The Other Side

Wasn't that guest post from Wednesday awesome? Emily did such a great job answering a lot of questions that have been on my mind recently.  Lauren has really put together such an amazing collections of posts about infertility all in one space, so head on over and check it out, if you haven't done so already.  I was talking to her earlier this week and she passed on this great blog post for me to read.  It got me to thinking.  As I read through all of these amazing stories from different bloggers, I am noticing a running theme about how to interact with your infertile friend, but the post linked above does a great job explaining what its like to be on the other side.  I really wanted to take a moment to write about my own experience and to give a little perspective of what its like to be the one with the baby bump.

These might not apply to everyone, so keep that in mind, but this is just what I've experienced.  It's my experience of having friends and family with infertility, and my own route to getting pregnant and being pregnant.  I was terrified of infertility in the years leading up to getting pregnant.  Both my aunt and uncle on my dad's side were unable to pregnant naturally.  My aunt never did end up having kids, and my uncle and his wife eventually gave me 2 much younger cousins through IVF.  Due to my family history, an irregular period, a chronic illness, and never getting a positive on an OPK, I sought help.  I eventually had an HSG and was supposed to go on Clomid the day I found out I was pregnant.  I really feel like I lucked out, and sometimes I feel really guilty about it, so just know this:

1. We (your fertile friends) might feel really guilty.  Sometimes I feel like my infertile friends would make a better parent than me.  It's confusing to deal with.  There is no rhyme or reason, but your pain affects us in different ways.  I truly thought I was going to be in the infertile club, and I feel absolutely terrible for ever making a "big deal" out of my own fears now.

2. We think (an excruciating amount) about how to break the news to you that we got lucky.  I did my best to inform my infertile friends about my pregnancy before they heard it from someone else.  I painstakingly thought about how to approach the conversation.  I did not look forward to it at all, but not telling you personally seemed more disrespectful.  I'm really sorry if I used the wrong words, but my intention was always to protect your feelings.  Same goes for stupid things I might accidentally say a long the way.  If I say something really stupid, its probably because I'm frantically trying to come up with anything to make you feel better, unhelpful but with good intentions.

3. Don't assume that just because we got pregnant that there aren't other issues we're dealing with.  You never know who might be experiencing something really scary or painful, even if they got pregnant.  This is important to me because I have a chronic illness, which happens to also be an invisible illness, meaning that no one can look at me and know I have it, just like infertility.  Getting pregnant was really scary for me and I thought FOR YEARS about whether my body would tolerate being pregnant.  So far it has, but it hasn't been easy and it hasn't been without pain.  I know I'm really fortunate to be pregnant in the first place, and I won't sit around complaining about it, but just know that you can't always know what another person is going through.  I need just as much support and encouragement dealing with my disease as you do with yours.

4.  Most importantly, know that we genuinely care.  We want to see you happy, we want to support you, we want to remain friends.  We want to raise our kids with your kids.  More than anything, we want to learn how to navigate this with you.  Please allow us the chance.