# Grief cycles



## LostHeart

Hi Ladies,

I haven't posted properly in here before. Was wandering around trying to work out where I fit. Am quite sensitive to feeling that I don't belong / haven't a place anymore. Anyhow my story is long I won't bore you with all the details, but in short I have severe endometriosis which severely damaged my ovaries and reserve, it culminated in a poorly managed pelvic emergency which scrambled eggs not already damaged, all of it had to be cut out. I was just wondering if anyone else goes through periods where they feel they are ok, then suddenly they are not? This keeps seeming to happen to me, I have days or weeks when I feel ok, then suddenly I'm crushed. I know that grief doesn't follow nice linear stages, but it seems to catch me out so much. A week ago I was all positive, telling myself there is more to life than having kids and checking myself everytime I felt bitter (I never used to be a bitter person at all), but now I feel it again. Anyway I'm starting to ramble so I'll stop, I just wanted to know if other ppl feel the same?

 to all those that need them x


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## Frothy

Hi again LostHeart, it's Frothy here - just read your post from today....you sound just like me so didn't want read and run! I go from being social butterfly go lucky girl to complete gloom with sometimes nothing to even trigger it off. When I'm 'up' I think I can tackle the world, take the situation we are in practically and with the attitude that we are happy and lucky to have what we have got (despite that being without children) to next minute feeling complete and utter envy and jealousy to any woman who has been blessed with the fortune of being pregnant, DP has even said he has noticed me clam up when babies are on telly and I even hate celebs I read about in magazines who are preg - are you like this too?? 

I guess like you say there are no rules with grief - I lost my dad as a teenager and battled between wanting a life with friends and partying (at times forcing it so I could feel normal I must admit) to being racked with guilt at either enjoying myself or wanting to feel normal again. It's the same with fertility - do you agree? One minute you're flowing along doing okay and next minute BAM! it all hits you and you suddenly realise you're actually living this nightmare that you never ever thought would happen to you.  

So all in all - you're normal, you've got feelings, sentiments and emotions - and hell, who would want to be void of that?? Please don't be too hard on yourself, so what if you feel bitter every now and then, you're allowed to be. You gave me similar advice earlier don't forget and you gave me comfort when you were feeling like this yourself XX 

Have you ever read the piece by Lesley Garner called 'When the Sea is Rough Mend your Sails'? It's not related to fertility, it's just about having winters in your life (in the emotional sense rather than the seasonal) where things just get on top of you, you feel at a crossroads, nothing seems to be going right. I read it years ago and still read it from time to time now when I need a pick-me-up. It's all about letting your self go along with how you are feeling and learning to live with the winters in your life. I'll find it and send you a copy.

Take care

Frothy X


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## tribble

hi I do think it is totally normal, I guess what we hope for is the periods of being more up & feeling a bit better about it all get longer & the others stuff gets less frequent.
I've had a similar experience recently thought I was doing OK. The next thing I'm at the allotment blubbing - mind you I was reading the book I bought - "Never to be a mother" which has really helped me see there are stages I will go through bit with these bumps up & down. So some blubs were bound to come out!
Also had a blip with stepdaughter recently getting gcse results, it was lovely telling people & I was so pleased for her; but somehow reminds me I'm not top of the list to talk to/ celebrate with just a reminder I won't be celebrating achievements with my own child - but it is a great second best & I';m not even really complaining, it just made me notice all those feelings again... 
The other book mentioned also sounds good.
Hard when the down is unexpected though, I completely understand what you are saying. 
Lostheart you certainly can belong here with us; 
I think the bitterness also fades gradually but obviously with these occasional flare-ups - it does not mean that you are not progressing through it all as you should, it just means you are normal
You all take care xxx


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## Flow13

It was weird reading your post, because last night I was having 'down' time, and my oh said 'I don't understand how one day you can be fine and then next day be upset, down on yourself and everything else'.  And I couldn't explain why at all.

I think when we feel low its as though we are alone (to me it does anyway) and no-one else is going through. But there are so many others the same. 

I really hope you feel better today.  xxxxxxx


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## Sam1971

Hi Lostheart 

Big  

Didn't want to just read and not post as i can totally relate to everything you say...swinging from thinking that everything will be okay and life is not all bad to thinking how can i live without my own children .

Its such a horrible situation for any of us to be in and one that i i think only others in the same situation can understand.

Frothy- you sound like me too!!... Fun loving socailable girl one minute   to completely down and not interested the next ...or worse still trying to be fun loving whilst dying on the inside.... and i'm sooo glad i'm not the only one who gets upset with celebrity pregnancies and children . Thought i was going mad where that was concerned  but i can't bear to even chat with my girlfriends in a gossipy way about the latest celebrity baby news .

Hi Tribble- Never to be a Mother is quite an inspiring book isn't it. So many brave ladies out there.

Much love and   to you all.
Sam xx


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## Jules2194

Hi ladies,

Just read these posts being at a loss of what to do with myself today. A week ago today got a BFN from first IVF cycle using donor eggs and sperm was totally devasted, but thought I was doing ok coping with it. Clearly I;m not. All the let downs along the way I thought were making me a stronger person.

I'm glad I am not alone with my feelings. My partner and I have decided to give it another try but having gone down the adoption route already and got nowhere I feel this is my last hope of having children. It is so heart wrenching and devastating. So unfair that other people have children and we don't. I guess we should be thankful like you say for what we have but it is so hard to do. It is so hard when i see my brother's 18 month old little boy, the fact also that they won't even let me babysit, always some excuse......... I want to share him but can't.

Life is so unfair. Sorry for going on, I'm in tears trying to work but can't, looking for some comfort from the support of these wonderful boards.

I'm trying to be positive and look forward but just fear it will all end in tears again..........

  to everyone 

Jules xx


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## LostHeart

Ladies...         !!!!

Just wanted to say a big thank you to you all. This will sound really daft but reading through your replies, it's the first time I've felt truly not alone. People have offered me comfort but they are ppl who have or can have children and it is *not* the same hearing it from them, usually it's the 'oh you can adopt' one !! I felt as though I really should be managing better by now and felt defeated by the troughs I found myself unexpectedly in , it really does help to know that I'm not alone, although I am so sorry for the heartache and loss each and everyone of you are expereincing . We are strong women to be living with this. In the 'real world' I have felt so separate from my friends, I was in my late twenties when I lost my ovaries and everyone around me was already a mother/ pregnant / or on their way, they were having morning sickness and I was having hot flushes! It was like a wedge had been dropped between us and I couldn't quite reach them anymore, don't get me wrong I love them to bits, just its been so hard and isolating. I'm feeling a bit more upbeat today, down but not out sort of thing.

Frothy - thanks so much for thinking of me so soon after your bad news, you take good care of yourself. I'm sorry to hear you lost your dad young. Yes definitely I am like that, though this goes in phases too. In the beginning I saw buggys and pregnant ppl *everywhere*, now its not so much that, or a mother or a baby on their own but more watching them interact that is deeply painful. Even in here I followed the advice and turned off avatars. Success stories must give some hope to those going through tx and that's great, but for me like I think it was Tribble who said on the other thread, a safe space is important.

I will check out the books, sounds like a few of you have found the 'never to be a mother helpful'.

Thanks so much for sharing, its really reassuring and much appreciated.  to you all x


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## Crikey

This is very interesting. I'm wondering if anyone is ever consistently "alright" after they make the decision to stop treatment? Why is it that we feel OK & "accepting" one day, and then lonely and desolate another - is it because of simple mood changes/tiredness/bad day at work etc, or are we really not alright with our decision? I've been thinking about it a lot because mostly I think I'm alright, but then I get swamped by loneliness & fear for the future and I think that on the good days, I must just be in denial..... I hope not.
It's not helped by IF being at the bottom of most people's lists of stressful events, way under "moving house" and "packing for holidays" (I know this because when a best friend ignored my devastated email about my failed ivf, she was very p*ssed off when I asked her weeks later why she ignored it - she'd been "emptying boxes" after moving house and did I not know how stressful that was with a toddler.... Needless to say I've alienated her a bit, which doesn't help my situation). So nobody ever acknowledges your losses in life - people just don't rate IF as very important (single friends think I'm lucky to have a man at all; friends with kids & no IF experience just say moronic things; family that I've told are thinking that I should be well over it all by now...). My problem is that I'm more or less over the hating preggos phase / feeling uber-sensitive about mentions of babies etc, but now and again I have a terrible, all-consuming terror of the possibility of loneliness in the decades ahead.
I feel that if my partner wasn't around, or I lost him at some stage, I would have absolutely nothing and nobody..... am I alone in feeling like that? Is it irrational?
Feel tragic just writing that....


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## Rowan22

Hi Crikey,

Of course you're not being irrational, not at all. I think most counsellors and psychotherapists rate infertility as like a full scale bereavement, though instead of mourning the past, you're mourning the loss of a possible future. As for your friend, words fail me. I'm afraid I would have retorted that she was lucky to have the toddler and surely the boxes could wait and terminated the call!
I share your fears about the future, especially as my dh is older than me. I dread the thought of years of loneliness, as well. 
Yesterday, going into our local city, there were a fair number of children and parents, even though we got there in the middle of the afternoon. Mostly I found I could ignore them, which I suppose is some progress but I couldn't help seeing a young and healthy couple with a toddler and a child just out of babyhood - and an enormous pregnant belly! Obviously they don't use any form of contraception but the way they seemed to be flaunting their health and fertility just got to me! I don't have either anymore and never will again. 
We are still thinking of using donor eggs but I think I'm too ill to support a pregnancy. Also, having watched the BBC documentary about an egg donor who traced her genetic offspring, I'm beginning to seriously wonder if this is a good idea. I do think that if you chose this route, you are never going to be able to forget where the genetic material came from.
You're not tragic at all! Have one of these!   

Rowanxx


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## LostHeart

Hi Crikey,

Sorry you are feeling low  . I totally agree with Rowan, it is a bereavement, it's just a shame some ppl in society remain ignorant of that. But their lack of awareness isn't your fault. I think these ups and downs are part of it and from where I'm standing we're all doing a good job of getting through the best way we can. Your not alone here.

