Balancing my message

I read an interesting article* today, that talks about countries that measure happiness and receive a high ranking, and how that can actually increase mental distress. In brief, it said that if you are told you should be happy (because you live in one of the happiest countries in the world, for example) but you are not, then your level of isolation and mental distress is going to be higher. 

Effectively, it seems that this is the old equation whereby Satisfaction = Performance less Expectation. If you expect to be happy and are told that you should be, but you're not happy (for whatever reason), you are going to feel even worse. Your expectations have been raised, and by not achieving them, you feel even more deficient. The article noted of course that social media can accentuate this, because of the pressure to show only the beautiful parts of our lives, or only the best photos, implies that everyone else is living a wonderful life, except us.

When reading the article, it immediately made me think of those of us who are Not Kidding. We have been (or still are) surrounded by people telling us that parenthood is the ultimate goal (as it may have been for us at one time too), and that we won't know true meaning, love, and happiness if we are not parents. It is no wonder that, fighting against that paradigm, we find it so hard to deal with the world sometimes, and find our isolation and otherness to be distressing. But of course, that's because the difficulties and stresses of of being a parent, and the regret that some parents may feel, are not given equal air-time, or equal validity. Most parents, even if they do want to scream in disappointment, anger, and/or frustration, won't do it on social media because they want to protect their children from those emotions too, and (like us) they want to avoid the judgement that they know will result. Both those are very understandable reasons. But what it means is that they perpetuate the idea that parenthood is everything, and we continue to be bombarded with just one side of the story.

This brought me also to thinking about my blogs about embracing our new lives. I know I've expressed this concern before. I worry that by talking about the positives of life without children - which are varied and many - I might make people who are struggling feel worse. Having been there, I would never want to do that. It is a fine line between acknowledging the true joys of our lives with the losses that brought us here, and the difficulties that we might face. It's a fine line between emphasising the good times and denying the pain that we have felt or occasionally feel. I'm often torn. I want and need to let people know that life without children (not by choice) can be and is wonderful. I don't want pity, or condescension. I am not lesser, and I do not want to convey that. 

But at the same time, I don't want any of us to be ignored either. We face discrimination, we face bias, and we are often ignored or invisible. Our feelings are not often considered. Our isolation is dismissed. Our lives are joked about, even if at the same time, our lives might be envied. So I guess what I am saying is that if you are struggling, I recognise that, and have written about it, and will continue to write about it here. I would never want you to think that I ignore the tough parts of our life. Life is not perfect, and no-one has the perfect life. But life isn't all doom and gloom either. That is not our fate. Far from it. There is so much to celebrate. So much to hope for, even in the dark days. Hope that your life will be good, that you will find peace and joy again. That your growth will be extraordinary, even if you can't see it at the moment. That you will find gifts from this life that you would never have expected. 

I'm not kidding. It really does get easier.

 

* I can't find the exact link, apologies!

You won't always be sad

A post recently made me think about grieving, and healing, and reminded me of how far I’ve come, and more importantly, how I got here.

Not So Mommy wrote about advice that it was “okay to be sad,just don’t stay there,” which sounds about right, doesn’t it? But whilst it might be true (as evidenced in Brandi's post), I don’t think it is helpful to tell someone not to "stay there” in sadness, because – whilst I recognise the temptation to do just that, when grieving becomes so familiar and almost comforting to us – when, in time, we want to move away from the sadness, we don't always know how to do that, which in turn can bring feelings of inadequacy or guilt or disbelief.

With the benefit of hindsight, I think the main thing I needed to know was that it would help me to welcome joy, and gratitude. Even in the midst of grief, there were occasional fleeting moments of happiness that visited unexpectedly –the feeling of sun on my back, or a hug from a loved one, or a surprising belly laugh at something silly. I felt guilty at first (which I explore here), but they also made me realise that joy was possible. It was still okay to be sad, but feelings of happiness, or gratitude, or joy, taught me that I wouldn’t stay there forever, and many years on, I know that is true. 

So I’d like to amend the quote to read, “It’s okay to be sad, just know that you won’t stay there.”

When the absence of hope is a good thing

A week or two ago, I was reading a novel (We Are Now Beginning Our Descent by James Meek) that had an interesting comment on hope, and I thought it was worth sharing here, given that hope is such an major part of the infertility journey, and of our childless life.

The idea was that hope allows for the possibility that the desired outcome won’t come about. Hope means that whilst we hope something will happen, we know that it might not. This seems a perfectly reasonable comment to me, but one I’d never really considered!

