It bums me out

It really sucks that someone having a baby makes me sad. It's supposed to be something happy.  And I am happy for the people that have the baby, but I'm usually more sad for myself.  I really hate that.

Getting over it

I have to say, I surprised myself this weekend. I've slowly noticed things changing for me, but it really struck me on Saturday.

We joined a playspace coop nearby for the winter. It's afternoons only and I knew I'd be going stir crazy if I didn't have somewhere to go with H after nap. I'd heard from neighbors that it was a good place to go and there was an open house there this past Saturday. I decided to take H there to check it out and to sign up.

It was great there! It was pretty crowded and of course full of kids. And of course TONS of the moms there were visibly pregnant. And you know what? I didn't care. I really, truly didn't. I wasn't jealous. I didn't get sad. I didn't feel much of anything at all.

I guess I've finally, finally come to accept that I will never be pregnant and give birth to a child. I don't have a lot of choice in the matter, and this is just how it is. Being angry and jealous isn't going to change that. I have H, and we will get another child, and they will be my family and that's how it is.

I will never say that on some level I wish that my children didn't have to have two sets of parents or that they could have been biologically related to me. I will never say that I'm thankful to have gone through infertility. But I have come to accept that this is my life. I have a wonderful son, we will have another child, and that will be that.

I don't think I'll ever be ebullient upon a pregnancy announcement. I will never enjoy seeing a F@ceb00k ultrasound.

But I am okay with never being pregnant and experiencing child birth, and I don't feel particularly jealous of people around that anymore.

Play Group

We're off to our adoptive families play group. We meet once a month in some donated space by a local maternity/baby store. I'm trying to be the 'organizer.' We're bringing Henry's book along with us. We finally ordered his Adoption Story book from online so that we can send it to his birth parents for his 6 month birthday, which is Valentine's Day. I want to show it to everybody there.

I'm really glad we have this group. It's so nice to know that Henry will know other adopted kids as he's growing up, and it's especially nice that a couple of them are so close to him in age so that they could be play mates. I like that. I think a lot of adoption processing can be done through play, so it's nice to have people who can play along that theme.

Someone on the evil FB is posting about her home birth plan and talked about the 'birthing tub' and I have to say, these plans are currently not making me jealous. Baby steps.

Independence Day

Yesterday was Baby S's second birthday. I asked E&R for a referral letter for our adoption. I also found out that E had her third miscarriage and D&C last week. That really sucks. I feel so bad for her. I knew she would get pregnant again before we had a baby, and I'm so, so sorry that she had to have another miscarriage. It's so unfair and it really, really sucks. But I'm also jealous that she was able to even get pregnant. Which is kind of silly, I suppose. She has suffered so much loss too, but she has never endured any ART and has had a live birth. Still it really sucks to have to endure so many losses. I know her son and the lack of ART is no comfort to her in this situation. A loss is a loss no matter what. It's a horrible place to be in. That being said, I'm selfishly kind of sad that they're trying again, though we had discussed it before and I knew it was coming. I thought I would be completely distraught on S's second birthday being still childless with no hope on the horizon yet. I was certain I'd be pregnant, at least by donor sperm by now. And here they are trying for #2. And failing. And having losses as we've had losses. But also having had some success. The whole thing just fucks me up and puts me in a weird place. I hate that everything about all of this stuff makes me unhappy. But it does. I'm not sure how I'm going to take E's second pregnancy. During the first one I was sure I would be pregnant at some point, if in some non-traditional manner. This time I don't have any hope for a healthy pregnancy. I could probably cope okay if we had a baby, but being childless through another pregnancy will probably really hurt.

Yesterday I was so happy and felt so lucky. My name got chosen at random to be let out of work with pay early. As I work in a call center, that is a rare occasion indeed. I never win anything out of luck. Ever. Yes, several people were chosen, but still I was convinced that this was a sign that things were going to go well for us this year and that things were looking up. But now I'm back in a dark and gloomy place.

Hopefully tonights fireworks will make me feel a bit better. I absolutely adore fireworks.

I'll leave you with some more pictures of our trip.

Badlands National Park, South Dakota.


Me on Jackalope. Wall Drug, SD. (Ignore my fat rolls, please.)


Devil's Tower, WY.

Yellowstone National Park, WY

The freak in the corner

Another one of T's employees' wives is pregnant. She was drinking when we were in Las Vegas (5 weeks ago), so how pregnant can she be?

I wish this news didn't hurt so much. They're like 25 years old. And they got married after us.

I mentioned to the HR woman how the adoption benefit, while good in theory, doesn't work out so great. And maybe that's why no one has used it. But she said, no -- no one in the entire company has ever adopted. She would have known about it because they would have to talk to her about maternity/paternity leave.

And the cheese stands alone.