Take care x


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## Crikey

Thanks Rowan22 and LostHeart
I was on a real downer yesterday and your replies have made me feel better and less alone.
I made the mistake of telling a colleague how low I was feeling about the future (she knows about my stage 4 endo and the infertility from it, all the treatment etc) and she said, for at least the sixth time since I told her about the IF: "Oh come on - at least you have your health".... I never know what to say to that. Rowan I'm sorry you're too ill to support a pregnancy, you probably have experience as well of the "well, at least you're not dying" brigade (people with kids usually, my colleague has four). 
RE DE, I cancelled a cycle at the last minute, earlier this year. I'd had it in mind as a safety net for so long that I hadn't really thought hard about whether I really wanted to do it. One of my concerns was that it was an anonymous donor (there are no known donors where I am) - I wanted the child to be able to trace the donor if he/she wanted to. But I would also find it complicated having the donor in the child's life. I also backed out because I couldn't stand the thought of more drugs, clinics, suspension-of-normal-life, waiting etc... I just hope I won't regret the decision in the years ahead, but there's no way of knowing that now
Thanks ladies
C x


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## Rowan22

Yes, I've heard the one about having good health, as well, though not from my family, who know my history. They just think i'm living in cloud cuckoo land to even think about having children and should just help look after my mother, who is reasonably fit and well and rather healthier than I am (this is particularly the view of my sil, who's hardly had a day's illness in her life). If I get this comment from strangers, I usually retort 'Actually, I don't. Do you want a list?'
Last night, I was awake half the night just crying. I've just been told I'm now anaemic, to add to everything else and there are times when I hate this body. The reason is probably the desperately heavy periods but I can't find a doctor who will do anything about them. Also, of course, I can't try donor egg tx if I'm already anaemic. The odds against this dream ever happening just get longer and longer. And I couldn't help thinking about that healthy young couple and their growing (obviously growing!) family and thinking what i'd give to be that age again and with that degree of good health. As it is, I'm looking at 50 next year and I suspect my fifties will probably bring yet more health problems. My life seems useless and pointless and the aching longing (you know the one!) never goes away for long. Also, the period is starting and I always feel desperately low at this time. 
I know exactly what you mean about the suspension of life while you're waiting to see if your tx has been successful, Crikey and the whole anonymity debate is difficult. Did you see that programme on the BBC about a donor who was determined to trace the twins who had been born as a result of her egg? It did seem to work out all right but it might not have done. I still don't know what we're going to do, if anything but nothing's going to happen unless my health improves. 
I'm glad we've made you feel less alone. I find this forum is wonderful for that, especially as I hardly go anywhere or meet anyone and I don't know anybody in this situation outside of the web. I suspect us poor infertile women hide away with our shame. The problem is there are really only two ways to think about all this, either it's our fault, which is a very painful position to take up and which isn't true, or it's our body's fault. The latter's probably true but where does it get you? As I read on a disability blog once, you are not going to get an apology from your body. It's not going to say, 'I'm sorry I let you down so badly' and though if a car was behaving this badly, you'd just scrap it, we don't have that option with our bodies. Somehow I have to live with it, all of it, the grief and the utter despair and just not knowing what the hell to do about the wretched situation. In the meantime, the fertile world goes on breeding, some parents are awful, as we all know and there's that desperate feeling of injustice, as well, as they're usually the ones who have half a dozen kids. Where do we go from here? God knows. 
Sorry, this hasn't actually cheered you up at all, has it?  
I am just feeling desperately low today and hopeless. 

Rowan


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## Crikey

Hi Rowan22
Sorry to hear you were feeling so down on Friday. I don't have a PC at home or I would've sent you a message. Don't worry about your post not cheering me up - nothing would've cheered me up last week anyway!
I did see that BBC doc about the donor tracing her recipient and two children/twins. I was a bit disconcerted by it. I'm all for DE - I was about to do it myself this year - but I found a few things uncomfortable in the doc. The way that the recipient admitted that the donor kids were intended to replace her two sons who had died, and that the new children wouldn't exist at all if her sons hadn't died. I'm not diminishing her awful, huge tragedy (it made me cry) but I felt uneasy about creating children to replace dead ones. Added to that the fact that she and her husband divorced when the donor children were six... It all made me sad, as if the doc was reinforcing that a life without children is not worth living; that there's no other recourse other than to replace them. Of course I know that hers had died, and I am a lot luckier to never have experienced this, but I was left with the feeling: is my DH enough for the years ahead? Do you need kids to have any purpose in life? Will DH leave me? Sigh. I wish there was more positive stuff around on living without children. Anyway, I also thought the donor was very narcissistic in her quest to find her offspring and she annoyed me when she was disappointed with her son for not being enthusiastic about meeting his donor siblings. I agree with you in that it might have worked out a lot differently. There are so many implications in having donor kids; I only realised at the eleventh hour how complicated it was (I was signed up to do anonymous DE cycle in czech rep); I pulled out because all these doubts surfaced. I wanted the kid to know its donor, but I also didn't want the confusion of the donor being known... I was very confused myself when I pulled out, but I don't really regret it.
I'm now trying to focus on living child-free, and the emotions come and go in waves... sometimes i feel great, and actually feel glad that I don't have to go through pregnancy and birth and nappy-changing etc. Other times I feel terrified of the future and feel desolate when I see those young, healthy couples looking like an ad for Boden with their gorgeous kids, and feel sick that I missed out on this. 
It's sad that we can't just focus on looking after ourselves, and switch off all the thoughts about having children. It's a shame that in our society they seem to be the be-all-and-end-all; I'm so sick of that. 
How are you feeling today Rowan?
xx Crikey


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## Rowan22

Hi Crikey,

I don't feel so bad emotionally but I do feel awful physically and I think this period is depleting my limited stores of iron, as I feel dizzy, tired and weak. Work is out, which is a problem as I actually have quite a lot to do and I will have to try to get a doctor to prescribe me some iron, I think.
It was kind of you to get back to me, thank you. I share all your reservations about donor eggs, having seen that documentary and I thought of all the same points. I do think the donor was unreasonable, especially when she referred to the twins as 'her children' (how could this be, all she did was donate a piece of genetic material). I felt uneasy about the 'replacement' issue, as well, though yes, it made me cry, too, especially as all these years on, the poor woman is still blaming herself. And yes, I was concerned that the couple had split up, as well. I do wonder how my dh would cope, if we did try to have donor treatment and I am afraid that there might be complications further down the line, especially as now there's no choice about anonymity, unless you go abroad. I don't think I'd want some woman contacting me when my child/ren grew up and saying that she was the donor and I would definitely have mixed feelings about it, while not denying that what these people do is amazing and it's probably the only chance for us, now. 
Do you need children to have a purpose in life? No, I don't think so but I do think it's the purpose we're all meant to have and I also think that if you don't have them, there is a great deal missing. The family tree stops with me, as obviously there won't be grandchildren, either. I still find I have intensely strong emotions about parents who abuse their children, for example or are too severe with them and sometimes I can't get those thoughts out of my head. They just go round and round and round and round and nothing I do will stop this happening. I do think you can get obsessive about this issue and I find it hard to think about all the good things I do have in my life. 
I know that feeling about missing out, too. I have it. I feel I missed out most of the last two decades, when I should have been bringing up children and they've been lost to illness. This is true, to some extent, which makes it even harder to accept. Unfortunately, while I was struggling with the illnesses, the clock was still ticking, which seems desperately unfair. Yes, the emotions do come in waves and so many things act as triggers. I know exactly what you mean about ads and if I see that Zurich ad one more time (with the baby asleep on his daddy's chest - aaahh!) I am going to throw something at the screen!
There's no escape, anywhere, even in your living room!  
I hope you're feeling a bit better today, Crikey. I suppose all we can do, sometimes, is just get through the days. We still have decisions to make but at the moment, I haven't a clue what decision I can make. Every time I read or watch anything about donor eggs etc, I end up even more confused!

Rowanxx


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## laurainhk

Hi fellow travellers,
grieving is a nonlinear process, one day we feel ok, almost forget about our infertility, the next we see a pregnant woman in the street, a new mum feeding her baby, a happy family scene in a movie, and before we know, our eyes fill up with tears, or we  become angry, or again our confidence disappears before an important meeting.
It's almost inevitable to think that life has dealt us a bad hand.


Two months ago, after my 4th attempt at donor FET failed, i lost all hope. I have since tried to come to terms with the fact that i will never have a child. It hasn't been easy. My only comfort is the company and support of 3 very close friends who cannot conceive after undergoing a hysterectomy (2 of them) or had no desire to become a single mother (the other). This is now my support network and it's making a huge and positive impact on my recovery. I have also read an inspiring book called "Silent Sorority" that made me laugh and cry about the fertility journey that so many women never manage to complete despite advances in reproductive technologies. 
I take comfort in knowing that so many women share my predicament and that there is no reason why i shouldn't start to focus on generating (metaphorically giving birth) to my new self, instead of clinging on the delusional hope of giving birth to a baby (which in itself is no guarantee that i will become a happier, more evolved, truly realised human being).

Self-realisation comes in many forms, for me it's yoga, more the spiritual quest for the source of the Self than the purely physical discipline.
We are all part o the One, and it doesn't matter whether we reproduce or not, as our souls have taken on a bodily form for a purpose we need to discover, and reproduction is not necessarily everybody's purpose in life. Our infertility may actually be a blessing in disguise as having no children to look after enables us to devote more time and energy to the discovery and understanding of our true mission in samsara, our confused, far from perfect world.
What really helped me to move on is the realisation that we are not confined to our bodies, that we may inhabit more bodies in the next life, and in the life after the next, before we finally find rest in a mystical union with the source of life. 
I may have been a very prolific woman in my previous life, and now i am unfettered by pregnancies and child-rearing, free to embark on a spiritual  journey that could be more fruitful and liberating, a journey that takes us deep into our core. If our bodies don't cooperate, maybe it's because we are destined for another sort of life experience, one that will shed light on who we really are.


What if having children is just a distraction from our selves, a way of not dealing with our deepest issues? Seen in this light my infertility is no longer a curse, but a blessing that i failed to recognise as such for so many years.


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## Rowan22

Er...
Thank you for that, Laura and I do realise you've had a very difficult journey of your own. 
I can relate to some of what you say. Yoga can help, definitely, certainly on a physical level, as if nothing else it helps you relax and eases those tense muscles. The regular breathing helps, too. I did go to a yoga class regularly for awhile and can recommend it. 
I'm not sure i want to give birth to 'me' and I'm not sure what that means, anyway. My inner child is a horrible little brat a lot of the time! I think there is a psychological journey, for want of a better term, from living mainly from the ego to connecting with the self, to use those terms and I can understand that and relate, to some extent but I certainly don't believe in past lives or serial reincarnation. Anyway, what does it matter if I had eight kids last time, that's not going to make me feel better about not having any in this life!
I certainly wouldn't mind coming back with a better body, as this one has caused me all sorts of problems but I can't take that seriously, I'm afraid. Also, some people would call motherhood and parenting very much a spiritual journey. I suspect you do learn and evolve by having kids. Also, though I'm pretty certain that some parents do use having children as an escape from their own issues, which they then often project on to the kids, biology isn't bothered; all it cares about is the survival of the species. Older male animals can reproduce but not the females. Cruel, isn't it?  
I understand where you're coming from, as I've read a fair amount about Buddhism, Zen and Taoism. There's a wonderful book by a writer called Tara Brach about having compassion on ourselves and others, which is a kind, very gentle read. You don't have to believe in any Buddhist principles to find it helpful. 
This is a very real wound that as far as i'm concerned has hurt more than anything in my life except my father's death. It's also a complicated process of grieving that's never really completed, while you can complete grieving for a bereavement. I suspect that if I get to 80 I shall still be looking at mothers of toddlers and feeling jealous. It's something absolutely priceless which we haven't had, for whatever reason. I am now thinking about surrogacy, out of desperation, because anything is better than the alternative, permanent childlessness. I know some women choose this and that's fine, that was their choice. Some of them do go into ashrams or convents; others get involved with their community and spend their mothering energy that way and I admire them. I just couldn't do it myself. 

Rowan


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## Debs

to everyone.