It seems to me, therefore, that when many people say they’re filled with hope they’re actually saying they’re filled with certainty that they’ll get their happy ending. I’m pretty sure we’re all like this (unless we have had a diagnosis prior to beginning our quest to have children). We start trying to get pregnant, sure that it will be possible. When we realise that this might not be so simple, doubt starts creeping in. Are we hopeful, or are we still sure that it won’t happen to us? I guess it varies. Some of us go into denial, confident that we’ll find a way. Some of us start to realise that it might not be possible, shocked to see our confidence and certainty disappear, and we cling on to hope, though see it receding. That element of hope though - even when we fully realise that we might not be able to achieve our preferred outcome, even when we are terrified that this might happen – can keep us going and give us strength. Yet hope can also torture us into continuing treatments even when we know we should stop. Hope – it is very complicated.

I’ve heard some people say that they think it might be easier If they didn’t have hope, as they deal with the agonising stresses of assisted reproduction or waiting for adoption or the month-by-month waiting of trying to conceive. Elaine, a new blogger who has guest-posted on hope this week on Klara’s blog here, notes that there is indeed a sense of relief when letting go of hope.

But she adds that then you have to grieve, and “that was no fun at all.” I have also said that at first I felt that the loss of all hope was harder than having it. And so for a while we live with a certainty that our lives are never going to be happy.

But then hope sets in again, bringing in at first cracks of light, allowing for the possibility that maybe our lives won’t be so hard after all. Hope returns, but for something else.

Then, to come full circle, I think hope goes away again. A new certainty takes root, the certainty that I and and will be okay, that a life without children is not only worth living, but worth celebrating. In that case, I don’t need to have hope that I will have a good life. Because I know I will.

A New Year post

As it’s the first day of the New Year, I thought it might be timely to make some No Kidding resolutions. I don’t always make resolutions in a formal way, but I always – whether it is January 1^st or the middle of July – have a list of things I want to do better. That is also the case when it comes to a) living my No Kidding life, and b) blogging about it.

Here is my list of No Kidding resolutions for 2016:

1. Stop blaming my weight issues on emotional eating born out of my No Kidding life
2. Continue to embrace the benefits of no kids
3. Be honest about the tough times
4. Talk more about what hurt, and what helped, what still hurts, and what always helps
5. Continue to nurture my relationship with my nieces, old and young
6. Stop using #MicroblogMondays as my only weekly blog topics
7. Remember to cross-post to BlogHer (and learn more about how it works).
8. Be grateful for those who read and comment, even if we disagree (maybe especially if we disagree).
9. Be brave – when blogging, writing, and in life.
10. Be kind.

Coastal celebrations

A much-loved niece’s wedding in an exotic location (well, as exotic as Australia gets) took me away from the real world for a while. I remember her sister’s wedding (also much-loved, in my much-loved exotic Thailand) three years ago. I felt a little pang at seeing the joy in my sister’s face as her daughter got married, but it wasn’t as bad as I had feared, because I actually felt so happy for my niece and for my sister. This time I felt no pangs at all. I felt secure in my role as aunt, and maybe because this time my other sister was able to go too, I didn’t feel isolated at all, rather I felt part of a loving extended family, all there to celebrate this so very happy occasion.

The fact that we were doing all this on the beach in the Queensland made it easier. We were focused on the sun, sand, and surf, the fun we were all having – and being from New Zealand, we complained (some more than others) about the heat. My status as a childless woman was irrelevant. I was another family member there to love and support my nieces, and to get to know further my delightful great-nephew, and to swim with my littlest niece, Charlie. It just wasn’t an issue.

We then escaped further south, to hippy central Byron Bay, where we didn’t feel childless. Just old!

Queensland's Gold Coast

Pick a point and grieve?

Mel at Stirrup Queens has posted on an interesting question asked of a Washington Post columnist.  The reader asked why the longing for a partner, and the longing for a child through infertility, should be treated differently.  They felt that infertility is treated with compassion, but that those longing for a partner are essentially (my words) told to “get over it.”

Not knowing anything about this columnist, I admit I was quite surprised to find that there might be a view that infertility is treated with more compassion than being single.  I haven’t seen this myself, having felt considerable judgement about my infertility, and having seen the compassion given to friends who have become newly single when relationships have broken up. 

So I wonder, how would I respond to this question?  Is there a difference between the two situations? I’m going to prevaricate.  Yes, and no.  The two situations – longing for a child and longing for a partner - are both different and the same.  And sadly, both can lead to the other, which is of course a difficult double whammy.

Suggesting, as the columnist went on to, that there are significant differences between the two, is entering into a dangerous game of the Pain Olympics. 

You can know you’re infertile, but you don’t know if you are going to be single forever, she said.  So that makes it easier?  I don’t know. It might make it harder.  I've seen lots of people going through infertility torn apart by the uncertainty, tearfully confessing that they are sure it would be “easier if they only knew.”  I can understand that, the stress of ongoing efforts, of waiting on adoption matches, etc.  This is the case of being in the waiting room, with all the fear and uncertainty and grief that entails.  But there is a waiting room when you’re single too, and that is also full of fear and uncertainty about what the future will hold.  And maybe you never fully get to leave that waiting room.

