This week is National Infertility Awareness Week. This subject is and will always be near and dear to my heart. Going through infertility has completely changed the person I am. This year's NIAW theme is "Bust a Myth". The Myth I wanted to bust was "You've had a baby, you're no longer infertile!" WRONG. I'm sure it may seem that way to a lot of people. But, just because I've had a baby, doesn't mean I've forgotten the physical and emotional pain that we had to go through to get here!
CJ is almost 16 months...so one of the main topics that seems to come up among the moms at playgroups lately is "When are you going to have another?" I'd say about a quarter of the moms with kids around CJ's age are already pregnant with their second. I thankfully haven't gotten that itch quite yet, and the timing really wouldn't be right for our family right now anyhow (driving cross-country in the summer, pregnant?! Umm, no thanks!). When I get asked about having another, I usually reply that "we had trouble getting pregnant with CJ" but then quickly try to deflect the question back to them "How about you?!". If I am being honest, I just don't enjoy "going there" in my thoughts and emotions...thinking about having to endure that path again for another baby...those battle wounds still seem way too fresh in my mind. And just like I knew we were going to have trouble getting pregnant the first time, I have a feeling it will be a struggle again. Probably TMI, but I haven't had a period since March 2009 (the one that the fertility protocol forced my body to have prior to my fertility meds that successfully resulted in CJ).
I was at a baby class last week and a few moms were discussing weaning our babies from breastfeeding. I chose to breastfed CJ for a little over one year, and then the time was right for our family to wean. When I mentioned this to an other mom, she remarked that it must have been easy for me to choose to stop breastfeeding since I could "have another baby and have another chance to breastfeed." I mumbled something like "not necessarily, but I hope so..." and walked away. Even the smallest things sometimes can bring that infertility pain back up to the surface.
I am able to talk about our infertility a lot more openly now than I was when we were going through it. I think because I am able to take a step back and look at it from the outside, seperate myself from the emotional aspect. I can easily rattle off terms and different procedures, and talk to people matter-of-factly about what we went through to have CJ. (Hystosonogram, countless ultrasounds and blood draws, 3 cycles on Clomid, 1 cycle on Femara, and 2 cycles of Gonadotropin injections with Gonal-F). But when I start thinking about doing it all over again...I just can't right now. And since we're moving, I worry that we'll be at a new clinic, new Dr...there are no guarantees that just because you had one baby that you can have two babies!!
Don't get me wrong, I would go through it all again in a heartbeat for my little CJ! He was definitely worth the wait. But that pain and hurt, those feelings, don't all just magically disappear when you have your baby. I continue to pray daily for my everyone who is going through infertility and all my blog friends still waiting to be blessed with their babies.
We went to church this morning. Our church always invites members of the congregation up at the end of the service to join the choir in the singing of the Hallelujah Chorus, which I so enjoyed getting to do! CJ did great in the nursery, didn't even miss us! After his nap, we had a mini egg hunt in our backyard. Despite being 15 months old, CJ has only been walking for about a month, so he is still getting used to walking on the grass! It is so funny and cute watching him stumble around putting eggs in his truck basket. It was a great Easter Sunday!