Im getting increasingly obsessed about my later years and the loneliness of not having children    and cannot think of it as a blessing in disguise on whatever grounds  

I really have no idea what my purpose in life is to be honest  

Im glad you have found peace Laura I really am but im nowhere finding peace myself  

I have a good dh and close family with nephews & nieces I adore but I still feel very lonely with it all.  Hey ho not much I can do about it I spose  

Love

Debs xxx


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## laurainhk

Rowan, Debs,
I understand your pain because that was my pain too. I battled infertility for almost two decades, and being a high-achiever it really dealt a blow to my self-esteem. I couldn't take defeat well. I went from being a very confident and successful woman to wanting to curl up in bed and shut the world out. I felt disabled, insecure, and either angry or depressed. I couldn't even tell people why i had gone through that transformation, and people's puzzlement and distance hurt me even more. My ego and pride stopped me from confiding in friends and family. It was hell.
And then, after reading a lot about the spiritual side of yoga, attending meditation sessions, and opening up to a selected group of friends, i started to heal. The seeds of my recovery were probably planted a couple of years ago, when i did a yoga teacher training course, and started studying Indian philosophy. That coincided with self-analysis, from a Jungian perspective. I had a breakthrough, and let go of my old beliefs, my old ego. Infertility first brought out the worst in me, jealousy, envy, a feeling of entitlement and then little by little it brought out a new understanding of  my spirituality, something i had never given much thought to. 
I re-read Siddharta by Hermann Hesse, and it made a lot of sense. His biography also resonated with me. He had success, a wife and a son. At 45 he left everything to retreat to a small village in Switzerland and spent years wandering in the woods. Obviously his earthly achievements had left him empty and longing for a deeper connection to the universe, nature in particular. Life isn't what Hollywood movies want us to believe. Nature is like Kali, it creates and destroys, and you cannot have one without the other. How many people go through the moves without ever understanding this simple law of nature, and they may lose everything they created, they are shattered by grief without realising that nothing lasts on this earth of ours, all mundane achievements are just that, mundane, not eternal. If we can achieve a serene detachment from our egos, and not be attached to our achievements, then life becomes a lot easier. We start to marvel at the beauty of the world when we realise its ephemeral nature, that's when we savour every experience, every moment because it may not last in its current form. Change is the only certainty in life. As we accept that our destiny is not one of procreation and seek the true purpose, which is different for everyone, we may be surprised by what we discover. It's a life journey. 
Infertility has equipped me with the humility to embark on this journey, that's why i see it as a blessing in disguise. Now i know that what we want is different from what we get, and do we really know what is good for us? We become wise enough to treasure this lesson and use it a springboard to live a fuller life, one that is not dictated by achievements and failures but by our understanding of life lessons.
I may not make much sense, but one day you may get to a point where you will be grateful for what infertility taught you. 
I know it sounds odd, but i know plenty of women who let go of their anger and envy and found their new beautiful selves. 

It's a painful process, one that lasts longer and may cause more physical and mental pain than giving birth to a child. After all you are giving birth to a fully formed, spiritually evolved human being 

Lots of love,
Laura in Hong kong


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## laurainhk

I cannot stress enough the comforts offered by philosophy, be it Eastern or Western. Philosophy cannot prescribe the particular character of meaning that each of us should embrace.  It cannot tell each of us individually how we might trace the trajectory that is allotted to us.  But it helps us reflect upon the framework within which we consider these questions, and in doing so perhaps offer a lucidity we might otherwise lack.  
This is as it should be.  Philosophy can assist us in understanding how we might think about our lives. It leaves the living of life to us, which in my eyes is better than what prescriptive religions offer.


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## Susan01

Debs. I've always felt that you'll get out what you put it. If you make sure you're a special person to your neices and nephews and all the other young people in your lives you  won't ever be alone. And you'll know that they spend time with you because they choose to - not from a sense of duty. So many people who do have children focus so much on their 1 or 2 children that they neglect everyone else in their lives. I suspect they are the ones who will end up lonely when their children no longer need them.


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## Rowan22

Debs  
I don't have nephews or nieces, which is perhaps just as well, as I'd only be jealous of my brother as well as most of the world's population. 
It is worth remembering that on a physical level, Laura, we are here to reproduce. In terms of evolutionary theory, I am a failure, I have failed to pass on my genes. Nothing's going to alter that fact, even if we do go on to explore surrogacy or some other way forward. And yes, I know there are an enormous amount of people in the world already but that doesn't alter that fact. I'm glad you've found a way forward and found that books by Hesse etc help you. In the end, that's all we can do, try to find a way forward because we can't live the rest of our lives feeling like this. 
I wouldn't have thought having a family was quite the same as mundane achievements, like getting promotion at work or having a big house, anyway. You're responsible for the development of other people from day 1 and you can either treat them gently and with compassion and understanding or you can be harsh with them, as many parents are. 
You may think there's more to life than physical reality but there's no proof of that, though I would agree, as I said, that there is a psychological journey. You're right about change, which is a major Buddhist principle, of course but nobody likes dealing with it, all the same. And there are positive changes and changes that are not nice at all, like the damned, hateful, accursed ageing process that denies us what we want and has other negative effects on our bodies. If it were possible to reverse it, I would choose that in a heartbeat. I lost most of my youth to major ill health and I want those years back. 
You're right about the beauty of the world and it's a gorgeous autumn day where I am, this is something that is worth appreciating but nature is a heartless bi*ch, despite what certain Romantic poets believed. The fate of the individual doesn't matter, all that does matter to nature is that the species survives. 
You're right about religion, in my experience, which was mostly negative, though other people find their religion enormously comforting. I'm afraid the serene detachment isn't going to happen any time soon. At the moment, I'm still raging against fate and no, I don't believe that someone or something else knows what's best for me. I'm not five years old and the very idea makes me want to choke. I do accept that sometimes you can miss out on a job, for example, only to get a better one but I'm not buying into the idea that this is somehow planned. That sounds very New Agey to me or it brings in the patriarchial God of monotheistic religions and I've been there and got the scars. I also cannot conceive of a time when I will be grateful for this heartwrenching grief, as you suggest. *There is nothing to be grateful about* that we are somehow not allowed an experience available to every teenager as soon as she takes her knickers down, even though she's not grown up herself and can't possibly know how to mother a child. 
Grr! I feel particularly bitter as the wretched period's still here and what good are the damn things, I want to know, as all they do is mock you every month. Anyway, it's great that you've found your own way forward. That probably is the most important thing. I just have no idea how to do it myself.

Rowan


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## Crikey

Hi Folks
Wow - since I was last on it all went a bit Eat, Pray, Love at one point...
Personally, I find it as hard to believe that we are reincarnated as I do to believe that we go to heaven or hell. I appreciate that people need to find meaning in this brief life, with all its pains, and I (kind of) admire those who can have blind faith in something built on sand, totally unproven. It must give great peace. I just don’t buy anything that I can’t see concrete evidence for: it’s just never going to happen for me. But I suppose it's good that laurainhk is offering what could be a positive solution for some people; it would be good to see more suggestions on how to deal with moving on. Although Laura, has it really worked for you in just two months? BTW all, I also read Silent Sorority & it helped me to feel less isolated; I recommend it.

Debs I too have been obsessing about loneliness in my later years. Rationally, though, I see that kids don’t guarantee company in your old age. I haven’t seen my own father for ten years; my mother was unhappy and died young, and I don’t know anyone who has an uncomplicated, loving relationship with their parents. I believe that quality of life comes from having a partner, not from having children, although having children does fill up the hours of the day by giving you something to think about. I sometimes think that my days are so empty even now, whereas friends with kids are occupied 24/7 with their kids and all the comings and goings of family... my life is so quiet, and I'm obsessed with the fear of my partner not being around someday, and having nobody. I feel like my life is precarious; partners can leave etc ... 
So maybe I want kids for selfish reasons. I know that the 1000s of fertile people who get knocked up every day are not doing it for SELFLESS reasons by any means, but I think that more analysis of your motives is involved when your only option is donor. I was stewing over it for months. For me, I would've got knocked up naturally without even thinking about my motives in having children, whereas with donor I found myself agonizing over the reasons why I was doing it. With donor it felt like it needed to be less selfish, and more about a passionate desire to nurture a child. People mostly talk about the genetic issue or the anonymity issue with donor; for me it was more: do I want this enough to create a donor child, and is it for the right reasons? Sorry to witter on about that but I've been thinking a lot about whether I was right to reject DE.

But I don't believe our only purpose in life these days is to reproduce; I'd be destroyed if I thought that was true. We must have a function apart from that. Yes it may be true on a very basic, animal level, but we are far more evolved than that and I refuse to ever accept it, or I'd be finished... There have always been and will always be people who can't/don't have the opportunity to/don't want to have children for whatever reason, so I don't feel like I've failed; there are loads of us out there. Just sad that I may have missed out on a better version of life (tho' it could have been a worse one, too: I have no way of knowing...). I know exactly where you're coming from though, Rowan. I've been depressed lately as well about "ending the line"; I often look at all my stuff, photos etc and imagine where it will all go if I die. I can understand your despair at the unfairness that you lost all those years to illness; I've had some fairly destructive thoughts lately about why I didn't have kids earlier. And yes ageing is horrible.
I'm just trying to switch off my mind whenever I have negative thoughts or regrets: I just physically refuse to think about it because it's futile; I can't do anything about it. I hope suppressing it like this doesn't mean it will haunt me later, but I don't know what else to do.
No I don't think I'll ever be grateful for being infertile, but I'm sometimes glad I've given up the battle with it, and the ivf conveyor belt etc; too much like flogging a dead horse.
C


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## laurainhk

Rowan, 
it's interesting that you mentioned genes.
I too was shocked at the idea that my genes would not be passed on...and then i read a lot about it, and discovered that it doesn't really matter as we share genes with millions of people anyway. I may look a bit like my mum, but don't look like any of my grandparents. 
As to my character, it's very different from both my parents and my sister, who i share a lot of genes with.
Oddly enough i was told by two friends that one night they met my double in St. Petersburg, they were so surprised as they could have bet anything that it was me pulling their leg and pretending to speak Russian....so, there is a woman about my age living  in Russia, possibly sharing very few of my genes. Who knows how many more doubles i have around the world. The fact is that we share a lot of genes with perfect strangers, despite a total lack of resemblance. Yes, they may be prone to the same diseases, etc, but do you care? I see my family once a year, and to be honest i am much closer to my Chinese friends than to any of my family members. 
We share common ancestors, and yes, the majority of the world population have African genes, even if they have blond hair and blue eyes.
In the greater scheme of things, our individual genes are like a drop in the ocean of humankind. And what makes our individual genes special? Our bodies will decay, and we will disappear, but that is not the end of the world regardless of whether we have children or not, there are still billions of people on this planet (too many to guarantee enough natural resources to each one of them)

Your legacy as a person could be so much more important than just a sequence of genes (nothing exceptional about them). I enjoy reading Plato, but honestly i don't care whether he had children or not. My favourite playwrights, writers, painters, political thinkers, spiritual guides etc. may have had children but that is quite irrelevant to the history of humankind. I once met a person who tosses who was the grandson of a great German writer. I was bored after 5 minutes. Not only he didn't look, didn't sound, didn't write like his grandfather, he suffered from a huge inferiority complex masked as utterly arrogant behavior. What use were those genes? 


We are all pretty unique, and what we leave behind after we die is only the memory of who we were. This memory can be saved by people whose lives we touch, either through our work, or our example. Just to cover the gamut of possibilities, neither Jesus Christ nor Virginia Woolf had any children and yet we know their name. Karl Marx had a lot of children and yet i i know only one of them by name, Jenny, and simply because of her work. 
So unless someone is a member of the royal family, their great-grandchildren will forget their name, pictures will fade or get lost...all memory of that person's existence will disappear forever.

Let's live good ethical lives now in the present, because the future will take care of itself.
If you don't believe in reincarnation and second chances in the next life, that's fine. One more reason to make changes in this life and develop your full potential as a human being. Infertility is a bogeyman that can only scare you if you choose to limit your life potential to physical reproduction. I am sure we all have another card up our sleeve, and it may be an ace!
By the way, i am far from being a new agey type, despite my interest in Indian (Vedic) philosophy, my friends still think of me as a super-rational politician who equally loves younger men and cooking, reads too many foreign newspapers, smokes the pipe, drinks wine and wears skimpy clothes whenever possible


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## laurainhk

Crikey, what a great post!
after trying almost everything else, i tried with Donor embryos 4 times; i spent two agonizing years analysing my motives for wanting a child. I was prepared and happy to have a baby who was not genetically related to me, but sadly it didn't happen. 
Maybe nurturing a child would have made my life richer, but how about the child's life? There is no guarantee that growing up in Hong Kong speaking three or four languages (if i threw in my mother-tongue), far from both our countries of origin, with no family around,  and with a working mum, this child would have been a well-adjusted kid. Yes, my boyfriend would have played an important role in the child's life, but for how long? I see too many ill-adjusted expat kids here.  