The difference, as Mel noted, is that most of us in that infertility waiting room, are holding the hand of someone else, someone who has promised to be with us, someone who we hope will be with us even when we leave the waiting room, through any of the doors offered.  

That said, there is also real judgement about those of us who can’t have children, or who don’t have them.  That it wasn't “meant to be” – implying that someone/god/the universe has come down to judge us as unfit to be parents.  And that judgement and condescension and pity is hard to take.

You see the danger of entering the Pain Olympics?  There are always cases of “on the one hand” and “on the other” that make this an impossible question to answer, other than to say, both situations should be treated with compassion and empathy.

Ultimately, at the end though, the columnist advises the single person to "pick a point, and grieve." She argues that the infertile can do this, that infertility allows a logical grieving point, and that it helps us heal.  But this is very simplistic.  What is the “logical grieving point” for someone who was infertile and adopted, never going on to have the pregnancy or birth or breastfeeding experiences they dreamed of?  Or for someone who was infertile and went on to have children, or for someone who had secondary infertility then completed their family, or for someone who did all these but the experiences were not what they had imagined?  They're all grieving losses, not specific points; they grieve the process, the loss of innocence, the way it changed them even if they've gone on to the “happy ending” of the fairy tale. 

And what about me?  I don't grieve a specific moment.  Which one would I pick?  My first ectopic or my second? My first failed IVF or my last? Or the moment when my doctor said he wouldn't support any further IVFs? Or the day when I discovered my tubes were blocked and trying again naturally, even with the risk of ectopics, was ruled out?  Or the day /days /weeks /months when we realised that donor egg or adoption weren't possible?  I don't have a specific point of grief.  Grieving those individual moments, any of them or all of them or the last of them, still pale into insignificance when I see what I really grieve.  And that is a lifetime of experiences that I won’t have.  And is that different to a person who is single?  No, it isn't.  The reminders are always there.  The grief can return at any time, though usually less and less.  So grief isn't something you deal with and “get over.”  It is a process, and whilst I think I am well through it, and out on the healthy side, I know that the process itself will never end. 

And as I move into a different phase of life, I know that at least for infertile women, our old friend called "Hope" who we know so well leaves us   – regardless of our diagnosis - quite definitively in our 50s, if not much earlier.  Yet a single person might always be tortured by her.  Hope might always be around the corner.  And that can be a good thing.  But it can also torture us.

So I think the columnist was too simplistic with all her “grieving” advice; simplistic and a little impatient.  I bristled at her comment: 

 “But keep letting grief make your decisions? No.”

No, I can’t really disagree with the sentiment.  But it is advice that has to be carefully given, and smacks too closely of the “get over it” advice given to those of us who have been through infertility or loss over the years. It smacks of a lack of compassion, and ultimately, both situations deserve compassion.  But not compassion with a time limit.  We’ll figure that out ourselves.  Time heals.  You don't need to push us on it.  Compassion, I believe, shortens the time limit and makes the process easier.  Tough love does not.  It just deepens the pain, and denies us our feelings.  But that’s another post for another time.

I’ll give credit where it is due though, and agree with her final comment that we all have to learn to want what we have.  But that’s the same for us all, single, childless, both.  In fact, that advice is right for everyone – those who couldn’t complete their families, whose children weren’t quite as they had dreamt, whose careers didn’t work out exactly had they had envisaged or hope, whose relationships (family/ friends/ lovers/ partners etc) became complicated, who didn’t win the.  Wanting what we have.  That is the pathway to joy and contentment and happily ever after.  And if we can do that, then we are lucky.

Places where we belong

Lisa, over at Life Without Baby, has just posted about losing an important little bistro near her.  It's not closing, it's going "family friendly."  And in a move designed to bring in more people, they're making her feel that she doesn't belong. 

I've written about this before, in a slightly different context.  I wish that everyone had a place where they felt they belonged, whether it is a family friendly cafe, a fine dining restaurant for adults only, a gay bay, a geeky store, or a shop for people with long feet!  When I was grieving my ectopic losses, I found it hard to find a cafe where I felt I belonged.  I had recently left my full-time job, so didn't feel comfortable in the CBD cafes full of people in suits having business meetings, but equally I felt miserable at the cafes clogged with mums, babies, strollers and toddlers, along with the brightly coloured playgrounds and heightened decibel levels and children who would come up to me at my table when I was trying to blank out the environment to take in some caffeine and a magazine.

But I am pleased to report that my husband and I have been lucky to find a place where we feel comfortable.  Our favourite brunch place is run by two guys, and it has a pleasant, relaxed, but sophisticated ambience, great food and an excellent wine list.  Clientele includes young adults  through to 90 year olds from the old people's home down the road.  And Saturdays, around 1 pm when we go, is the day and time for regulars.  There's the multi-racial gay couple, the middle-aged couple who always have a bottle of wine, the grandson with his grandparents doing a good turn, a few families with older children, two elderly women enjoying a special lunch out (I love that), and usually two or three younger women enjoying a Sunday catch up. And, of course, us. 