Why is it always so hard, or, the happiness quest day 6

I went out to dinner with some people from my last job. Though I didn't like the job, the people are very nice. So, we decided to get together for dinner and hang out. The group has disintegrated even more since I left. I'm two for two on that front. My job before my last job has also disintegrated. At least that means it makes sense that I left both of them. Anyway, I mentioned another former co-worker, the one who is adopted and moved to CA with her husband. The news? You guessed it. Oops! She's pregnant. They had planned to wait a year to start trying, but she wasn't on birth control.

It's amazing how that kind of news never loses its sting. My co-workers know that I've had some trouble getting pregnant and some of them know I've had a miscarriage or two (they don't know about the third), but I don't talk about it much with them, and I'm sure they don't know that news like that can make my ears ring leaving me unable to concentrate for several minutes. They don't know that this news is like a punch to my stomach. They don't know that this can make me want to start crying immediately as a release for the anger and frustration that someone's easy first and viable pregnancy creates in me.

I didn't cry. I kept chanting to myself, "I am not being depressed anymore. It's okay. Forget about it. I am not being depressed anymore." But I have to say, this news has definitely set me back a little. I have been doing very well not obsessing and not feeling bad for myself lately. I've been able to push the sadness and the anger and even much of the jealousy away. The ready-to-pop woman at work is hardly bothering me these days. But this blow was just a little more than I could handle.

It's amazing how bitter and jealous one person can be. I get so angry when people have so easily what I have tried to achieve endlessly and tirelessly for two years. I just feel like my losses are incomprehensible to these people and I just don't understand why poor T and I have got such a short end of the stick.

But I am doing a little bit better today. I'm trying not to think about it too much. It is sort of working, I think. I want to get back on my happiness track. It was feeling pretty good.

I have a phone screen on Monday, an interview on Tuesday and a Red Sox ALCS game tonight. My b00bs and nipp1es are a bit tender, but I'm absolutely certain it's Cl0mid side effects. I'm trying to decide how early I want to poas.

Oh yeah

I forgot to mention. T's boss's wife had her baby. He's a boy. We think he was conceived while we were in Mexico for T's work vacation. Remember, the one where I was having my third miscarriage? Yeah. So that sucked. Especially for T.

Sigh.

jealous again

T and I are going to the game tonight. The weather has cleared up, so hopefully it will be better than last time. And hopefully we will win.

It is the Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashana) and I got sent a New Year's bulletin from my mother's cousin. His daughter is pregnant. She's in her early 40s, and my mother told me that she and her husband were 'having trouble' but there it was on the bottom of the note. I was furious at my mother for not telling me. To be fair, she may not have known, but I sent her an email about it. I wonder what their 'trouble' was. Part of me wonders if she had donor eggs. But I don't want to ask her. She's due in February, which means she just passed the 12 weeks mark. We went to a party at her house in July. She must have been doing whatever they were doing to get her pregnant around then. She literally cooked for over 50 people by herself and she works full time, so I don't know how she could do that and undergo treatments, but she seems kind of the wonder woman type.

This is her second marriage, and in her first marriage she said several times out loud that she didn't want children. I guess maybe it was her first husband that didn't want them. Of course, everybody's allowed to change their mind. I was just surprised when my mother told me they were trying because I always just knew that she didn't want kids. New husband must have really wanted some.

Why can't I just be happy for them? Why does this kill me so much? It really just makes me miserable and jealous. Especially if they didn't use donor eggs. Then I'll really be jealous. But who knows if I'll ever know. I'm sick of all of this pain.

I just got an email from my mother. She didn't know. She learned via the letter, too.

I'm trying to decide whether or not to go to synagogue on the high holidays. T is not Jewish, and he has to work on Thursday for Rosh Hashana, so I would have to go alone. We found a synagogue that we might want to join, but it's full of young couples with children, and membership dues are not cheap. I suppose I could just go for the service and not join, but I just don't know if I want to go alone. There is a separate children's service, so there probably won't be a ton of kids there, but I'm just not sure I feel up to it. But then I feel guilty that I don't feel up to it. I told my family that I'd go there, and I just don't want to 'fess up to them that I just decided to not go this year. But I just don't know if I can do it. I'm going to just decide in the morning, I guess.

Hopefully the Sox game tonight will be a good distraction. I love baseball. I think I may go to a coffee shop today and apply, too. I'm meeting my friend S later to help her choose some yarn to make a scarf for her husband. I also need to cook for the dinner tomorrow night at my brother's house. I'm making broccoli with Parmesan butter, lime cheesecake bars and chocolate mousse. So, despite not working, I'm pretty busy. Hopefully that will elevate my mood.

I just found out another cousin is pregnant with their second after 'trouble' and a miscarriage. I'm still a selfish bitch and am not able to do anything with that except be sad for myself. I hate wallowing in self-pity, but that's just where I am right now. This pregnant cousin is very lovely and was adopted herself, so I'm sure she would be very sympathetic and understanding. But the fact of the matter is, she is having two children that are biologically related to herself and her husband and we aren't. At this point, we're not having any children.

I really hope some of this anger, sadness and jealously goes away once I'm (hopefully) pregnant. Not sure what will happen if we end up adopting.