested to see that yesterday someone found this blog by searching on “ivf existential crisis”. I have used this phrase before but haven’t posted lately on the subject. And yet amid all the blood tests and the multi-vitamins this is very much what this experience comes down to for me. I am in a constant state of confusion about how I feel. And while I appreciate that no two people ever feel exactly the same, I suspect I am not the only one who struggles with the weight of not just the grief, anger, resentment and frustration that can come with the IVF territory, but also with the strangeness of what it means to be put in this position in the first place . When I think about this, combined with the fuzzy headed-ness brought on by the drugs, I want to congratulate us all for ever managing to leave the house.

If you read some of the professional literature around treating IVF patients, you will find our condition referred to as “a hidden disability”. I had realised for myself that my identity was uncertain in the face of infertility; it is still shocking to me that I can’t conceive. It still doesn’t seem to fit the image I have of myself. As many times it has been proven to me over the last few years, I still don’t feel like it’s real. Sometimes I still find myself baffled that I’m doing IVF. Me.

So I think the term “hidden” is important here. My infertility is hidden – through my choice – from most people in my life. I protect it from the curiosity and assumptions of people I don’t trust to understand. I also think society keeps the reality of infertility hidden from itself because, like me, it doesn’t know how to integrate it into the realms of normal experience. What could be less normal than the inability to reproduce? Our very existence depends on the fact that we can do so. On a very deep level, I think most people don’t know what to make of the reality of infertility.

So no wonder some of us feel existential angst. Our experience doesn’t make any sense. One of the most important parts of grieving is thought to be that ultimately some sort of meaning is made from what you go through. In some way, the traumatic event will come to make some kind of sense in your life. You will relinquish suffering and find acceptance. I haven’t found that place.

As I’ve mentioned before; I don’t feel like I can’t survive if I don’t have kids. On the contrary; part of my struggle has been to choose to even try. I’m caught between wondering if it’s really not meant to be – there’s something else I’m meant to be doing – and feeling like I have been deemed by some greater power to be unworthy, faulty. That my infertility is natural selection, because there is something fundamentally wrong with me that doesn’t belong in the gene pool.

Existential angst is borne of the struggle to find meaning in a meaningless world. I don’t feel I need children to discover the meaning of my life, but I do need to find the meaning of being required to think so carefully about the idea of having them at all.

Is there such as thing as “psychological infertilty”?

My therapist put something interesting to me the other day which was really hard to hear, but I know it’s true. And that is, I operate on a pretty “masculine” level most of the time. I’m not a gender separatist, but I do believe that it makes sense to basically divide certain characteristics into masculine and feminine. Importantly, I also believe that both men and women carry both kinds of characteristics and ideally should be able to draw on them appropriately depending on what the situation requires.

So, my “masculinity” shows in my extreme need to analyse and make sense of things logically. To organise information systematically. To hold onto my feelings tightly and to remain in control. None of these things are problems in themselves; my therapist’s point was that I’m unbalanced. I don’t allow myself to be chaotic, I punish myself for not achieving, and I don’t nurture myself when I feel bad. Masculine, feminine, whatever; the point is I’m out of touch with myself and it’s stopping me from moving forward in my life. It’s hard to explain, but it was one of those moments where I knew I was touching on something true about myself.

The reason I’m putting it down here is because I am starting to wonder if and where this might fit into my infertility. It’s hard to summarise a life of feelings, but; the simple truth is I have never been very self accepting, certainly never felt good about my body, never really seen myself as a “real” woman; empowered and sexually confident. The more I think about it the more I realise that it many ways, especially regarding my sexuality – my womanliness and all that entails; I’ve felt… incomplete, disconnected…not ready.

Whether this has anything to do with having babies, I can’t really say. The question in the back of my mind is, of course, do I have time to find out?