Gary and David who run the restaurant are consummate professionals, chatting to all the regulars, and making everyone feel comfortable.  Children and babies are welcome, but rarely seen.  Gary and David have just made a business decision not to make their restaurant specifically "family friendly."   There's no playground, and the menu doesn't cater to children either. Two cafes just fifty metres down the road fill this gap, as does another one about a mile away.  Everyone is catered for.  And so they fill a niche - suburban dining in a calm and elegant environment, one that is blissfully child free. 

This place has been our saviour over the last ten years or so.  It has been somewhere we could go and feel normal, accepted, and happy. We're not deafened by children or babies at the table next door.  We don't have to smile and be polite if a child decides to run around or come and play on the back of our chair.  That doesn't happen here.  Parents either don't bring their children, or keep them well-behaved while they're there.  In those days when we were raw and in pain after loss, we knew we wouldn't have awkward encounters or painful reminders there.  Even now, if we're having a bad day, it's generally a safe place.  Here, we're accepted for who we are. 

It's a place where we can relax and have a nice lunch, a good glass of wine, and a good conversation.  It's somewhere where we make decisions, discuss family troubles or travel plans, where we sum up the week, and make plans for the future.  It's somewhere where we can linger if we want, or dash off if we're in a hurry.  Where there's always extra bacon, where summer salads are delicious, and where the winter mushrooms are to die for.  And where the lemon tart "sweet treats" are so delicious, that I begged Gary for the recipe (and he gave it to me).  When we go, regardless of what we order, it is always a treat.  It cheers me up for the day.

I'm so glad we can go there (though we're having to cut back till we get more regular income).  And I would be devastated if they closed.  Do you have a special place like this?

Speed warning

I thought I would have a leisurely December, but no, it is full speed ahead and I fear I will just crash into the end of the year without getting much more posting done.  I have lots of thoughts and ideas, just no time.  And now all the relatives have arrived in town, it's only getting worse.  My first resolution for 2014 will be to be a better blogger here.

I did want to note one thing though.  In the spirit of the season, I was pleased to see that I changed a comment I was making on another blogger's post (she and her husband are childfree, but she is not an ALI blogger, and I don't know her story).  She posted about going to see a school play in her small community, and all the children who are part of her lives who were performing.  And I started to say how envious I was that she had all these children in her lives.  I don't have many children in my life.  Partly because the children of friends grow up and move away, and partly because many of the nieces and nephews live overseas. 

But then I paused.  Yes, I was envious.  I was also envious that the children had met my friend.  We have been internet (first blogging, then FB) friends for about seven years now, but I haven't met this friend who is freezing in Vermont at the current time.  But then I thought how petty it all sounded.  Her happiness doesn't change my reality.  I'm very glad my friend has these children in her life, and that they have her in theirs.  And as soon as I changed my comment, I felt uplifted.

Checking In

Spent the last few days with family in Qatar.  It is always odd seeing ordinary family life going on somewhere exotic, somewhere so foreign.  Of course, we've done it too, in Thailand, but that was a long time ago.  It is just proof that home and family can be wherever you make it.  However you make it.

It was lovely to see BIL and SIL again, and of course, our 13-year-old nephew too.  We don't know him that well - over the years have only seen him a few times, and being a boy he's a bit more reticent with us than his sister (who had the advantage of knowing us well before she left the country).  We had the opportunity to attend a major milestone for my nephew, and whilst he may not have realised it, it meant a lot to me that we could be there for it - supporting him, supporting his parents, and being part of the family.  I talked to his mother about it.  She acknowledges that she misses her family, having community and family around her for such events, so she appreciated us being there.  And I said to her too, that the childless aunt and uncle appreciated being there, as we don't get to be part of milestones like this.  It is one of my major sadnesses - that most of my nieces and nephews live so far away, and only know me as a theoretical name, the mysterious "Auntie (Mali)." 

But at least this day wasn't sad.  And I was glad to kick off our trip in this way.

It's a sign!

I'm not a believer in signs, I told my friends at dinner a week or so ago.  "But?" they all laughed, knowing that more was coming.

But if I was, I continued, I would think that I'm seeing signs telling us this trip to Italy is the right thing to do. I was amused more than anything - since we had decided to go to Italy and the Middle East, I had received my Cuisine magazine issue that turned out to be all about Italian food, that I'd seen articles about Puglia (one of our planned destinations), and that I'd seen a number plate that seemed, on first glance, to read "Dead Sea."

