It has been a long time since I blogged but there are some
things that I have always sort of glazed over in the past that I think need to
be put out in the open about our struggle to have our daughters.
Our first loss was 7 years ago this week. I think that the
day that we found out that we had lost our first pregnancy, a little bit of my
husband and I died that day and we had not gotten that back. I think that over
the next 4 years of struggles and losses until we got to the point that our first
beautiful little girl was born, we lost more and more of our selves and each
other. Then we were hit really hard with an incredibly painful loss, a huge
blow to ourselves and our marriage. Somehow a miracle happened 6 years to the
day that we lost our first baby, we got pregnant with our second daughter without
any treatment. Was she a sign that life would start to get better that we would
no longer have to struggle?
Infertility is not something that we women struggle through
alone our husbands are suffering too, but women tend to take on the major
burden and guilt. We feel like we have completely failed the man we love, we cannot
have his children and provide this extension of our loves together. Over time
the stress of that shameful inferior feeling is reflected in our personality as
we become so incredible focused on what has to be done to have a child. We
become bitter and angry and although we do not mean to treat the people around
us badly we cannot help but feel that life is just so fucking unfair and
everyone should suffer with us!
Of course sex loses its luster and becomes a well-timed, well-oiled
machine that may end up in disappointment if the two lines on the pregnancy
test do not show up 2 weeks later, or worse they do show up and then slowly
fade (another miscarriage, another failure). An article that I read today
really put this idea well. It says, “Their sex life becomes a scientific
experiment, no longer an expression of love. It also becomes an act that is
always going to be judged as a success or a failure, not as an intimate act. It
is anything but intimate, since it must be done by a set of rules established
by physicians and, like children, they must report in to get their grade. Only
the stakes are so much higher” (full
article).
Your daily life becomes timing sex, painful injections and
high emotional stress. You become someone you do not even know and you lose
sight of the things you love because your life is centered around making this
baby thing happen.
That alone will kill the romance and love in a marriage, but
when you add to it that likely the wife/girlfriend in the situation has taken
on this great burden and guilt, you often find times that women have completely
shut down and slowly shut out their partners, weaned them off of them so to
speak, because they are so ashamed of themselves that they are not able to achieve
this dream. Being infertile starts to define them and they lose sight of each
other and all of the reasons that they fell in love with each other and wanted
the family in the first place. Another article I read touches on this a bit, “As
a result of taking responsibility for the emotional impact of the infertility,
the woman experiences intense feelings, such as pain, anger, fear, etc., which,
combined with the messages that her way of dealing with things is in some way
dysfunctional or "crazy", causes her to feel an anxious depression.
As feelings spill out, she feels out of control and doesn't really know how to
ask for what she needs, especially from the husband she is struggling so hard
to protect. She may yearn for an emotional connection/interaction at one moment
and in the next withdraw emotionally from her husband when she fears she has
disappointed him” (full article)
It is a dark place and sadly in many cases couples give up
on each other without ever achieving the dream of having children. I think
there is something to be said for a couple that has gone through this struggle
together. If they have made it to the other side, with or without achieving the
dream of having a baby that it should show them that they can achieve so much
in their relationship. Even if after the battle that they have been fighting
has left them with the darker feelings and the lack of luster and love, that
those things can be found again now that the storm is passing. Infertility is
rock bottom for most couples and if they hang in there they only direction they
have left to go is up in their marriage.
Honestly, my husband and I struggled, we struggle still but
I am hopeful for us, because we braved this incredible storm together and we
have come out the other side with two beautiful little girls. We have proven
that we are stronger than we ever though that we could be, and we make a great
team.
In closing I just want to say thank you husband for loving
me on days that I did not deserve your love. Thank you for being my rock and
standing with me through this storm. We
can only go up from here, believe it.