Caffeine Compromises Fertility

It’s official. Well official enough for me. My dear friend who’s a naturopath rang me the other day with some research she’s been looking into. It seems that caffeine increases dopamine (no surprises there). The problem is in the way the dopamine interacts with estrogen. I can’t remember the explanation exactly but the gist of it was every little jolt of caffeine – that is the amount you get in a standard caffeinated soft drink – temporarily lowers your fertility. It recovers, but if you’re taking in caffeine every day you’re probably operating on a less fertile system than you could be. I seriously doubt if I can get any less fertile, but talking to her strengthened my resolve to get back on the wagon with the coffee. My intake was creeping up again, so now I’m trying to get excited about tea leaves. Low caffeine tea leaves. They’re called “Formosan” in case anyone’s interested. Naturally tannin free and low caffeine.

Contraceptive Blues

I feel like crap by the way. I’m kind of blaming being back on the pill. I don’t know if that’s true. My head hurts and I’d quite like to stay in bed. I keep trying to engage Big H in screwy, emotionally enmeshed conversations about what’s going wrong in our relationship. Nothing is. I just feel like crap and I can’t stand it so I dump it on him. He’s very sympathetic, but there’s a limit to how much misery anyone can take, and I don’t want to wear him out, because for all I know it could be down hill from here!

Which is why I’ve started seeing a therapist. We don’t really talk about IVF that much, so far. We’ve mostly talked about the fact that I cry when people are nice to me in supermarkets.

I’m still not talking to anyone about IVF really. It seems ungrateful but I just find the attempts at support by people who don’t get it to be so woefully inadequate that I end up feeling sorry for them. When I think about before this was happening to me, I know that no matter how sincerely I might have tried I could not have really got how this feels. I don’t even know how to describe it now, and it is happening to me.

Just to be clear; the extent to which I’m not talking about it goes to the fact that I haven’t told either of my parents we’re doing IVF. My brother is the only one who knows and he seems to find it pretty hard to talk about so we usually don’t. My naturopath friend is the only person who’s really up to date. I don’t know how that compares to other people? Do you think I’m making a mistake?

Yes, I’m aware it’s clear that the relationships in my family are clearly not very emotionally open. Which is why I’m protecting myself I guess. I figure if it works I won’t care what they think and if it doesn’t I’ll never have to face talking about it with people I don’t feel safe with. Not very psychologically mature of me but there it is.

Anyway I’m off to make an apple tea cake, with blueberries on top.

No sex please, I’m infertile.

I’ll get to the sex bit in a minute, but I just wanted to clarify something about that last post. It probably came across as a little trite to anyone who suffers from depression. The whole “deciding to be happy” thing is just my way of trying to get some relief from the melancholy I seem to get drawn into most days. I’m experimenting with how much I can influence it, because it seems to me that to some degree at least, I can. Sometimes. I’m not can’t-get-out-of-bed/ can’t-stop-crying/ suicidal thoughts depressed at the moment, and I wouldn’t dream of telling someone who was, to “decide to be happy”. It’s just something I’m trying out this week. Next week it might be eating cake every day. Oh yeah, I already do that…

This week’s cake is a lemon slice. I won’t be doing that again in a hurry. Not that it was bad – in fact it was deliciously zesty – but  I need a cake I can eat in emotional-vacuum-filling quantities. Having attempted that with the lemon slice today I have broken out in a tingling cold sweat across my top lip, and my eyes are watering. This is not my idea of comfort food.

The sex bit

As for day four on Lucrin – still nothing to report.  But while we’re on the subject of hormones, I will once more gently pose the question; AM I EVER GOING TO WANT TO HAVE SEX AGAIN, EVER?! I just feel like I’m switched off. I like the idea, but I just can’t follow through. Is it the three months straight on active OCP’s? Is the Lucrin making it worse? Am I a robot? Or is my infertility now so deeply comprehensive that I will never have any kind of even vaguely sexual or reproductively oriented urge again?

Maybe I’m more depressed than I thought.

Of course, having started the Lucrin on Thursday, I stopped the OCP on Saturday, which means I’m supposed to get a period. Which is great because I always feel like having sex when I’ve got my period…(not). I think I can, as of the last two minutes feel a bit of a cramp coming on. Then again, the lemon slice OD may have consequences that are yet to be revealed. Also, in hindsight, the leftovers I ate for lunch were probably older than I wanted to admit while I was inhaling them, so I think I’ll reserve judgment for the moment.

Either way, I suspect I may be on the crest of a hormonal wave.