My healing was helped by Yoga (i trained as a yoga teacher out of interest, but i never thought of quitting my job to teach yoga) but probably started when i realised all the difficulties that this poor child would have to overcome in this city, i put myself in the child's shoes and got a bit scared. That's when i reached out to my childless friends. They showed me how good their lives were, and what an amazing support network was there for me. We may all grow old in Hong Kong, and still hang out together, or move back to Europe and live close to one another, meeting everyday for a game of chess, a chat and a cocktail. There are a lot of women who found meaning in life . I agree that we will never know if having children would have made our lives better, or richer. It would have been different, but hey, people with children often envy those without...so it can be a case of the grass is greener etc.


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## Rowan22

Hi Laura,

Sounds great to me, well, apart from the pipe! And it's getting too cool now for the skimpy clothes but I guess it's warm in Hong Kong. 
No, I don't accept the concept of reincarnation because I don't think there's any proof. I know there's hypnotic regression and people have come up with some interesting stories but we do retain a lot of information unconsciously that comes up under hypnosis. It doesn't mean we lived in the Victorian period or whatever, we've just picked up lots of info about it. 
You make some good points about genes, it's just that I'm the end of my family tree. I have one sibling and he hasn't got kids, either. That's difficult. I agree that family aren't necessarily the people you choose to spend a lot of time with but it's that blood thicker than water thing. 
I'm sure we do all have other things to do with our lives, especially if we are talented in one way or another but I was just pointing out that from an evolutionary point of view, we're just gene carriers. Also Virgina Woolf was deeply saddened because she didn't have kids, as she recounts in her diary. I don't think it matters if you are an innovative modern novelist who's developed a whole new form of narrative technique, there's still that hole inside you that doesn't go away.
I guess it's easier for men because the biological drive isn't there. It certainly does seem as if you've made peace with your own situation, though, so good for you.   

Crikey, yeah, eat, pray, love...! Well, the love bit is quite important, I guess. One of the things I can be grateful for is my marriage, as despite all the s*it life has thrown at us, we're still together and we still love each other. I agree that trying to switch off the unending negative thoughts is a good thing to do but it isn't easy and this pain is triggered by so many things. I still hardly ever go out so I don't have to see the happy families, especially at weekends and I won't go to any function, like concerts, for the same reason. If the parents lose patience, that's worse, I want to scratch their eyes out and scream that they don't know how lucky they are. 
I suspect we all want them for selfish reasons, if we're honest but that's not our fault, again, it's biological programming. For guys it seems it's the 'who's the daddy' syndrome. You might be right about giving up the hopeless battle. I have got to the point where I just don't know what to do and I am so fed up with it all. I don't know whether it's a good idea to have one try (which is all we'll be able to afford) at donor egg tx or just give up. I have thought of surrogacy but after seeing that programme about surromums, I'm beginning to have second thoughts. Two of them were so young and one of them found the pregnancy far from easy. Is it right to put another, young woman through that even if she is willing? I don't know. Too many questions and at present, no answers. 
Take care,

Rowanxxx


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## Frothy

Hi girls, 
I haven't written for a little while but have been following your threads and find comfort in a lot of what you are saying. You all seem so stable and good with words. I'm having a really low week, everything sinking in, DP has said that if he can't be a dad himself then he doesn't want children - why should he have 'someone else's kid' and has tried to talk about the positives - that we can have nice holidays, no stress etc etc - I see his point to a degree but inside I am wailing and am not sure I will ever come to terms with never being a mum. He tries to understand but admits he won't ever completely get it that I want to do nappies, school runs, homework and even the teenage years - it's part and parcel of it; I'm not seeing things through rose coloured glasses (although have friends who according to their updates have babies that don't even cry and everythign is just lovely and perfect ARRRGGHH!!!) - this is me and I have a nurturing character and I want to nurture!! Top and bottom of it is that the decision has now been made for me - DP is infertile, DP won't consider any other options - I'm thinking about my future, growing old, one of us dying, nobody to hand anything down to blah blah. It's not particulaly that I worry there will be nobody to look after me/us as I would not want any children we had to ever feel tied to lookign after their elderly or poorly parents but it's a big scary thought that this is our future - and if I'm honest I'm not sure I'll ever feel fulfilled or will ever get over it. But cards are on the table now - I guess it is my decision - we either stick together as a couple or we call it a day. can't believe I am crying as I'm writign this, what is my face going to look like and got to go to a meeting right now (already late!). It just sucks. Is it possible to really deal with it and lead a fulfilling life without children?
Thanks for reading, sorry for the rant. I think you are all so brave. 
Frothy XX


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## Susan01

Frothy I didn't want to read and run     . Infertility forces us into making such hard decisions that other people can't even comprehend. I also had to deal with the fact that my DH wouldn't consider other options. He didn't even want to do IVF and eventually did 2 rounds of IVF for me (but unhappy about it all the way!). I guess in some ways we were 'lucky' that our diagnosis was unexplained - so the whole issue of responsiblity and 'what if' was taken away. I feel so sorry for you having to consider the choice you have. But if you love your DP and see a future together that is such a valuable thing. Have you thought of going for counselling as a couple to talk it through. That helped us hugely - I'm not sure where we'd be now if we hadn't.


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## Crikey

Hi all
I'm finding this thread really interesting.
Rowan - was that the BBC documentary about surrogates, "I'm pregnant with their baby"? (or similar). I have it taped; will watch later and report back tomorrow! Has it put you off, then?
I used to think it was so simple: if the worse came to the worse, my safety net was always donor or some other means like surrogacy/embryo adoption. I didn't even think about any of the implications until two weeks before I was due to go, when it all hit me..... In the end I visited the clinic anyway, on the day I was supposed to go there for the transfer: I booked a consultation to discuss it all since I was feeling doubtful about it. And they were awful: very brusque, rude; had completely forgotten about our consultation - they more or less said "What the hell are you doing here, wasting our time, if you've cancelled the treatment?". We saw then what kind of industry it is, and we ran out of the place. This was a very, very popular place near Brno, by the way. So I am happy to be out of the ivf battery farm in many ways.
Laura, I probably sounded facetious saying Eat, Pray, Love - I do agree with a lot of what you say. I know we are more than just a set of reproductive organs. I do believe that other relationships are as important as those we have with offspring. I find I get depressed when I'm not in touch with friends and siblings; if I fall out with them or feel isolated, I start dwelling much more on how I should have had children etc etc... It's like, I can't control my relationships with others, but children would be all mine, and would provide me with the comfort that I don't get from people now; they would always be there - so wrong, though. 
Frothy - hiya...
My DH also now only talks about the positive aspects of not having kids. Since we cancelled, he is dead set against donor, which means it has definitely gone as a safety net. When that advert comes on with Fay Ripley and husband doing the school run (they take loads of kids to different places, all speeded up), he shudders and says "thank god we don't have that every morning".  I know that he is now quite happy to never have kids. This has helped me in some ways - I've blamed myself a lot, since I'm the one with the endo etc; I've felt like he may have resented me - and deep-down I agree with him; there are lots of things about kids that I find tedious: I've never been keen on newborns, and I do kinda hate teenagers. But it also scares me; it has closed the door forever.  It brings home the fact that I really do only have him as my family. I do live in terror of him leaving one day, which is tragic I know.
Frothy I believe that you do not need children to fulfil you. Most people fall into parenthood feeling very ambivalent about it, and then just muddle through it. However, there are the super-maternal types who have a kind of "vocation" for it and cannot face life without children. When infertility meets this second group, that's the bad thing. I was always ambivalent, which made infertility very confusing - how far should I push it? - but I think easier to deal with. 
But how do we deal with these fears about a lonely future?


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## Rowan22

Hi Crikey,

I don't want to influence your viewing of that documentary in any way, so please don't take what I'm saying as gospel but it did raise some real questions for me. I was happiest with the oldest surromum, who already had two kids of her own and went into it with her eyes fully open. She even offered to provide a sibling, if required, after the registration process to put the child into the intended parents' names, so she must have been reasonably happy with the process. But two of them were really young, only early twenties and one did go through the mill a bit being pregnant. One of them made me cry when she wondered if the intended parents would like her and her toddler ridden house. I thought, 'My God, you could have three heads and come from Mars - of course they will like you!'
Do watch it, I thought it was well worth watching but I also found it produced quite a few emotions as well as numerous questions which I've yet to answer. 
I do share some of your ambivalence about pg and parenting but I suspect that's natural. It is a massive responsibility, after all. I watch some programmes about parents and families, like 'Supernanny' and find it very easy to pinpoint the mistakes but whether I'd do any better remains to be seen. Most of them are fairly desperate by the time Jo Frost gets involved! As for teenagers, I'd rather not even think about that. I tend to get on well with them, actually, even in my professional capacity most of the time but of course if you're the parent, things are not so straightforward. I do find those 'World's Strictest Parents' programmes (about trying to turn around 'bad' teenagers)  interesting, if horrifying sometimes, but some of the so called remedies horrify me as much as the kids' behaviour!
And yes, I don't go gooy over newborns, either. I prefer toddlers and children. The newborn stage with its endless broken nights would be one to get through asap, I'm afraid but I suppose when it's your own baby, you do feel differently. 
I'm sorry your dh has come out against donor tx so strongly. That must be very difficult for you. At least we haven't yet closed all doors, though we can't do anything until we get some money. I agree that some of these clinics are not always particularly helpful and there was a thread on this forum about the fact that they don't need to charge anything like as much as they do most of the time. 
Your dh won't leave you   but I think it's natural to think like this. I worry about mine being suddenly seriously ill and how I'd manage but I think this is because he is literally all I have. I have no friends, as all my contemporaries are busy moaning about their teenagers or the cost of uni fees. There are supposed to be so many of us infertiles out there but I never meet any.  Perhaps we should all wear badges or something!
I blame myself, too as I'm the one with the physical incapacity; there's nothing wrong with dh. Again, I think this is normal. There are times when I could beat this body into a pulp but it's not as if I can get another one. It has too much wrong with it but there's nothing I can do. The infertility has caused much more pain than anything else, though, at least the rest of the problems are just physical. They cause issues but I can deal with them, most of the time. 

