I've written before about infertility and worst case scenarios. At first, we think it will all be easy. The worst case scenario might be struggling to get pregnant. Then if we are lucky enough to conceive, a miscarriage is the worst case scenario. That can escalate, as it did for me, to life-threatening ectopic pregnancies. Then the worst case becomes IVF, then not even getting a chance to complete a cycle, and then childlessness. That gradual but relentless spiral down became familiar, until we reached the depths of where hope for that life did not exist.
I'm going through the same thing now with my husband. It is rough. I know I will come through it, and will survive. I just don't want to have to go through everything that is coming.
On top of everything that is going on, we got some shocking news this week. My sister-in-law, someone I've known since our first year at university together 45 years ago, died suddenly. She had been sick for years, but with the wonders of new medical advances, she had survived the last seven years, and was actively caring for her own husband (my husband's brother) who was facing severe medical challenges of his own. The situation was bad enough already. Talk about spiralling down.
For obvious reasons, we can't travel to support the family, my brother-in-law and my niece and nephew, in Asia. I am live-streaming her funeral mass as I write this. (The audio is terrible, which is why I am writing right now, but the music is lovely. She was a musician, and would have liked that). Emotions have caught up with me. Today, it is all too much!
My sister-in-law was always supportive of me. She recognised that my life was different because we did not have children. In particular, she has thought of me undertaking this care-giving role without adult children, or any family in this city. I have always appreciated her acknowledgements that sometimes, life without children is really difficult.
We'll get through this year, one way or another. I know that. Pregnancy loss and childlessness taught me that. But I've really had enough of these ever deteriorating worst case scenarios.
And so in honour of my SIL, I prefer to think of the road trip we took together from Amsterdam, where she was living 20 years ago, to Lille and Bruges (or Brugge). For years, we had talked about escaping, just the two of us, and this was our one opportunity to do so. I'll remember us laughing in the leather shop in Lille, in the middle of a Gay Pride Weekend, when we were assumed to be a couple. I'll remember her patience as she drove round and round the one-way loop road in Bruges, until I could figure out the navigation route to our hotel. I'll remember her pointing out all the Madonnas on the corners in Bruges, and eating mussels and later waffles there with her on a sunny, early summer day. And I'll remember her laughing at our soup course at the Michelin-recommended restaurant, as we tried to figure out how to eat it out of the tiny cups, with the sporks we had been given. Patience, and laughter in the face of challenges was a strength of hers, it turned out, as the years to come proved. I think that's a wonderful legacy. One I am trying to emulate.
