The struggle is part of the story...

by Bex

Yesterday morning I was crying.  I decided to write.  I wrote this post.  I felt better and now I am ready to share it.

Life is pretty shit right now.  

You might have trouble believing this with all of the exciting things such as bloggers events, new maxi skirts, zoo trips and recipes on the blog lately and by no means was my excitement about these things meant to deceive you.  In fact, they were more to deceive myself.  To distract me from the other, very upsetting part of my life I've been going through this last year.  I am constantly trying to remind myself there are good, fun things I can do to make life worthwhile.  I am sorry this is obviously a rather depressing post but I have got to the point where I feel I need to share.  It's such a personal thing and you may have remembered me talking about stress and life being difficult a couple of times over the last few months, relating to Nik's exam, job, etc. but the main reason has actually been our difficulty in conceiving.  We will never conceive without outside help and it's been a struggle to come to terms with.  I do share a lot of our lives on this blog and I am so grateful to those of you who made the effort to send a hug or message whenever I said I was feeling down.  Now you know why.  I don't want it to be a secret any more.  

Source: society6.com via Bex @OliveDragonfly on Pinterest

I have found other people sharing their stories about fertility problems and struggling to conceive so helpful, knowing I'm not alone in having these feelings of disappointment, guilt, misery, hopefulness and just the sheer fact it feels SO unfair.  I know we're not the only ones going through it but sometimes it helps to be reminded that we're not.  When people all around are getting pregnant some so quickly and easily (and knowing a couple for whom it was a real surprise after just missing one pill, SO easily) and sharing their lives, be they at times difficult, it still twists a little inside.  I am happy for all of you who have started a family, however it happened.  Those of you who have struggled and those who it just happened for.  I don't begrudge any of you in the slightest but it still hurts when we just don't know if we'll ever get there.  A few weeks ago, after a particularly difficult couple of days, oblivious to the exceptionally bad timing, our neighbour came to tell us she's pregnant and due in August.  I just can't help thinking, why are they so lucky?  I can't help but be insanely jealous.  

Source: blog.whitneyenglish.com via Bex @OliveDragonfly on Pinterest

It's difficult that most people don't know.  I wish it was easier to talk about it openly since if people did know I'd be less likely to get unintentionally hurtful comments from friends or family.  Especially as we have two family weddings coming up and we're likely to get asked about children, having been married for two years now.  I am an adult and can handle these potentially awkward (and, for some baffling reason, socially acceptable) questions but if they happen to come on a bad day, or phrased in the wrong way the scenario could get quite uncomfortable and I may be liable to explode.  

Hypothetical inappropriate relative/family friend: Oh how come we're not hearing the pitter patter of tiny feet yet, we thought you would have a rugrat in tow by now?!  

Me: We're so sorry to have disappointed you in our reproductive efforts but actually we've been really struggling for the last two years and may not be able to have children, thanks for the reminder at this happy event when I'd managed to forget about my misery for five minutes!  

Not the best, really.  And obviously I'd be much more likely to politely reply with the (presumably?!?) expected response: Oh, one day soon, hopefully, * insert jovial laugh*.

The only reason I haven't shared this story so far, when I do share so much of myself and what I'm up to, is that this obviously concerns more than just me.  I always thought I would share this story eventually, when our IVF worked and we were pregnant.  It has taken us both a long time to come to terms with what we are going through and it's only now I have felt able to share, with Nik's permission, our personal story in such a public way.  Some of you already know what we've been going through and I thank you massively for your support through it all.  Even those of you who didn't know what 'other things' I was was referring to in February - the messages I received and placed together in a post have been wonderful to go back and read over when I've felt down or lonely.  I'm sure you can imagine that feeling I had so little control over our lives in any aspect whatsoever at that time was just too much.

Source: searchquotes.com via Bex @OliveDragonfly on Pinterest

The treatment side of things hasn't been too bad.  It's the waiting, the not knowing, and more waiting.  The rollercoaster of emotions.  That's the killer.  

Sadly, our first cycle of IVF has just ended today in an unexpected way, at a stage we weren't prepared for it to fail.  It was a shock.  We were always trying to remain positive yet be realistic and were prepared for it failing at so many points but we were really starting to believe it was going to work.  It hasn't.  We're devastated.  We're back to square one.  And more waiting.

I am terrified it might never work.

Source: babaloud.com via Bex @OliveDragonfly on Pinterest