"I know, I know!" I said, as we all laughed at this.  "It's simply another example of seeing something you're thinking about.  You know, just like cancer sufferers suddenly meeting lots of others who have had cancer, or infertile women seeing pregnant bellies and newborn babies everywhere they go ..."

"Or seeing Dead Sea number plates!" they all chimed in.

Turns out there's a name for this phenomenon, which I learned that night.  It's called the reticular activation system (RAS), and describes the way we can become acutely attuned to specific topics or ideas.  The RAS  goes much wider than our often acutely felt sensitivity to pregnant bellies.  It explains how our brains sort through what is important (ie hearing our names being called at an airport), and what isn't (all the peripheral chaos around us at an airport).  And we can train our minds what to recognise as important.  Not in the way a lot of the self-help books suggest we can (eg.  the ghastly "think positive and you will get pregnant" suggestions).  But perhaps it explains how I managed to reprogramme my brain to stop thinking about babies, stop thinking about pregnancy, and see the positives and benefits of life without children. We've all suffered the effects of our brains' reticular activation systems.  But it makes me happy to know that we can also use this to our advantage.

Two lives lost, or one life lived?

I was thinking, as I was responding to a blog comment elsewhere, how differently I feel about having no kids today, than I did even five years ago, let alone nine-ten years ago when it was all so raw.  Yes, I've mentioned before I'm sure age has a lot to do with it, but the old cliche is true.  Time really does heal.

And letting this happen is really important. Reading other blogs and comments, and in the years where I volunteered on a pregnancy loss website, I have seen so many women who have pushed against the idea of acceptance and healing.  I have seen them stamp their feet, as I have done at times too, determined not to like their new lives, determined to keep trying or keep grieving, terrified that acceptance means forgetting.  And so they haven't healed.  And they wonder why they are so angry, so bitter, so stuck.  Yet I doubt they could articulate that, filled as they are with so much grief and anger and turmoil.  And so they stay stuck, often for years.  I'm not saying we shouldn't be angry.  Anger is part of grieving.  But we need to move on to the next stage.  I wish I could hug them and tell them it really will be okay.  Tell them that they don't need to stay angry. That it is okay to heal.

Anger only eats you up.  It's a negative emotion that turns on us.  It achieves nothing else.  I mean, it's not even as if there is anyone we can be angry at, is there?  After all, there is no-one to blame.  (And what would that achieve after all?) Healing means eventually letting go of the anger,and letting go of the anger and bitterness means acceptance can take its place. And acceptance is healing, and healing is acceptance.  Healing takes time.  You can't one day decide not to be angry and wake up the next morning feeling healed.  (Oh, if only it worked that way!) But it opens the door, and lets some light in, so that healing can occur.  Healing doesn't mean forgetting.  Ever.  But it does make remembering easier.

And acceptance isn't a betrayal of what I wanted, or a denial of the love I felt (ever so briefly - yet lasting a lifetime) for the babies I lost.  Acceptance is simply an acknowledgement that this is my life now.  And accepting and embracing my life now just means that I'm accepting and embracing my life now.  It doesn't mean anything more, or less.  If anyone reads more into it than that, then we all have a good reason to get angry!

The alternative - not accepting or embracing our lives now - would be just too sad.  It would be as if we lost two lives.  The one we hoped for and the one we have.  And that is too awful to contemplate.  And if you're going to be angry, then maybe that's what you should be angry about, rather than the loss of the future you (and I) couldn't have.  Me?  I'm not going to waste any more time on anger.  I'm going to live what's left of the rest of my life. 

What I did on my holiday ...

A number of you asked for details/photos of our adventure in South Africa. I've written about it here on A Separate Life, and included a number of photos.

And an added bonus - A Separate Life is wordpress, and won't let me upload videos (unless I pay a fortune), but Blogger it seems is more generous.  So just for you, here is a clip I put together from still shots of a thrilling encounter.  (Warning:  it involves an animal mother and baby.  If this is likely to cause pain, you might want to skip it.)

Infertility and guilt - again

I was referred to this post a while ago (Mel's Round-Up I think) about motherhood after infertility and the inevitable feelings of guilt.

Good mothers, know that you are not alone.  I've written before  (and most prominently, here) about the feelings of guilt I have had (and observed in others) when I find myself enjoying my life with no children.  The guilt brings up thoughts - does this mean I didn't want it enough?  Does this mean I never should have had kids and that somehow there really IS a reason I didn't?  Does this mean I wasn't enough of a woman?  Yes, guilt brings up thoughts that I have long since dismissed, long since ignored, thoughts that I thoroughly disagree with and discount 99% of the time.

As I've said before, letting go of the guilt is the beginning of understanding and acceptance and true happiness.