Look after yourself,

Rowanx


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## Frothy

Hi all, thanks for your lovely words - it is so comforting to come on here and have someone go 'I really do know what you mean'...it also opens my eyes to everything, other people's feelings and that we are not on our own. As for our future I really don't know what to think right now. It's only 2 months since we found out that it's game over and there is nothing they can do and we have another appt at the clinic in about a month - I guess at which point it will be decided whether we will be discharged or to discuss other options (which are out of bounds according to DP). Just hate being in this situation. Sometimes feels not real. There I am bounding through life and bam it hits me that actaully this is a complete nightmare that we're living and it seems so very final. I'll have to read back on your posts about Eat, Pray Love as not sure what they are referring to! I agree wtih you Rowan though that this infertility causes so much pain - and this has got me thinking that DP and I only really tend to argue when it's down to this (of course there's barneys over this and that in between but when it comes to stress and arguing infertility wins hands down). And he made a fair point last night that if we can move on from this together we probably have got the prospect of a happy and comfortable life together. He is fed up of the whole topic and the pain that it has caused to us both. 
Waffling now so will sign off but I'll be reading and replyign when I can so keep your words of wisdom coming, hell I need them this week X


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## Crikey

Hi Rowan
Sounds really interesting - I'll try and watch it tonight, if DH can stand another pregnancy thing....
I have no friends either: not wishing to sound like billy-no-mates, but I'm in a foreign country and I really don't any more. I have absolutely no one to call here if anything happened to either of us. I think I saw children as a way to create a support network (I think it's true that mothers find it easier to band together and make friends). I made a few friends here but defriended one girl who was too earth-mother about her pregnancy (when I'd just found about my IF). She now has a golden-haired son and daughter, and I couldn't deal with comparing our lives .... I'm sure I'm only seeing the exterior of her life; I actually know she's very unstable under the surface. The others just dropped off or left the country... I admit I grasped onto having a child as a way of integrating better and making friends. I see the community that my friends with kids have and realise how cut-off I am. But again, I can't have a donor child just for these reasons.
Supernanny is a great antidote to all this - i always tune in for a dose of reality.
Hi Frothy - I was just about to post this when FFriends told me there was a new reply.
Eat Pray Love was referring to the posts about eastern philosophy (no offence Laura!). Finding yourself etc... 
I tried to read Eat, Pray, Love and threw it across the room when she went off to an ashram in India to chant all day and it all got a bit self-indulgant.... I would secretly love to find peace this way but find it mentally impossible.
Frothy, if it's any consolotion I went through an awful period when I was waking up on the hour (HORRIBLE; for months), having palpitations, panic attacks and crying fits, all about "time running out" and the window closing etc. I thought I would never come through it. I felt like I wasn't doing enough. It took me months to feel calmer. it sounds stupid but I listed everything I had done, in black and white, in marker pen: every visit, every scan, every consultation, every drug, every ivf cycle - to "show" me what I had done to try and have this child. I had a real problem with rejecting donor egg; i was seeing it as a continuation of that path (ttc - ivf - donor egg = child), and I was beating myself up for not doing it. I felt like I wasn't trying hard enough if I stopped at OE ivf. But when I put it all down on paper, I realised that DE or DS is not a continuation of the path, it's a fork in the path, a HUGE alternative that is there for those who want it so much they can't live without it. I was seeing it all as a linear thing; that the next step HAD to be donor egg or I would regret it forever. Anyway all that helped me to see that i had tried as far as it was physically possible, and that calmed me down a bit.
It is very scary Frothy, when the door closes. I personally could not forsake my DH for a child that exists only in my imagination, and might never exist in the flesh; it's so nebulous, so I have to go with what's real. And I believe at this stage that pushing the DE thing with him might break us, so I'd be left with a child but no DH or relationship... and I'm sure I'd be a bitter mother and maybe lonelier than ever: it happens.
Rant on here whenever you want xx


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## sanfrancisco

Just wanted to post on here,I have been reading your posts and feel very emotional.I am ttc no2 and needed to read this to give me a bit of a reality check.Feel really small,ungrateful and like a spoilt brat for feeling so low in trying unsuccesfully for no2.I think you are all so brave and wish you all peace in the decisions you make,be it to continue treatment or move on.I hope you don't mind me posting here and maybe it's inappropriate and insensitive,but I am thinking of you all


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## Frothy

Hi again girls

Crikey Crikey! Your words very calming and very true (I had to put myself to bed on Sunday night at 8.30pm to stop feeling so anxious, panicky, breathless, you name it). I am sorry about the friend situation - we all have our demons/achilles heels when it comes to friends. Good on you for being so honest about it all, thousands wouldn't be. I am grateful and fortunate to have a wide circle of friends having lived where I am now for almost 9 years (amazing how many people I am not in touch with from where I used to live, despite living there until mid 20's - promises promises!) but there has been a definite shift in how often we see each other and what we talk about. Most have children and DP and I have found ourselves excluded from certain little 'in-things' - which to be fair we wouldn't want to join in anyway but you still feel a bit rejected when not invited. THen again had we been invited we would have felt they were being inconsiderate (they can't win). I feel this real green eyed monster rear its head from time to time though and I CAN'T HELP IT. Am past apologising for it, it's normal and I do wonder how half the people we know would cope if god forbid anything was thrown at them. Tsk, I am in a bit of a funny mood today aren't I! So unfair. And there's this certain underlying smugness about fertility - does that sound weird? You just know that when your friends are offering you empathy or support they're just thinking 'well thank the lord it isn't me and that we're fine'. When I'm feeling less irritated and more in control (today's not that day!) I know that rationally our friends are absolutely devastated for us and would do anything they could to make things happen. I just resent it all sometimes (sorry). 

That is a very good point you make crikey about being on your own with a child but no partner. That has entered my head too. That I become so head strong and determined to have a child that actually I end up living a very different life without the man I love and who loves me. Hmmm. 

Sanfrancisco - not at all, do not apologise. Good luck with ttc. I remember when we were going through our first cycle of ICSI one of my colleagues said she has a friend who could never have children and her and her husband split up because they ended up wanting different things. She never did fulfil her dream of being a mum and my colleague said she doesn't think her friend has ever got over it. I cried for the friend when I heard the story - at the time I was just embarking on my first crazy step of the journey and was so so grateful of the opportunity. It makes me wistful to think that that is what we are facing now, and I would never have thought it. But who does think it will be them. Hey ho. THanks for your post X


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## laurainhk

Oh... the panic attacks...i almost forgot about them. I used to get them when it was time to leave my flat and go to a dinner party, or an important meeting. I was such a wreck and felt so inadequate. Now that i think about it, it coincided with the time when friends started having children and i couldn't get pregnant no matter how well-timed intercourse was. Years of trying and trying after my tubal pregnancy. To make things worse,  i had no money for IVF and my marriage was on the rocks (we eventually got divorced in 199. 
I felt so helpless and impotent. 
During the Donor FET cycles i was strangely calm, as i had already accepted that i would never have a biological child. In a strange way, those two years i spent travelling to Brno during my summer holidays or waiting for a match prepared me for the worst.
My life was almost suspended, i was losing interest for everything and felt a bit disconnected from myself, too busy daydreaming about the future, and forgetting about the present. I was neglecting my partner, my friends, my job. Luckily my childless friends brought me back to my senses after the 4th failed attempt. Without mincing words they told me i was turning into a fertility treatment junkie, i was jeopardising my health by taking all those hormones, jeopardising my relationship, my friendships, my job and possibly my future if i lost everything in the crazy pursuit of this elusive pregnancy. They basically told me to get back to reality, which admittedly i had departed from.

So, yes, friends are really important. When we suffer from infertility we need to choose them carefully. I am sure there are couples and singles without children everywhere. It may be easier to connect with them if they share similar interests, be it good wine or gardening, triathlon or yoga, hiking in Nepal or playing golf, book clubs or chess tournaments, philosophy or politics, charity work or motor-biking. We don't have to hang out with couples with children! I made some good friends through a hiking club, and the Royal Geographic Society. It helps that i live in HK where most foreigners lack a family support system, so we tend to replace it with a surrogate family of friends.

Once you come to the end of the road in terms of fertility treatments, you can start to rebuild your life, and take full advantage of the opportunities that are available to those without young children, like travelling, spending some quality time with your partner, your friends, finding new interests, getting more involved in your community etc. It takes time to shift your perspective, but don't worry, when you are ready, you will. My partner is so relieved that i am no longer talking about hormones and babies   Last but not least we rekindled our sex life since i started focusing on him rather than some imaginary Czech baby. 

Best wishes to those who are still struggling with the idea of a childless life, I hope you will soon start to see the other side of the coin. It is not that bad after all. 
A big hug


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## Crikey

sanfrancisco - I appreciated your post. There is always a stand-off between people ttc #1 and those trying to conceive #2: there are threads on some messageboards asking "Which is worse, primary or secondary IF?". Objectively speaking, if you asked the man in the street, he'd say that to never have a child at all is worse. For me that's obvious. But pain is pain wherever it comes from, and second-time ttc'ers can get very defensive about it. So your post was refreshing.
Rowan - my DH refused to watch that doc because it had "pregnancy" in title.... I'll have to try and watch it on my own at weekend (at 6am maybe!), I'm dying to see it!
Frothy, going back to your first post, I feel like I was in your DP's position. If my DH ever wants babies with someone, he'll have to leave me. I felt very defective when I first got my rollcall of faults: all my bits stuck together with endo, tube blocked, AMH of 2.2,  Franken-eggs with no nucleus (ugh) that were too cr*p to transfer back, all at 37. I clung onto DE as a "cure" because I was sick of pushing my body to do things it can't do, but DH was never keen. He is now completely unreceptive to any notion of doing more treatment, and I'm slowly becoming grateful for this. In true bloke fashion he is settling comfortably into a childfree life. He told me that he even has cold sweats sometimes when we do the deed that it might actually work. I was weirdly offended and also pleased when he said this, as it means he isn't yearning for something I can't provide. I did read that most men think having a partner is more important to quality of life than having a baby. Of course you hope that the partner will always be you.... That's where I freak out, worrying about the future... (Sorry I must've said that a dozen times already.. insecure). I find that this is a common theme tho': male partners get thoroughly sick of the ivf etc and abandon it mentally quite easily, being blokes... I'm seeing the advantages in this right now.
Anyway my own dad didn't ever find comfort in fact that he had adult kids - when our mother died in her 30s, he completely abandoned me & siblings (all in late teens) and went through dozens of women trying to find a new partner. He married two of them before settling on his current one and I haven't seen him for years. 
At the height of my txs I alienated a lot of friends, feeling "can't you see what I'm going through!" and I feel a bit like a different person now, so you do come through it.
Laura I agree, once you come to terms with it it's very liberating, and I'm feeling flashes of that all the time.
Crike x


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## Frothy

Hi girls, I thought of you at 03.20am this morning when I was having a moment of panic. Felt a little calmer last night and had a good talk to my mum about it all whilst DP was at work. I talked to DP when he got home about the posts you had all been writing yesterday, about finding other things to fulfil our lives and I felt more able to prepare for that although will need help along the way and will never be able to give a date to 'oh I'm over things now'. Still feel wobbly as to whether it's the right decision but on talkign to my mum (who I have to admit is not a risk taker, never has been never will) she reminded me that actually there have been problems with both of us ( I had 2 surgeries for endo and tube removed) and there is no guarantee that DS option will work and that she feels we have gone through enough pain and stress and that perhaps we can enjoy a happy life, provided DP makes me happy and looks after me. I agree with you though Crikey, I don't like to generalise (except I'm doing just that) but men do tend to switch on and off from it much easier and are likely to be able to see the benefits of a child-free future. I just still dread getting asked the 'when are you goign to have children'....so many people still don't know. I was asked recently by a work colleague who just continued to push and push  and I eventually told him but I still remain fiercley private and dont' think it's really anyone's business. What LAura said about choosing your friends more carefully is just what I agree with now. Of course I don't intend to block people out who have children (well not the ones I'm very close to; the others have gone already) but there may just be a big 'people without children' world out there that we just have been too pre-occupied to notice. The way I feel right now is that people will just have to deal with it if they don't like the way I don't gush over their babies. So there!
Thanks for your inspiring words girls, appreciate it. 
Frothy X


