Parent Dish (formerly Blogging Baby) has a new entry up in the Parent vs. Parent series. Hyper-Fertility is the opposite of Infertility. (Both articles, btw, are quite an interesting and worthy read.) Not all birth mothers can relate to the Hyper-Fertility issue as there are quite a few that either made the choice not to have more children or suffered the perplexing problem of “secondary infertility when it’s really primary because you have no child to show for it.” However, I “get” the article. Hardcore.
I’ve got Fertility Guilt. Much like the article, if my Husband leaves a pair of underwear on the bed, I’m going to get pregnant. While that’s somewhat exaggerated, my Fertility Guilt is not. I get pregnant. Easily. In the case of our miscarriage, we were not even trying which made some people say that my grief was unwarranted because we didn’t try for the baby so therefore we did not want her to be a part of our lives. (False, by the way.) I actually let myself believe those words for awhile; that I had no right to grive the child we lost because we didn’t go through any problem to conceive her.
But that’s some messed up logic.
I grieve the Munchkin almost daily and there was no problem, at all, in her conception. Again, there are those that say that since I placed her for adoption, my grief is again unwarranted since I “chose” this path. (Again, false. But whatever.) If I had miscarried the pregnancy with the Munchkin, it would have been somewhat more socially acceptable for me to grieve that loss than when I grieve her loss via adoption. That’s mind boggling.
More over, it took us four cycles to conceive BigBrother. Not “a lot” in the grand scheme of trying to conceive. If we had, God forbid, miscarried that pregnancy, would we have then been allowed to grieve? Or no? It’s all so very confusing.
The subject is on my mind with constant presence as of late. My brain hurts. My heart hurts. If I could make all of the people in the world who truly wanted and deserved babies magically pregnant, would that solve my own Fertility Guilt? Would I then be able to look friends (real life and blogging) in the eye (virtual or real) again? Would I be able to rejoice in things like the fact that: we’re pregnant? And it only took us one cycle? And we feel so damn guilty about it that TheHusbandMan couldn’t tell his two best friends and telling my two best friends has all but killed me?
What a lousy way to announce a pregnancy, right? It will be much better on the family blog. I promise. This is just a “safer” place for me to discuss the ins and outs of topics that surround all of “this,” whatever this is.
For the neb-noses in the crowd: we haven’t been on birth control since mid-2006. I’ve been charting and we’ve been employing FAM as our main form of birth control. Of course, since the miscarriage, my cycles were wonky and crazy and everything in-between but normal. The last two cycles leading up to this one were an-ovulatory. One was 37 days long and one was 26. We started trying thinking that it was going to take some time since my charts were all over the place. And then, magically, I ovulated. We obviously had sex. And there you have it.
I’m tired of feeling guilty, really. And it’s probably not politically correct to say so but I did anyway. I want to celebrate this child. I started taking belly pictures the day after ovulation because I wanted to have a full week-by-week progression of this pregnancy: it will be our last. People are quick to forget that I suffer from a kidney disorder that makes pregnancy pretty darn risky for me. The risks will soon start to outweigh the benefits when it comes to my health and we know that… which is why our children are to be so close in age. I just don’t have a lot of time to play with; it’s not on my side. So, I want to celebrate this pregnancy. And feel beautiful. And joyous.
And maybe stop PUKING. (Seriously, who is THIS sick at 6w0d?! OMG!)
I want to usher this child into our family in peace and happiness. I think, with my therapist, I hit a lot of those issues that I didn’t know to hit last time around. I’m still nervous, somewhat, about the boy/girl issue. But, I think together we’ve covered that as well as we can and, really, I’ve got absolutely no control over who is inside of my uterus.
I’m rambling. In short: we’re expecting a baby in December. We’re delighted but cautious still as it’s early. We can’t agree on names. TheHusbandMan has already started laying his head on my belly and telling this child “secrets” like he did with both BigBrother and Munchkin. My heart is full. (My belly isn’t since I keep vomiting, but hey, you can’t win them all.) I know some people will call, “Not fair.” But all I can say is that this is what it is: a new child for us to confuse with talk of open adoption, siblings who live far away and a crazy bunch of people to love him/her… no matter what. (Pregnancy also makes me snarky.)
