Men and IF

The Misfit at Being Infertile posted about how her husband finally showed his feelings about IF.  Her post got me thinking about the difference in how men show their feeling about IF.

I know that I've had issues where I got really frustrated with D because it seemed like he didn't care about all the IF stuff.  I think there are a few big issues that cause it to be difficult to see the pain that our husbands are going through with IF.  The first issue is that I think that often they don't want us to see their pain.  They are trying to be strong for us.  It's really hard for both people to be highly emotional over long periods of time, and we usually do need them to be our rock.  The second reason is that the men handle the intense emotions differently than women do, and men often have a hard time even acknowledging certain painful emotions (like sadness and depression).  We get frustrated because we don't see them showing their emotions the way we do.  Our husbands can feel intensely about IF, but we may only see small glimpses of it.

And on a complete different note, I've actually updated my recipe blog recently (I started in January but didn't do much with it until October).

27 days until surgery.

Sometimes I feel like a fraud

When I take the kids that I nanny for (boy almost 2 and girl almost 4) places, people assume that they are my children unless I tell them otherwise. It often not worth mentioning unless it's people we or I see regularly. Those times when it's not worth mention, I feel like I'm lying to people when they ask questions about the kids, like how old they are, and assume I'm their mom. After the tire incident Saturday, I had to take the little boy with me to buy a new tire while the girl was at VBS. The tire guy asked how old he was and told me about his 2-year-old. When I was picking the little girl up from VBS, I was think about how I'm the hidden infertile, who everyone would assume was a mom and how everyone else there (even the grandparents) had had children (or at least adopted). It's weird being an infertile who takes care of children all day.

Congratulations to Sew, who if you don't know, recently found out that she's finally pregnant!

Cycle update etc.

I'm on CD 11 and I'm still spotting which is crappy.  I've been feeling my ovaries more this cycle, but I'm not sure why.  They actually feel a bit like they did on clomid where pressure is uncomfortable.  I'm hoping the spotting will finish up so that I can actually o at a decent time.  I'm going to be starting the T3 soon (whopee on checking pulse and temps 3x a day).

I don't know if it's the fact that 2 years is getting close or D's best friend's wedding coming up soon (or some crazy hormonalness) but I've been feeling sad about IF this cycle than I had in a while.  I did however find out at the bridal shower (same wedding) that an acquaintance from my church in my hometown is now dealing with secondary IF after dealing with primary IF.  We commiserated about the fact that there was a woman there who was pregnant with her 10th child; how it's great for her but it's still hard to see when you have been waiting for the same blessing for a few years.  I'm trying to bear my cross and surrender to God's will, but right now I'm having a tough time. 

 

I've done a little writing (like 2 pages or so) on the book, but I'm going to try to do some more over the weekend now that I have a more functional computer.  I'm not sure if I'm ever going to be able to make it a true book or ever get it sold but I feel that I need to try to get it down on paper at least.  I may at some point make a private blog for it.

It's funny

I was thinking back to last September, and how anxious I was to have a baby and how upset I was about our timing that month. I really wanted a June baby, since I was teaching then. It actually seems that I get less sad when I get FP and crying than I did in those first couple months. I think part of it is that I've resigned myself to the fact that there's probably a problem. Even during the Clomid cycles, I had a bit more hope. The last couple ones have been pretty obviously doomed right after ovulation because of the spotting/bleeding.

I do hope that charting with the Creighton Model will help and that Dr. Hilger's will have some suggestions on what might be wrong and how to go forward. I won't be able to send in my chart until mid-November, so it'll be probably December before we might have answers. December will be 17 months, cycle 15.

I feel disappointed about not being pregnant, but the way it hurt is less acute but more widespread. I guess that I'm lucky that we got the stressful timed sex out of the way in the earlier cycles and are able to be more relaxed during now. I'm waiting to o right now; it's CD 15 so I should o by next Friday hopefully.

Something I've been thinking but haven't been able to put into words

This Cross I Embrace wrote a post a few weeks back about infertility vs. recurrent miscarriage that is something that I've been thinking for a little while. It's controversial and someone who's had a loss might not agree, but I feel the same way she does.

Money and Infertility

This post is a C&P from the Nest. A girl C&P about a girl asking the multiples board a question about working with twins since she was about to undergo IVF and the C&Per commented in a way that was insulting to the original poster.

This was my reply:
Dealing with IF causes you to have to make difficult financial decisions. You have to save up to see an RE, for treatments, and still be able to afford the child that will hopefully be the end result of all of your expenses. Getting pregnant (even with treatments) is generally easier when you are younger, so time is not your friend. You have to balance what you can afford and debt with the fact that you have a limited amount of time. This is especially an issue if you are hoping to have more than one child (non-multiples). Multiples is a concern in IVF, but most REs limit the number of embryos transfered, again trying to strike a balance between increased likelihood of getting pregnant and the risk of multiple and the accompanying complications.

Additional comments:
The reason that we aren't currently pursuing treatment or additional testing is financial. D wants to be in a better financial position (with less debt) before we spend money on testing and treatment since our insurance doesn't cover IF. I don't even want to go back to my dr (ob/gyn) about the bleeding (still happening by the way) since they couldn't find any answers and it just seemed to be a waste of money. We can afford a child, but we can't afford testing and treatments right now to get a child. Thankfully I'm still under 30, so it's not as if we only have a year before AMA. When we do get testing and treatment, it will be through an RE and hopefully it will be around the beginning of the year (in less of course I get pregnant by then).

Edit (9/3/08): I have realized that it's a good thing that ART isn't covered by our insurance, although testing should be covered in my option. We might have jumped into ART without thinking about the morality of it. However, the financial aspect of dealing with IF is there whether you follow the Church's teaching or not. Treatments for the physical causes of IF are likely not covered under insurance for many people, and adoption is expensive as well.