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## Crikey

Hi Froth
God I'm really not in mood to work today...
I also don't know if I can ever say I'm truly over it. If it helps, though, I know I am over the phase where I hated people asking me about having children, and every tiny comment would send me into a rage - that passed, but it took two years. I now say "I can't have children because of a condition I have". I kind of delight in any discomfort that causes the auld fertiles.... I'm still a bit prickly but nothing like I was a few months ago, when I was asked to do SIX baby collections/cards at work by someone who knew about my IF... I got so mad I absconded from work. I can now tolerate preggo bumps, announcements and the likes, and I feel pretty well prepared for any stupid questions of the "Didn't you want kids?" type. I am full-on OK with saying, I can't, I have physical problems". Deal with the embarrassment, fertiles! If anyone dares to pull out that cr*p about "nothing else comes near having children, it transcends everything, it's the only thing that matters, all other achievements are nothing" (transcribed verbatim from an oft-pregnant frump that used to come into our office; HATE her!)... let's just say I give them a piece of my mind and they don't come back. I don't believe that BS anyway... that would mean that me and my single friends' lives are not viable - just a crock of sh*te.
I tend not to show much interest in people's babies, but then again I never did. I just don't see why women are expected to fawn over them (they all look like Winston Churchill anyway) when men aren't: it's sexist! I don't care about offending new mothers, I've been offended often enough by the baby-centric culture we live in and all the pressures put on us.
Crike x


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## laurainhk

Well said! Our society has become far too baby centric and a correction is overdue. It's almost as if adults' lives have to revolve around children rather than the other way round. Yesterday i was reading Heidegger's biography and apparently when he was  busy writing in his holiday home in the mountains, mothers would tell their children to keep the noise down not to disturb "the philosopher". Can you imagine this kind of consideration today?
When i was a child and my parents invited people over for dinner i wasn't allowed to interrupt their conversations out of respect for the guests, and if i wanted to play i had to retreat to my room, kicking a ball in the living room or running around screaming wasn't tolerated. Babies were not paraded as trophies, pregnant women were not taking pictures of their bellies and exhibiting them as if they were the most amazing things on earth. I think we are now in the age of pregnancy porn! Today i  saw a heavily pregnant woman wearing a tight tee-shirt that didn't even cover her protruding belly-button... just as tasteful as builder's cleavage, IMHO.

When people ask me why i haven't got children, my reply usually is "sex is not only for procreation purposes", or if i am in a particularly good mood "you can lend me yours whenever you are tired of her/him. I enjoy spending time with other people's children if they are well-behaved", which i do... for about 2 hours at a time. But given the choice, i'd rather look after their pets.


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## Frothy

Oh you two have just had me cracked up laughing at your posts, forgive me if that wasn't the intention but just so drole! Will write more later, cannot abide this damn phone x


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## Rowan22

Hi all,

I have to agree with a lot of your points, Laura but if the kids are badly behaved, it's not really their fault, especially if they are tiny. The parents need to be a little firmer, obviously and lay down some boundaries. As for the pg porn, I think you're absolutely right and it's one reason why I've never wanted to go on ********. Why some women think it's acceptable or desirable to exhibit their pg scans and big bellies on the Internet for the world to look at I've never understood. The next thing will be the actual births!
Crikey, I certainly haven't got over it and I don't know if you ever do, especially when everytime you go anywhere there are a thousand reminders. We are still looking at options but we're waiting for the money to come in and we can't try more than once. Also, I am now badly anaemic, which would explain why I've been feeling so ill lately and obviously, this has to be dealt with before any clinic can trying getting me pg, with or without another woman's egg. I do sometimes feel as if it's one thing after another as far as this body is concerned!
As for the business about having children transcending all other achievements (did she really say that?!), you could reply that there's no difference between a human woman and a cockroach, in that case. I'm not talking about bringing them up, which does require a lot of love, kindness, wisdom, etc but the actual conception and pregnancy are down to pure biology and that's all it is. But the achievements that are characteristically human require intelligence, dedication, talent, hard work, discipline and creativity, in something other than the purely biological sense; and of course, love. 
I don't fawn over babies and I never did, I prefer toddlers, tantrums and all. 
Have a good weekend.

Rowanxx


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## LostHeart

Wowee, this thread has changed since I was last here! It's good to hear about how ppl's experiences of it has changed over time. It's great to share the process with other ppl. I think it's always a case of 'what works for whom', we all have different histories and will ascribed different meanings to what happens to us. The same way of dealing with something will do wonders for one person and nothing for another, there will never be a one size fits all.

Crikey - (know you posted it a while ago) but I think the comment about 'at least you have your health' when you have stage four endo just underlines their complete ignorance. How can someone that has a disease that causes rogue masses of cells to grow throughout their body, that bleed internally, cause scar tissue, and are capable of destroying whole organs including ovaries and kidneys, not to mention the severe pain possibly 'have their health'. I would have a few choice words to say to that. Sorry but this diesease has ruined my gynae, bowel and renal system and my entire life: career, social life etc is controlled by it and that kind of stupidity makes me very very angry.

Now that I have got that off my chest. I'm sending warm wishes to all of you ladies. I think simply surviving this grief, anyway that we can is an achievement and it's not for anyone else to pass judgement on, though sadly the ignorance that exist in relation to society accepting our right to grieve makes it much harder. x


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## redpixie

loved reading your posts. ( crikey - you could be me writing !!)

i´ve just made the leap i my mind to stop trying, stop treatment etc
so am trying to come to grips with how unpreictable my thoughts can be.
on one day i´ll be glad i wont have children so i can be as free as a bird and do what i like
other days i am desparately lonely and jealous of all my female friends who have children.
and anger at the stupid comments about how great a mother i´ll be for an adopted kid !!!
of couse i would if it were that easy !!!!

just waiting for a missed misscarriage to pass then i´ll be getting on with the rest of my new life....
after 9 years TTC . . .

x x x


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## Crikey

Hi Redpixie
I just noticed you'd posted on this thread and was reading your signature - god, you've been through some stuff.
I totally relate to what you say about having unpredictable thoughts. I was absolutely fine a month ago, even managed to convince myself I'd dodged a bullet by not having kids and would be better off and less stressed than other people. I felt quite good & liberated. Then two friends announced their pgs and the anger and loneliness came back: I feel like the lone ranger again and can't bear to look forward to the years ahead. I kinda hate these friends, if I'm honest. I mean, I don't, but then again I do. I'm finding I can't speak to them without being scathing or scoffing about kids. I wish I could be different. I'm having real trouble seeing either of them at the moment.
I was told I'd be a great mother for an adopted kid with special needs. Totally spurious, but it was this person's way of saying that she didn't agree with ivf. She then told me how many kids with special needs were waiting for homes. Funny how fertile people think it's the infertile people's job to adopt all the kids in the world, however hard and however many years it takes. They think it's the logical progression from being infertile, as if it's a smooth path with no complications.
xx


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## Susan01

I'm like that too Crikey - most of the time now I'm ok, but then something triggers off, and such strong negative feelings surge up uncontrollably. 

And I know what you mean about adoption. I know people who've been through the process and the difficulties of taking on a child and it is such a hard option. Nothing like having your own child, even though I'm sure people get there in the end. I notice very few people with kids of their own choose adoption.


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## Tulipwishes

I only joined this forum yesterday full of hope that maybe we could try embryo donation, I was so excited that my dream might finally come true and now they have all been dashed again.

My OH today has told me in no uncertain terms that he will not participate in any treatment as he has enough going on with the children he has with his ex, he actually smirked when he said that to me. I adopted my daughter with my ex husband and I really thought my new partner of 3 years would want us to try, even if it was just so that i knew in myself that I had tried everything to get pg.

His last words to me on the phone today, were that I should think about finding a new man to have this baby with, because it will not be him, I have to say I was so angry and upset with him that I agreed. I will now have to wait and see what he says when he gets home from work, but I know it wont be good, I live in his house so I cant even get away from any arguments tonight  

So it looks like it is definately the end of the road for me before it had even began


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## Jules2194

Boleyn, so sorry to read your post. You must be devastated. Some men say things out of spite and don't really mean it. My OH is just like that, he can be really hurtful and very selfish at times. I'm sure when the dust has settled he will be fine.

I am using donor eggs and sperm, my OH wasn't happy about it. Male pride and all that but I'm in the same boat but he came round in the end. The number of arguments we've had through this journey as well as through failed adoption attempts all because of his past, he has been leaving me I don't know how many times!!!! Do you know what I thought the same, go then, fine, I know I don't need you and I can do it without you. He's still with me thank goodness. I don't want to be a single mum but if that's what it takes then that's what i'll do.

I hope things work out for you and your OH comes round and you can continue your journey. 

   

Jules


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## Tulipwishes

Thank you Jules, you have given me some hope.

This journey is so hard x


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## Babytears

Hi ladies,

I'm having a particularly bad day today. I was walking my dog and could hardly lift one leg in front of the other. Like you all I have good days and bad days. I feel so crippled with grief it's never far from my thoughts. IF has really changed my personality. I used to laugh all the time and be quite witty. I miss those belly laughs but I just can't have them any more. I can't seem to make friends like I used to. I just have a connection problem. Something has died inside even on my good days. Not a very uplifting message is it. I should probably post again when I'm having a better day. 

Xx


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## Libran

Babytears, I'm so sorry that you are having a bad day.   Your post really resonated with me, as I feel exactly the same.  I can function, I can go to work, I can even laugh (sometimes) but the grief and sadness is ALWAYS there, never far from the surface.  My personality has definitely changed, and, I have to say, probably not for the better.  I am bitter (and, lets face it, nobody likes a bitter person) and can often feel isolated from "normal" life.  However, I know that there MUST be a way through this, and I am determined that I am not going to live the rest of my life in this manner.  As the title of the thread suggests, grief does go through cycles and stages.  We will all face setbacks and struggles (it is never going to be a straightfoward linear progression of improvement) but surely the possibility of a happier future HAS to be there.  We can not rely on others for our own happiness, so the answer HAS to lie within ourselves.  Maybe we should set ourselves "goals" or targets to achieve by certain deadlines ?  In the meantime,   to everyone and anyone who is struggling at the moment.  And, Babytears, remember to be kind and gentle to yourself and seek support and solace from whoever and wherever you can XXX


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## Babytears

Thanks libran for your understanding. It may me cry (probably due another). Like you suggested I am trying for a happier future an setting goals as I always used to be quite a positive person and always appreciate life so try to get the most out of it. I have always had horses and ridden an competed all my life but had to stop as I needed back surgery. I never thought I ride again but 5 years later which was 3 months ago I started riding again as I was desperate to feel some happiness again. It has worked for a while but I can't connect with all my new riding pals. I'm still functioning with no personality and so nobody had really friended me. I just can't get my old personality back. I must be sooo dull. Everyone just seems to get on with life and each other. My horse is lame so I can't ride so my escapism has been ground to a halt so my crutch had just collapsed again. I wish not being able to have my own baby wasn't so damn painful!! I think I've just got to except I'm having a shocker of a day and roll with it. Even when thinking of others going through much worse than me only works for that moment. Sorry again for negativity but it may make somebody else realise that they are not alone on their darker days xxx


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## Rowan22

Babytears   

I've been where you are, so many times and today is the first day I've felt reasonably positive for a week. 
But then AF is here; what a coincidence!   What a pain in all senses it is!
I am sure you're not dull, you're just in pain, that's all.   Give yourself a chance to feel a little better.
I don't know if we ever get our old personality back after all this. I am sure we don't come out of it unchanged. But the essential you is still there and she will emerge again, once you start to feel a bit better. I hope tomorrow is a much better day for you. 

Rowanxx

Hi, Libran, how are you doing?


