dancing madly in pyjamas with my sister

pumping it up before exams and interviews

everybody at our wedding

dancing

and singing our hearts out

rest in peace, Michael Jackson - because of the way you made us feel.

"Couples experiencing infertility often receive well-meaning but extremely insensitive "advice." We can all list the most popular ones; "just relax and you'll get pregnant," or "adopt and you'll get pregnant," or "why can't you just be happy with what you have," or the most painful from the ones who seem to have the good on God's plan; "maybe God never meant for you to have children."

The sheer audacity of making a statement like that never ceases to amaze me. These same people would never walk up to someone with cancer and say, "maybe God never meant for you to live." However since I am infertile, I am supposed to get on with my life.  It is hard to understand why people cannot see infertility for what it is: a disease for which I have the right to seek treatment. What if doctors said to the parents of polio victims, "Maybe God meant for thousands of children to be cripples, live in iron lungs or die." What if they never tried to find a cure? Who could think for one minute that was God's plan?

Why do I think God gave me infertility? I think he meant for my husband and I to grow closer, become stronger, love deeper. I think God meant for us to find the fortitude within ourselves to get up each time infertility knocks us down. I think God meant for our medical community to discover medicines, invent medical equipment, and to create procedures and protocols. I think God meant for us to find a cure for infertility. No, God never meant for me NOT to have children. That is not my destiny, that is just a fork in the road I am on. I have been placed on the road less traveled, and like it or not, I am a better person for it. Clearly, God meant for me to develop more compassion, deeper courage, and have greater inner strength on this journey to resolution and I haven't let him down. 

Frankly, if the truth be known, I think God singled me out for special treatment. I think God meant for me to build a thirst for a child so strong and deep that when the baby is finally placed in my arms, it will be the longest, coolest most refreshing drink I have ever known. While I would never have chosen infertility, I cannot deny that a fertile woman could never experience the joy that I know awaits me. Yes, one way or another, I will have a baby of my own. And, the next time someone wants to offer me unsolicited advice, I'll say,

 "Don't tell me what God meant when he handed me infertility, I already know."

~ Anonymous

{ found on The Angry Infertile }

I could say all sorts of trite expressions here. I could pen all sorts of platitudes about the sun coming out tomorrow. But I won't. I feel... angry? Empty? Completely disenchanted?

Our Québec trip was a conception-moon of sorts. A mini-baby-making vacation that worked. My cycle temperatures were exactly the same as my February (pregnancy) temperatures, with the exception of a thrilling spike in the last week of the luteal phase. My boobs had orbiting moons, and I knew I was pregnant. I took SIX pregnancy tests from cycle day 12 to CD 16. I got my BFP on CD 15, and confirmed it on CD 16. I approached this pregnancy with a "can-do, kick-ass" attitude. I was going to have this baby, and it wasn't going to come out until I said so. This baby was going to yell at me when it was a teenager. I was going to bake so many birthday cakes for this one.

I was careful to keep my stress levels down (stress can interfere with implantation), and was generally much more relaxed about the whole process. I went to the doctor ?(GP) and asked for a requisition for a hormone/HCG panel so that if anything was wrong, it could be rectified. Or, at least measured.

He said no, because there was "no way anybody could know they were pregnant before two periods had passed." I was dumbfounded, and sat there in shock as he told me that home pregnancy tests measure progesterone (they don't, they measure HCG), and the tests must have picked up progesterone (they don't, otherwise anybody could get a positive result), and I certainly wasn't pregnant. He also told me that every woman ovulated on day 14 (they don't, it varies), and practically told me that to have sex a man puts his wee-wee into the lady's belly button. Positively prehistoric, that man.

I left without having any blood tests done, and with a certainty that I definitely was going to be seeing a midwife, if Western medicine was allowing such crack-pots to operate fully-licensed.

Last night, after going to the bathroom, I saw bright red blood and wrote last night's post. Thank you for your prayers. I took a pregnancy test this morning - negative. The bleeding and cramping has increased, so I'm inevitably having another early miscarriage for causes unknown.

Dear God,

It's me, Shortcake. Where are you?

I wasn't going to say anything until the second trimester. I'm newly pregnant again, and bleeding. PLEASE, PLEASE PRAY.