Infertility Awareness Month

In September 2017, my husband and I took a walk and decided to try to get pregnant. We weren’t going to tell anyone we were trying — that’s weird, right? Everyone thinking of you *trying* (maybe that’s just in my head). Anyway, we decided to try and keep it a secret.

A year later, and still no kid. Maybe it was him or maybe it was me. Maybe it was timing. Surely there was an explanation, right?

A year later, an infertility specialist. A couple pretty invasive ultrasounds and some not-as-invasive tests. Still no kid. Still no explanation.

We spent years waiting. Putting off plans and opportunities because of the what ifs… what if we are pregnant in June and I don’t feel up to taking a vacation? What if we invest all of our money then get pregnant? Don’t want to make any career moves in case we have a kid!

This week, we finally got a diagnosis. An explanation. Endometriosis. (I should probably learn how to spell it…)

Google says endometriosis is “an often painful disorder in which tissue similar to the tissue that normally lines the inside of your uterus — the endometrium — grows outside your uterus”, says it can lead to scar tissue and infertility. Google also says 1 in 10 women have this disorder.

Infertility is one of the most isolating experiences I have ever lived through. There’s a lot of shame (there shouldn’t be, but hello to my dear inner critic), and there’s a lot of heartbreak. Every. Single. Month. When my therapist asked me to name my emotions yesterday, I had a few come to mind, but isolated is the word that stuck in my head long after the tele-health appointment.

Despite my husband’s prodding, I spent the last two and a half years not speaking about it… not telling people we were trying for a baby, though the reasons don’t hold true anymore. It’s not so much the giddy-hopefulness of the newly trying, waiting to tell people when they finally get pregnant. It’s the weight of not wanting to see the pity in the eyes of the person, knowing they will never understand. I sincerely and truly hope they will never understand.

The way to get out of isolation, though, is to be vulnerable. Vulnerable with yourself, first and foremost. Recognizing that beneath the tough exterior of strength and determination is a soft layer of pain and hopelessness and shame. Recognizing that most of those icky feelings aren’t logical, and you’d be pissed if your best friend was talking to herself the way you are talking to yourself. Feeling those feelings anyway.

But also vulnerable with the world. Opening up and realizing that 1 in 10 means you probably *definitely* know someone who has walked this path of infertility and a diagnosis and all the things that come with that. That you can take solstice in community and understand that, while many people you love will never understand what path you’re taking, there might be new friends waiting who totally get it.

While I’m happy to finally have an answer to the confusing question of our infertility, my brain can’t get past the word diagnosis. Confirmation of my body’s brokenness. The feeling that it is all my fault.

It’s not. Stop talking to yourself that way, Emily.

I get it. But for now, I’ll sit with it. Wanting something requires vulnerability… the hoping with reckless abandon, with full faith that things will work out. I’ll find compassion for myself in this moment of my life, and look ahead at my future, where everyone around me has hope for our baby, and I will feel my brokenness and my hope mingle within me.

Because I can be in conflict. I can see the sunlight and feel that hope warm my face, while also acknowledging the deep pain and confusion I have felt for the last two and a half years. I can be grateful for an explanation and yet grieve over a diagnosis. I can contain multitudes.

I fully believe this journey will end with a child for me and my husband, but how we get to that point is still unclear. There may be more time spent in that gray area of waiting and hoping, and I’m finding myself more at ease with that. I’ll never be grateful for the disorder, but I am grateful for the discovery and the options it opens for us.

It’s been a long and hard journey, and it may be longer and harder still, but I’m finding the hope where I can and committing myself to be vulnerable with the people who care about me. If you are on this infertility path, know that you are not alone.