This week, as this is published, I will be here (though this time we'll be at their safari lodge by the hippos' waterhole, not the one on the hill). And there will be no kids there either.  So with any luck, I will be communing with hippos and giraffes and elephants and lions and leopards and warthogs and more.  With any luck, enjoying being a long way from cellphone reception and wifi, relishing being out in fresh air, soaking up that Vitamin D after a gloomy winter.  Enjoying time with my man.  Forgetting how old I am.  Smiling.

And not feeling any guilt whatsoever.

Be happy

I saw the following quote recently.  This I think sums up how those of us in the No Kidding community are trying to live our lives, and is relevant given my previous post about guilt.

So here is my thought for the day:

Don’t wait until you have no more suffering 

before allowing yourself to be happy. 

 —Thich Nhat Hanh

Imagine ...

It’s well recognised that those of us who don’t go on to have children, whether naturally, by IVF, surrogacy or adoption, are not welcomed with open arms to the community.  Perhaps that’s unfair, and an over-exaggeration, as I do know that our presence on-line is appreciated by those who want to see that there is hope after infertility.  But the majority don’t.  They majority would rather not acknowledge our existence.  The majority who are “still in the trenches” have their heads firmly in the sand.  Let’s be blunt here.  They don’t always want to see us, to accept that our lives are a reality, and that they might become one of us.  “I could never do that!” they say in horror contemplating our lives.  They are incapable of seeing our happiness, our joy.  They look at us and see only their imagined emptiness.

Yes.  I know this, because I’ve been there. I’ve been thinking about this issue a bit lately, after writing a few things.  And then today, in response to Mel’s post about finding out how the infertility journey was to end, I wrote this comment:

“When we’re in the midst of infertility, of treatments or losses or both, we are blinkered.  We're the ones wearing the eye patch, and no matter what we saw, we wouldn't believe how happy we could be in the end, regardless of the outcome. I think I was like that, and I certainly see a lot of women here in the ALI community who refuse to allow themselves to imagine another possibility.  So if I'd seen a happy, childless Mali at 49, would I even have understood what I was seeing?  No, I don't think so.”

You see, I wouldn’t have understood what I was seeing, because I just wouldn’t have let myself let go and imagine it.  The power of imagination is after all what drove me on to keep trying, what drove me to want to have a child in the first place.  I could imagine my family, I could imagine being a mother, I imagined pregnancy (beyond 7 weeks), and childbirth, and breastfeeding.  I imagined holding my baby, my toddler, my 6 year old.  I imagined all that, and it kept me going.  And all that imagining didn’t let me stop, because the (imagined) feelings were so good.  The thrill of the BFP, of telling people, the thrill of it all was (as I have said) addictive.  And easy.

And so I didn’t want to imagine not having children in the end.  I wouldn’t let myself imagine that. Perhaps because in that imagining, I knew there would be sadness.  But I think I also feared that if I did imagine how it would be, I would find that I might like it.  So I was stamping my feet, in a tantrum, and saying “NO!”  Like a toddler, I was shaking my head, wanting only the yellow sweets, not the red.  The ALI community is a little, no, a lot like that.  Even those who got their yellow sweets still will not allow themselves to imagine that it would have been okay to have the red.  They will not allow themselves to imagine their happiness with the red sweets, only their unhappiness, because otherwise it means they didn’t get what they want.  (More stamping of feet).  But it's not an all or nothing equation.  Wise Loribeth commented “but what if you saw you were 50, no kids, and happy?”  But our ALI sisters won’t let themselves imagine that.  Why?  Because if they understand the happiness, it might make them feel differently about us, our lives, our so-called choices?  Or because they feel that it in some ways it denies the struggle they ... no ... WE have been through? 

And yet those of us who have had little or no choice in the matter, who have come to a stage when our only option is to imagine our lives without children, when we finally let ourselves imagine that life, we often feel a huge wave of relief and happiness.  We see lives free of treatments, free of waiting for adoptions, free of more losses and disappointments and endless uncertainty.  We see lives where we are in control (as much as anyone ever is), where we can plan, where we can live the way we want to, where there is certainty.  For me, this came in a flash between treatments, and it felt as if a door opened, a light shone, and a burden was lifted.  It is what kept me going, and helped me know I’d be okay, even when I was in the depths of disappointment. I've had other friends describe this too.  I wish more women were prepared to let themselves go, and imagine – for one minute – what it might be like.  They might find it helps them get through the most difficult parts of their infertility journey.  It won’t necessarily influence the outcome.  It might make the process easier though.

The best medicine

I’ve written quite a lot about joy.  About how important it is to take joy when you find it, to never feel guilty about that joy.  I also found, in the depths of my despair, how uplifting laughter can be.

I love to laugh.  And I probably laugh louder now than I did before my losses, before I discovered what grief was.  I try to control my laughter in public.  But when I’m at home, I love to laugh uproariously at something I read, hear, say, watch, do, etc.  It feels good.  And in those first days, weeks and months of grief, any laughter was life-saving.  So laugh.