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## Susan01

Babytears - so sorry to hear things are so hard at the moment. As Rowan and Libran said - remember to go gently on yourself. You are allowed to feel bad, and if others don't understand or empathise that is their failing, not yours.
I don't suppose this helps, but I have been where you are. I've felt so bitter that I thought I'd twisted and gnarled like an old hawthorn and would never grow straight. I've hidden away and withdrawn from the world. I've cut off from old friends who now cause me pain.
BUT it has got better. I find I can now say to people 'no we don't have children', I've found there are true friends who do understand, and accept and offer amazing kindness. I am able to laugh, and look towards the brightness in the future. There are even days when I don't feel defined by my lack of children. Ok, so I'm a different person than I was. And maybe I'm just on a good patch at the moment. Maybe it's taking the anti-depressants   , or talking to a counsellor. But there will be better times ahead.


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## laurainhk

how is everybody doing?
i took a long holiday from this site, mainly because i seldom think about fertility and infertility these days. The sight of pregnant women doesn't stir me anymore, i can be around children and babies without necessarily thinking about what my child would be like and i have completely stopped hoping for a miracle. I even think that a child would disrupt my newly found balance. I suppose i have finally made peace with my childless status.
Instead of wanting something i cannot have, i appreciate what i do have.
I keep my mind busy with other thoughts, make plans that do not revolve about an imaginary child but about myself, my partner and my community. 
It feels good to be in control of my life again.
Once i stopped obsessing about children, i discovered that life is so much richer than i had allowed myself to envisage. Infertility had put blinkers on my vision, had limited my perspective and once i got rid of those blinkers a new range of possibilities emerged.

I wish all of you amazing ladies a great 2012. May it bring wisdom and serenity, and the energy to embark on a new journey.


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## Joan

Hi Everyone,


I suddenly felt the urge to come back on the site...after 4 years...and found I remembered my password...and nothing much has changed.


I don't go past a single day without some reminder of the fact I don't have a child, a baby. However much I fill my life, and I do - I work too hard and am obsessed with being busy - the gap is not filled.


I do yoga. I am fit. My partner and I separated. I have tried internet dating. I am still single. I still have my dog (11 in March). I don't look or behave like a 48 year old....I am gorgeous. I have a house, car, everything and everyone says..."but look at your life - you have everything, you should be happy for what you have". Why? Why should I? 


I am as unhappy as I was 4 years ago.


I tell everyone I am great, super, fine, couldn't be happier.


It's not true.


I keep smiling.


I loved reading all the posts - and Laura's are inspirational, although I feel somehow that deep down inside, you probably feel the same way I do.


Joan


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## Debs

Oh Joan  

Im so sorry to see youre feeling the way you do - but glad you are able to say exactly how you feel because we understand here.

I'm doing ok atm - this was the first christmas I actually looked forward to and even enjoyed myself.  Dont get me wrong there are still "moments" like out shopping this morning - if I seen one bump I must have seen 23! But on the whole im ok with it - I have to plan lots of things to keep me busy so I havent got too much thinking time  

Atm im creating a new me!  A healthy 2012 is what im aiming for as I know for many years now I have comfort eaten which in turn has not done me any favours at all resulting in high BP and being a porker    

Big hugs to everyone - I hope 2012 is kind to us all.

Love

Debs xxx


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## laurainhk

Hi Joan!
I know how difficult it is to recover from this terrible blow. I also know that what works for someone doesn't necessarily work for another person. Each one of us has to find her own path. Human beings have a tendency to desire what we cannot have even more than what is within our reach. This leads to extreme unhappiness. 
There were times when i thought that having a child would make my life better, fuller, richer, etc. Now i know that it isn't necessarily the case.

I had a heart to heart with my sister, who has a teenage daughter, and found out that she feels that her life lacks direction, she is frustrated and often feels trapped. Having a child provided a respite from her existential malaise for a few years, while her daughter was very young and needed care and attention. Now that her daughter is more independent, the sense of emptiness has started to creep up again.

Having a child is no quick fix. If there are underlying issues, like marital and emotional issues, a child could actually precipitate the crisis. I know plenty of unhappy mothers.

We need to find our own path to emotional well-being, and that doesn't require a child. 
We may fool ourselves that if only we had a child everything would fall into place, but it's a fallacy fueled by our own perception of failure.

We haven't failed. Simply it wasn't our destiny to be mothers. We have a lot of possible roles to play in life, and i can reassure you that a lot of mothers feel like failures too if they focus on what they miss rather than what they have got, or on the perfect child they dreamed about, the house or holiday they could never afford, the promotion they never got, the husband they no longer love, etc.

The secret of happiness is appreciating what you have, rather than focusing on what you can't have.


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## Rowan22

Hello Laura,

I don't subscribe to ideas of destiny, not in that sense. Otherwise we would be puppets with no free will at all and I don't buy that. A more useful concept perhaps is something like the Anglo Saxon 'web of wyrd' popularised by Alan Bates, though this also has unfortunate associations as sometimes I feel like the fly in a spider's web! But it does suggest that it isn't just one strand that leads to the particular event or situation we're enduring but quite a few and most of them are not under our control but they're not imposed by some sort of Creator as the result of a 'divine plan.' 
At the moment I am trying and failing to get through to my gp's surgery to try and get the blood tests I need for IVF. I've no idea if the surgery will do any of them but everything that has to be done at the clinic costs more money. 
I never thought I would be in this position. 
I wanted our child, _our_ child, his and mine, conceived as the result of an act of love, which seems to be what happens for every teenager who takes her knickers down! When _I _was a teenager I thought this was wrong. I still do. I also thought that a child should be born into a committed relationship. I still do (no offence to the single mums on this site). Nature doesn't, it seems. She also has this nasty habit of springing surprises, like the serious illness which went on for a decade and would have stopped me conceiving if I had found my dh earlier. Biology and any sense of morals or values appear to be incompatible. 
I am still angry that we have to take this route and I'm not at all sure it will work. If it doesn't I will be thrown back into the emotional hell that characterised most of last year. I don't want to go back there. I want my life back but I can't seriously consider a childless existence (not 'childfree,' please, I deal with the language all the time in my professional capacity and I don't need euphimisms). It's so incredibly unfair. 
Joan, I'm sorry that you're still struggling.  I have a feeling that I will be, too, several years down the line if this attempt doesn't work. I don't even want to think about that. We have to try, that's all.
Look after yourself,

Rowanxx


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## Joan

Hi guys,


yeah, i guess you are right Laura. I am still focussing on what I haven't got - when, in fact, I have almost everything!


That's almost the problem in itself! Everyone thinks I have everything and I should be really happy - I am fit and healthy and good looking and have a great job and a lovely house and car, blah blah.


But I don't have a partner, or any kids.


I shall make a concerted effort from now on to appreciate what I have and to be happy. I am hoping that I will meet a nice guy with some young kids that I can play Mummy to.


My Mother still takes my hand everytime I see her - she is 85 - and she stares with her watery eyes at me and says, "Darling, darling, what WOULD I do without you three daughters?? What WOULD I do?"


And I say "I don't know Mummy. What am I going to do?"


And then her eyes fill with tears and she tugs her hand away and says "Don't say that darling. Don't say that".


And then I remind her that she says it every time! I'm used to it now!! 


Love to all x
Joan


P.S. Laura - you write really beautifully. thank you.


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## kesh

i would like to thank all the unlucky ladies for sharing their feeling its nice [for want of a better word] to read i am not going mad and all of my feelings are natural doesnt make it any easier though the hardest thing of all is not having any friends who really understand and god help the next stupid person who tells me all about their friends friend who had failed IVf but went on to get pregnant naturally because i dont think they will like my reply as i ve decided i m not going to play nice anymore why should i  thanks for letting me rant


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## Itgetsbetter

Kesh - you are so right. If I hear another 'miracle' story I think I will scream. I've also had a lot of people recently say to me 'keep trying, you will get there in the end'. Like it's that's easy !!!!!


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## barlismum

I think its nomal to always experience cycles of grief..I am menopausal now, and have had a lot of years feeling that i should be used to this childlessness...But the truth is i can be ok for quite a long time and just getting on with life as we all do, but then there will instances where i am reminded, and the hardest bit is the feeling of isolation and loneliness...I suddenly remember that there is a void in my life that never really goes away, and when some people mention( for instance) going shopping with their daughters or various other family things, i feel that empty feeling loom over me....Of course i shed a few tears in private and indulge in feeling sorry for myself till it passes again, but i know it will never entirely go away....


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## laurainhk

Barlismum,
the menopause can be a tough time even for those who have children. We suffer more because the loss of fertility it's a reminder of our infertility, something that eroded our confidence and self-esteem. We may have rebuilt that confidence and self-esteem over time, just to see it being shattered again once our hormones plant bombs where we had erected our bastions. 
I hear you. I am perimenopausal and go through a lot of ups and downs. At times i even question my relationship, especially when my sex drive is low and i just want to be alone, rather than find excuses. I am happy whenever i spend time with my single girlfriends. We go hiking together, cook dinner or go out for a glass of wine.


Last weekend i joined a 20-hour long yoga workshop and i felt very exposed because i was out of my comfort zone, working with my emotions in the presence of strangers. Most of them were nice, sensitive and tactful women but one woman in particular felt entitled to making comments that i wasn't too happy about. We were asked to walk around the studio as we would normally walk in the street, and the rest of the participants had to observe and analyze each other's gait from a muscolo-skeletal but also energetic perspective. She commented that i was "too fragile" and my energy was "too low"! I took her comment in my stride and didn't show how upset i was. 
Everybody made constructive remarks, except for this woman (who walked like a soldier, but of course nobody felt appropriate to point it out to her) . 
When we went to a nearby cafe' for lunch, she sat opposite me and started showing everybody pictures of her three kids, and talk about her pregnancies and how yoga helped her etc. almost as if this was the only thing worth talking about. In a nanosecond, all the other ladies produced pictures of their kids, and she monopolized the conversation offering parenting advice, schooling advice, relationship advice as a self-appointed earth mother/guru. I kept quiet, but at that stage my discomfort couldn't be so easily hidden anymore. I left the cafe' pretending i had to make an important phone call. Well, at the end of the workshop, she came up to me and said "if you had a child you would be able to connect to other people and tap into your energy and hidden potential". WTF! 
What gives this kind of people the right to offer unsolicited advice to strangers


She may choose to live vicariously through her children, or consider them as the only source of her self-esteem ("I am a mother, therefore i am")  
But her insistence that this is the only avenue for a woman to express her potential was frankly insulting.
I replied "i am working on my emotional cracks, thanks for your concern. Actually i am trying to let some light in through these cracks. One can spend her life in a dark cave without ever realizing that the sun is shining outside. By the way, that cave can be full of children". Suffice to say we didn't exchange email addresses after the workshop!


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## barlismum

Laura I empathise... Think i could write a book on the number of insensitive and sometimes very ignorant comments i have heard over the years...They are not all from virtual strangers either , some from family which i still struggle with at times ..How offensive  to make the statement, that just because you hadnt produced you were unable to connect to people, who the hell does she think she is?? Are we meant to feel like lesser,capable beings...I am fifty now and some people still never cease to astound me, but i have through having to, managed to develop a slightly thicker skin...Not totally impenetrable though


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## laurainhk

and there was me hoping that the menopause would dissuade people from asking very personal question such as "when are you having kids?". No, these people would just change the tense, but basically display the same lack of tact "why DIDN'T you have children?" 


It just never stops! I think the only way we can get some peace of mind is by hanging out with those who haven't got children, for whatever reason. Only with them i feel comfortable talking about infertility.


