The first thing a Stirrup Queen needs after receiving that infertility label is a lady-when-waiting. Yes, the same concept as a lady-in-waiting—a confidant who is there to help guide you when making decisions as well as lend a shoulder for crying (because there will be crying). A type of personal assistant who can help you along during a grueling IVF cycle. But SHE is not “in waiting” for anything. Or, more realistically, her “waiting” is not of the infertility variety. The best type of lady-when-waiting is one who is completely there for you when you are waiting and does not expect a reciprocal effort on your part. And this is an important point.

Ladies-in-waiting are the friends you turn to in the chat rooms. The ones who are also doing the two-week-wait and are as anxious as you are. A lady-when-waiting will not be someone you lose because they become pregnant before you. They are someone who will be your rock. Who will be there for you from the first treatment until you hold a baby in your arms. Because the lady-when-waiting also realizes that your needs do not end with a BFP. A pregnancy post-infertility has highs and lows that make Everest look like a joke. That lady-when-waiting may need to be there for you even after you hold your child because Stirrup Queens have a higher rate of Postpartum Depression than the average female population.

*Yes, I am writing a very exclusionary entry that is aimed solely at the friendships of women because I have no idea at this point on the needs of men. And my husband is playing with his iPod (that isn’t a euphemism for anything—he actually is busy playing with his iPod). But I can say that even though he can talk something out with me for hours, at the end of the day, he is a man, and he probably would rather have a basketball partner than a lady-when-waiting. But he will post more on that later.

In England, the lady-in-waiting is traditionally someone related to you. Blood brings trust (unless…you know…you’re the bitter sister and you want the throne and you’re plotting on having family members knocked off). But we all know that our hearts tell us who would be the best person to support us. Sometimes it is a family member and sometimes it is fictive kin—a woman who knows us better than we know ourselves. Go with your heart.

Now here is the question—can you truly ask for this level of support or does someone need to give it before asking for it to be meaningful? Hopefully when this book is published, it will give people that level of understanding so they can give before being asked. At the same time, I think sometimes you need to turn to someone and tell her exactly what you need in terms of support. And people generally step up to the plate. If you do not have this person in your life…I don’t know. I feel like we should start a support program where you have that person in your life.

And now the ode to my Mommy. Because my Mommy is my lady-when-waiting. I am very lucky because I actually have two ladies-when-waiting. The other one will be serenaded in a later post that ties into a different idea. But this post is about my Mommy.

My mother also went through infertility. It took her eleven years to build her family through adoption, fertility treatments, and natural cycles. She weathered a huge storm in a day and age when fertility treatments were limited in their scope. Since we started this book, she has shared more and more of her emotions over infertility and parenting-after-infertility. But when we were going through infertility, she made it about us. She shared stories from time to time to let me know that I wasn’t alone. But reading back through old emails, I never realized how many times she sent words that were just for us when she could have delved back into her own pain through our experience.

Early on in our journey, I started to worry. Things just felt…wrong. I don’t have the best intuition and have certainly not predicted many other things in life, but I was certain before we ever started trying that we would have difficulties. A half a year into the process and my mother slipped into the role of my lady-when-waiting…

Infertility is determined after a year of trying. I know you don’t want to wait that long to see. This website is wonderful. Helpful without creating panic.
http//mywebmd.com/condition_center/inf
There are other sites I found but start with this one.
Love, Mom

(Yes, Mom, I do save all of your emails. Okay, most of your emails).

At the turning of the year, she made the phone calls for us and got us an appointment with the best fertility doctor at the best fertility clinic in the area (she researched it and presented us with two choices and the pros and cons of each choice). If she was going to the store, she picked up some things for us so I wouldn’t have to go. I could use those saved minutes to relax during a stressful cycle. She made phone calls for us and baked us banana bread. She sent emails that were short and heartfelt and got me through my day.

Hi hon,
I’m thinking about you and Josh. It seems unfair and such hard work just to conceive a baby. I’m always here if you want to talk.

When we got pregnant, we waited three days to tell her so we could confirm it at the clinic. It was torture not to tell her because she was my lady-when-waiting. She had gotten me over the chasm. I wish there were moments that you could record—not just visually, but through every sense, every emotional pore—to play back over and over again. Telling my parents I was finally pregnant was one of those moments.

She was by my side through the pregnancy, even sleeping at our house the night that I started bleeding heavily while at work. Josh out of the country on a business trip. She was so angry that I hadn’t told her to meet me at the doctor’s office. She met me at my house and fed me and put me to bed. I am still her daughter, even in my thirties. It gives me hope that my daughter will always be my little girl.