And just for a treat, my favourite TV ad at the moment.  It makes me cry and laugh. 

Laugh with me!  (After all, I'm resigned to the fact that I'll never win Lotto).

Just Life

I feel as if I’ve had quite an intense month or two, not only recovering from illness, but also with some pretty serious posts, some intense voluntary work, and so a lot of thinking and writing about infertility and pregnancy loss.  So it’s now Friday afternoon, which means time for another post, and my mind is blank.  Actually, it’s not completely blank (thank goodness!), as I’ve thought of a number of post topics, including a follow up to Biscuits and Broccoli about tomatoes.  I love tomatoes, I understand that some people don’t love tomatoes, and I feel very sad for them that they’re missing out on the absolute joy I felt a few days ago as I sliced into a tomato to toss into my fried rice and smelled that beautiful scent, that promise of deliciousness.  But unlike the “just adopt” folks, I would never try to convince someone to try or to eat tomatoes if they didn’t want to.  Though, really, I ask you, why wouldn’t you want to?  (I know, I know ... and I have now been completely distracted and have gone off to write a post about my general love of tomatoes here.)

Anyway, after the intense month or two, for the last week, or perhaps last few days, I’ve just been enjoying life. I’ve had a book-club get-together, had a friend to visit, went out to dinner with a friend I hadn’t seen in ages, been out to brunch at my favourite place on the weekend with my beloved, saw a movie, and I’ve been trying to catch up with my reading of paper books (I’m an e-reader convert). 

I’ve been working out more intensely, determined to try to lose some of that sickness weight, as well as the still-there Christmas weight, and holiday-in-Thailand weight.  Then I’ll be able to start losing that extra last-three-years weight. 

And I’ve had coffee ... a few times ... in nice places.

And I’ve been working hard to finish a photobook of our European trip last year.  I love photobooks.  And I’m a bit of a perfectionist.  So the photo has to be exactly right, the placement of a group of photos has to be exactly right, and the text has to be right.  As my husband said, the book will cost a hundred dollars or so (more), but the time I’ve spent on it probably goes into the tens of thousands of dollars!  Yes, this is what happens when you’re self-employed, and don’t have many active contracts.  I only have a few technical things to check out now and then I'll be finished.  I'm always a bit nervous though when I send in the order. What if there's a glaring typo or mistake?

So I’m looking forward to the free time I’ll have.  Of course, my To-Do List is already incredibly long.  I don’t understand people who say they get bored.  I have more free time than most, and I still can’t do everything I want to do.  Imagine if I had kids!

Savouring the moment

My husband celebrated his birthday on the weekend.  Since we married many many moons ago, we have always done something special on our birthdays and anniversaries, and the only times we haven’t have been if a) we’ve been ill, or b) on a flight somewhere exciting.

So I booked a fancy restaurant, one we’ve been to before but haven’t visited for ... um ... too many years to remember.  (We’re guessing at least seven.)  We went on Saturday night, keen to avoid the Sunday night Mother’s Day Brigade on his actual birthday.  Saturday nights is their degustation night.  I booked the six course menu, as the nine course seemed just too much.

We got dressed up, took a taxi (so as not to be tempted to drive home after too much alcohol), and ordered a glass of champagne on arrival.  The restaurant is in an old Bank building, with ceilings double height, large Greek Corinthian columns surrounding the main room, and a grand bar; suitably luxurious surroundings to make my husband feel special.  The service was impeccable, as was the food, and matched wines.  A tiny serving of crab on a transparently-thin wafer whet our appetites (and not included in the six courses) and then, over the next two and a half hours, we savoured salmon with horseradish cream, paua ravioli, venison with beetroot risotto, rack of lamb with pea gnocchi, a divine divine brie with a fig compote (almost our favourite course), and a selection of chocolate desserts with peanut butter ice-cream.  Fortunately the servings were small enough that we didn’t feel stuffed, and the matched wines included half glasses as well as full glasses, so we were able to stand without wobbling at the end of the meal.  The price was what we expected, but we got a discount by using a gold card for an entertainment club, so we felt as if we’d had a bargain.

We didn’t have to rush home on a deadline to baby-sitters, or to tip-toe into the house scared we'd wake the kids.  We could sleep in on Sunday morning, knowing we didn’t have to rise early for young children, or to ferry older children to sports activities.  We didn’t have to save the money for school fees, or a child’s birthday present, or music lessons.  We simply enjoyed an evening, and celebrated our relationship.

What they said ...

I have to say that when I agreed to have my piece published on The Huffington Post, I thought about who might see it, but I didn’t really think about the comments.  I didn’t think I was getting any – my piece wasn’t on the iPad version (sob, I would have been so chuffed to read it there) – and so I didn’t look till yesterday.  After Kate’s comment on my previous post suggesting I'd be better off hitting my head against a brick wall, I braced myself, and went in.