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## barlismum

At least its good to feel able to come on here, and be amongst those that understand....Its sometimes helps a bit to have a rant and let off steam.....Not easy being in meno tho is it?? with hormones and emotions all other the place at times..x


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## Susan01

I've come to think that modern motherhood is one of the most selfISH places to be. I see a lot of mothers who totally fail to connect with other people because they are so wrapped up in their children as an extension of themselves. Why is it ok to talk constantly about how wonderful your children are, and what great achievements they have made, to neglect your friends, to break off mid conversation, to expect others to adapt their requirments to fit around your children. And motherhood is supposed to be selfless .... 

I think that some of the most kind, thoughtful, understanding people I've encountered are those who've been through the pain of childlessness. What's so wrong with using your energies to benefit others outside of your own family rather than giving it all to one or two people - your own children.

Sorry to rant - I must be going through a rather angry phase at the moment   .


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## Littlegwen

As I've got a little older I think I'm becoming a bit braver.  I now enjoy being a bit naughty and hope that sometimes it makes people think a bit more before they say something thoughtless - even if it doesn't work it's quite therapeutic  
It was a while ago now but another teacher at school was complaining about being asked to do something outside of school hours while a group of us were having lunch.  I asked her why she had a problem with it (we work in an independent school and we're all expected to do our fair share  - she'd been asked to do something that was quite reasonable and necessary and wouldn't have taken more than an hour).  She replied "well of course I can't do things after 4PM as I have a son..... "
so I said "does that mean then, that those of us who can't have children should be expected to cover for you for the rest of our working lives?"
The rest of the table went deathly quiet until the lovely lady next to me said....... "these beans are nice"


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## Susan01

I love it Littlegwen. I'm also getting a bit naughtier as time passes. I do get fed up of being tactful...


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## Libran

Littlegwen, your post DID make me laugh  . And, Susan, just like you, I am getting ever more naughty as the years pass by. The struggle to move on is just so hard  . The bottom line is that these feelings will never, ever disappear completely. They do subside, with time, but they still come and go and vary in intensity. It is just a case of learning to "go with the flow" and live through them. What scares me is the thought that, in the meantime, life is rapidly passing me by and I am not focusing on "living" because all my energy and focus is taken up with trying to cope with these feelings. 
Had a couple of sticky moments last week. Taking instructions from a female Client (with an 8month old daughter) for her will, the Client openly told me that she and her DH were trying for baby No. 2. Cue deep breathing from me in an attempt to stem tears and remain professional. Then, was discussing with my mother on the phone when she could come and visit our new house (she lives a 2hr drive away). Her response was "Well, obviously not Mothers Day weekend............." and then her voice tailed off as she realised the implications of what she had just said (the implication being that she would far rather spend her Mothers Day with my elder sister who lives 5 mins away from her and has 3 children). 
So, of course it's tough. Then I read in the paper a story about a woman in the 1950's who lost a 4yr old daughter in a tragic accident. In the 1950's, the docs believed that the "cure" for her grief was to have another child, which she duly did, even naming the new daughter "Maria" the same as the daughter she had so tragically lost. Of course, the new Maria could never be a replacement for the first Maria, and this led to not one but two lives being destroyed and blighted. Firstly, the life of the mother was ruined, as she could never get over her grief and ended up rejecting her new daughter, and secondly the new Maria who could never hope to live up to the saintly image of her dead sister. 
And, this made me think long and hard, do I really want to get to the end of my life and look back realising that it has been blighted entirely by my childlessness. Surely, I have two choices - I either choose to let my life be ruined, or I choose to keep on fighting against it. 
Life is for living, and, although it is a battle and an uphill struggle, I know which choice I want to make.
 to all the lovely, brave moving on ladies


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## Susan01

Well said Libran. I have made that decision - that I've done all that I can to have my child, and I would much rather reach the end of my life knowing that I'd accepted my lot and made the best of it, rather than wasted my time mired in the infertility mud. It doesn't stop me feeling sad, but there is still joy to be had.


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## Lisa16

Hi ladies

I hope you don't mind if I join you? I have been reading posts on this board on and off for the last year in preparation for the day I might have to post here but hoping that I wouldn't (no offence ladies). Well that day has arrived after my final BFN on Wednesday. Spent the day crying and so stressed out due to couple of nights lack of sleep but starting to feel a bit more human (if somewhat numb still)

I have to say that reading your posts over the last couple of days have moved me both to tears and laughter, as have some of the other threads on this board. I find all of what you say inspirational and your stories hilarious - I especially like the naughty responses to the tactless parents / nosey sods!! I feel like I have very little to contribute at the moment as still processing the closure of this chapter of my life. The processing may take some time as I am only allowing myself small moments of thought about what could have been rather than dwelling on it and remaining a blubbering wreck for the rest of the week / month / year / life

I hope to add something more as time goes by and my cycle of grief moves through the inevitable path it will stumble and fall through

Nice to meet you all

Lisa
xxxxxxx


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## Lisa16

Oh and to top it all, am 40 in a couple of weeks!!
xxxxx


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## Rowan22

I'm 50, Lisa. These milestones are never easy. I am so sorry for your bad result.   
I had a doctor's appointment yesterday to discuss the letter I need for my clinic before I can have even one try at IVF. The blood tests have flagged up yet another health problem. I do not believe it. The diagnosis has still to be confirmed but it affects what I can eat and as I am already diabetic I am facing a diet of spring water, eggs and lettuce leaves or so it feels. Naturally, my doctor won't write the letter while this problem remains undiagnosed and uncontrolled.
One step forward, six million back. 
I just can't stop crying. 
What the hell have I done to get this useless body?

Rowanxxx


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## laurainhk

dedicated to those who are perimenopausal or menopausal. 

"Menopause in Japan, or konenki, is thought to begin in the early 40’s and last until around 60 years of age.  Some Japanese women don’t worry about menopause much at all. This may have something to do with the breakdown of the word konenki. Literally translated, ko means “renewal and regeneration,” nen means “year” or “years,” and ki means “season” or “energy.” While translated into English as “menopause,” konenki connotes a much lengthier, gradual transition where the end of periods is just one contributing feature.

Most of us here in the West don’t regard menopause as a period of regeneration or renewal, but as something dreadful that’s eventually going to happen to us — and there’s nothing we can do about it. If we compare the Japanese term with our own, the cultural differences are obvious. Menopause comes from Greek roots: men meaning “month” and pausis meaning to “stop” or “cease,” which gives no greater meaning to this life stage than the fact that our monthly bleeding stops."

Looking at the menopause across cultures  is very enlightening.
Some of us, myself included, have got on the fertility treatment roller coaster at a time when our bodies and minds were already preparing for a new, more introspective, phase of our lives, and instead of gently easing into it, have tried to boost our fertility with hormones. Not only we didn't conceive,  we also ignored the need to make room for a new identity that needs to be cultivated with patience and acceptance.

Now that i stopped thinking of children, i can embrace my new life as perimenopausal instead of resenting the loss of fertility.
The other day i had my first "power surge". Hard to describe the feeling. I was overcome by a warm wave, a fuzzy feeling that wasn't unpleasant at all and reminded me of the first ecstasy pill i tried at uni. It lasted for about 2 minutes, and luckily i could just lie down and enjoy the trip 
Of course my brain was completely foggy, but i didn't worry because i could afford to feel like that,  let myself go completely, and be transported by this wave to the deepest recesses of my non-rational being. 
I could just be (as opposed to think/do),  in a safe, cozy cocoon. When it ended i was so excited that i phoned a friend to share the experience, and told her that if this is what the menopause feels like, than i am up for it. She should get used to the new, stoned me 

A common belief among traditional shamanic cultures is that women must enter menopause to access their shamanic and healing powers. Menstrual blood has the power to create life in the womb, so when women reach the age of retaining their “wise blood,” they cross the threshold into “wise womanhood” by keeping their wise blood within. At this point they become priestesses and healers — the spiritual leaders of their communities.

I don't know if i will ever gain any healing powers, but i am certainly more in touch with the non-rational part of my being and happy to ride that wave. Bring it on.


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## Rowan22

Hi Laura,

I think you are absolutely right about how our culture regards menopause and I suspect it's even worse in the States, where many women have plastic surgery at this time to try to look twenty or thirty years younger. First nation cultures do seem to view it differently and much more positively. I was interested in your remarks about how the Japanese view it. The idea of 'elderhood' is similiar to the concepts of some Native Americans. It's also in vogue in pagan communities, of course. Having said that, in most cases it's a question of passing on what you've learned about living, raising a family, etc, to younger women. How can you do that if you haven't had one?
I'm not sure about zoning out, though I suppose it's one answer! We could all get high on various substances, I suppose, not think and more importantly, not _feel._ Now, that sounds good!
Some of us didn't leave ttc so late by choice, though. I spent all my thirties being ill with problems which meant I couldn't conceive. I do not want to 'move on', when I've missed out on one whole phase of my life, especially when it wasn't by choice. I am stubborn and stuck and no, I don't know how to begin to 'accept', though this has been suggested by various people. How do _you _accept it? It must help that you know other people in the same boat. We don't. I have nothing to do with most people except professionally because I can't stand all the refs to children, etc. 
The shift out of fertility is not endured by men, which is so incredibly unfair and the fact that they often view post menopausal women in a negative light obviously doesn't help. We seem to be defined by the state of our reproductive systems in a way that men simply aren't. Sixty years of feminism has made no difference. 
Oh, well, another difficult day, made worse by lousy weather and the start of another period. I am definitely looking forward to _those_ ending but so far they're as regular as ever.

Rowanxx


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## carysw

wow! it certainly makes you feel not alone seeing so many similar responses. 

I have a 12 year old step-daughter who's lived with me and huggy full time since she was 3 and a half so we have brought her up... but she's not mine... i love her to bits and everything but not having those 4 years (from conception, through birth, feeding, walking etc) i feel i have no bond with her. well meaning friends say "aw well at least you have her". not the same though i want to have the sleepless nights etc.

i'm just really starting on the grief cycle as today got the big negative, in work typing this so trying not cry, didn't want to be at home as hubby and me are having a few issues at moment which are going to be because of the treatment. my brain has not been focused on the day-to-day financial things which has meant me paying things late. not making sure enough money is in the banks to pay for things resulting in dd's being returnes which means more charges etc 

ARRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH hoppefully with this at an end i can start to appreciate the life and family i do have... good luck to us all xxx


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## prommer

Ladies,

I have spent some time away from FF, in the wilderness, trying to just `deal' with being childless.  It's been an awful experience, one that NONE of my friends could possibly understand, or my family would either - they give The Waltons a damn good run for their money!

I thought I could heal by ignoring my desperation and loneliness and just get on with life.  I know that I am finally appreciating my DH - who was the least of my priorities, as I was driven by the ultimate beast of `I desperately want our baby' syndrome. I was only interested in going to bed & getting the deed done. No closeness, no relaxing, just rush, rush, rush, to fit everything in before dinner and bed!  Hasn't it been so awful for all of us!

I want to say an enormous thank you - as I have read this thread, and as previous ladies have said - I have laughed and cried at the unfairness of what we have all had to endure but how we have found comfort and understanding with strangers.

After TTC for 8 years I have finally moved on and have found a few - and only a few! - of the positive ways to carry on. Well at least for the moment.  My best friend moved abroad, and I can visit her how often I like - without any other responsibilities.  Well, apart from sorting out easy to microwave meals for DH and a couple of bottles of the red stuff!!

Thank you all for cheering me up and I appreciate every honest and supportive words you have sent.
I shall continue to find happiness in each day - as I am the only person who can truly make the effort to heal.
Huuuuge hugs to you all and whoppee for the sun finally shining soon -can't wait to chill in the garden with a book or two!!
Prommer XX   XX


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