They were all there - positive, negative, off the topic, angry, and just plain nuts.  It was weird seeing myself referred to as “the gal” or simply “she.”  Especially as my mother was a strict believer in the “She’s the cat’s mother” rule.  It was weird that people had taken the time and effort to comment on something I had written, on an international news/magazine site.  I mean, blog commenting is different; we develop more of a personal relationship on a blog, and there is more of a conversation.  So reading the comments made me feel as if I was eavesdropping on a bunch of people talking about me. 

Quite a number had missed my point.  I don’t feel guilty for not being able to have children.  I did (but don’t any more) feel guilty for feeling happy and enjoying my life without children, when I had wanted to be a mother so much, and had grieved my pregnancy losses, and the end of my fertility, so very much.  They also obviously thought I was much younger than I actually am - not realising that my insight (or happiness) didn't come over night!

No one, i repeat no one should ever feel obligated to have children, or feel any guilt over not having children.

Some people just don't want to have kids. If you are one of those people, why grieve the loss of something you didn't want to start with?

There were the meant-to-be-supportive, vehemently child-free:

I choose not to over populate this earth with drooling little crumb crunchers and Im perfectly happy. There is adoption for the desperate, and there are many, many puppies that need good homes. No grieving needed.  (Actually, I'm a cat person).

... if I couldn’t have children I’d throw a party!

There were the adopters (with many variations on the theme):

I am not sure that it seems she really wants children.  Adoption seems obvious.

I'll never understand what is wrong with adoption?  (Fortunately many commenters pointed out the many barriers to adoption).

Adopt a child and do some real good.

There was the one “just try surrogacy”:

Actually, before age set in ectopic pregnancy is easily solved by IVF  ... carried by surrogates.  (The commenter wanted me to go to India for this!)

There were the mean or smug:

Of course, she's infertile.  She's old.  Can't have your cake and eat it too, sweetheart.  (Sweetheart?!)

I am so sorry but part of this problem is that woman are falsely given this "you can have it all" line which we clearly can not.  (No kidding?  I do agree with this - I certainly was fed that in the 1980s.  But I could have done without the smug, I know best, tone of voice.)

We can not wait until our mid to late 30's to start thinking about kids. Otherwise you see this. (Ditto above).

You are lucky your man did not leave you.  (I suspect this was written by a woman who had been left - but it still jarred.)

And the nastiest, probably from someone who calls herself a Christian:

Thank you God for not allowing this person to bring life into this world. 

For a while there I felt indignant.  These people didn’t know why we didn’t adopt, they know nothing about me other than that article, and many of them didn’t really understand my point.  But, as I explained to my husband who said I should reply, these people would never understand.  They didn’t want to understand, which is precisely why they were commenting.  In fact, I was really surprised to find myself laughing and rolling my eyes at these comments.  They didn’t hurt.  Even the last one.  (Well, okay, it does irk ... just a bit!)

But the positive comments were wonderful, and made me smile.  They include:

Why the guilt over one's strength and one's ability to re-balance? 

Any loss is difficult. For me, it was the loss of a husband when my children were young. I remarried, and had periods of time that I felt guilty because I was happy again.

I applaud her for being honest and sharing her innermost feelings regarding her personal experience.

I could have written this article, because it captures my thoughts exactly.

Thanks for sharing your grief.  It helped me.  (From an infertile man, this moved me unexpectedly.)

God Bless all of us women for being women.  ... God bless us to be what we want.

...if we do not become mothers, that does not lessen our worth as women in any way.  (This commenter must have read Nicole's fantastic article a few days earlier!)

 

Sounds like you're a person with her head screwed on straight. Continued happiness!

This woman to me would be a joy and a treasure.  (Either a lonely or horny or both  man.  I made a point of passing this one on to my husband.  Just to make sure he remembered how much of a a joy and a treasure I really am!)

Thank you for this article, for your honesty and your thoughts. This is a wonderful attitude.

It is wonderful to read a post reminding people that you can have a happy ending even if this means you did not get to be a parent.  (Yes, yes, yes!)

Reading these comments reinforced exactly why I blog, and why I am feeling motivated to write more widely about the subject.  To know that I had inadvertently helped some complete strangers was amazing.  The examples above, and the wonderful wonderful support I’ve received here on this blog from you all, made this rather scary “coming out” venture worthwhile.  

And at times, especially after weeks like this, it does feel  as if I'm "having my cake and eating it too" - it's just a different cake, sweetheart!

Baking in the sun

Just a quick note. I've blogged in A Separate Life about why I'm not posting this week. I'm feeling good so far, but wondering if seeing my sister watch her daughter get married on Friday will bring unexpected emotions. Not that I'm tempting fate - more an intellectual curiosity. And in the meantime, I'm enjoying being back in Thailand. Now, for another frozen mango daiquiri ...