She has been there for me as I parent after infertility. Because it’s a different playing field at times. The pediatrician berates us for some of our decisions, acquaintances snicker. Some of our good friends who haven’t been through IF never understand. But my mother just stands by us and lets us make our decisions remembering the choices she made in order to hold onto our babyhood one day longer. She gets it. And even if she didn’t get it, even if she had never been through IF herself, when she signed on to be my lady-when-waiting, she signed on to support me.

The reality is that if we want to have more children, we will need to dive back into that awful, tumultuous sea and step back into Infertility Land (where I still have a time-share) to try again. Starting with just the infertility drugs and then moving to the procedures or adoption. And she has already stated how she will be my lady-when-waiting when we become brave enough for that travel. When she tells me what she’ll do, she makes the enormity of the situation so much more manageable.

And she did all this for us without asking. I know there are people who will say that every mother would do this for her child. But you and I both know that not every mother is cut out to be a lady-when-waiting. I hit the jackpot. If you do not have a mother who can be your lady-when-waiting, choose a friend or an aunt or a sister. And the whole point of this book comes from this concept—how to mold a Lady-When-Waiting (as well as the male equivalent). I learned from a pro. I would be honoured to pass along to your lady-when-waiting what I learned from my mom. I love you. Thank you so much—my lady-when-waiting.

Welcome back after a long holiday weekend (or, for all of you living overseas–a normal weekend). A special shout out to our neighbours up north for Canada Day (yes, Americans DO know about Canada Day. They just…er…forget to say Happy Canada Day…). And of course, if you are here in America, we hope your weekend was filled with sparklers (if they’re legal in your state), fireworks, and all the hamburgers/veggie burgers you could eat.

A discussion with my mum this weekend led to question number five. When she was going through infertility in the 60s and 70s, the only paths to parenthood were Clomid or adoption if you were going through IF. No IUI or IVF; no sperm washing or donor eggs/sperm (of course, the flip side was that without the option of abortions in the pre-Roe vs. Wade days more women put up their babies for adoption, hence adoption was a lot easier. My mother has a ridiculously easy adoption story for my sister in comparison to the hoops adoptive parents need to jump through today).

My mother’s point is that it’s easier today because there are more options. People at least can see a lot of hope before them because there are many things to try. My argument was that with all of the options out there, it’s difficult to limit yourself and ever say “enough is enough” because you always want to try one more thing. Also, the financial burden of fertility treatments make it more frustrating when there are things out there to try that you think might work, but you can’t afford them. This leads to a lot of couples/people heavily in debt with their bodies having gone through the grinder (anyone who has had a burst follicle will question the sanity of what you’re putting your body through).

Which leads to the question: would you rather be living in the 60s with fewer options or living in the aughts (is there a better word for this decade?) with many options? Which one do you think you’d be able to handle better emotionally?

Not that you can go forward or back in time. So this question is a moot point. But it helps define the way different generations approach IF and may help you understand how a different generation (eg. your parents) views your struggle.

Tune back later for an ode to my mother–the woman who was our rock through IF. Thank you, Mommy.

My heart goes out to a recent reader who began her comment with the thought that she doesn’t belong here (on this blog or in this book) because she had no difficulties getting pregnant. She lost her beautiful daughter at 38 weeks. She is struggling with the recent news of a sister who is pregnant. The reader shared her pregnancy journey with a friend who gave birth to a healthy child–a person who would have been her child’s playmate–and needs to navigate that relationship. She is healing. She is mourning. And she belongs here.

We define infertility with broad brushstrokes. It’s a diverse community–those who can’t get pregnant and those who continuously get pregnant yet miscarry. Those who are rich and can afford fertility treatments and those who need to quit their journey to parenthood due to financial means. Breathing inside this space are those who are using donor insemination, donor eggs, surrogacy, adoption, IVF, IUI, Clomid, or timed intercourse. Everyone is at different points in their journey. There are women who have been trying for 6 months but have the nagging suspicion that something is wrong because their cycles vary each month. And there are the 4 years veterans who have been dealing with 48 BFN and don’t know if they have the emotional wherewithal to face number 49.

We are defining infertility as someone who either has difficulties getting pregnant or has difficulties carrying a child to term.

Why this community needs to be inclusive–infertility is hard enough without second-guessing whether or not you belong on its streets. We frown on any level of comparative grieving. There should not be a hierarchy in the different classes of infertility. It is impossible to measure grief and it’s not helpful to quantify your grief (I’m mourning my miscarriage. Yeah, well, I’M mourning my stillbirth so my loss trumps yours. Really, well, I’M mourning the fact that I’ve had four miscarriages so my loss is worse than yours). It doesn’t assuage the pain of the other person. I’m not sure what people believe they are accomplishing with this type of comment.

There is a phenomenon that we’ve noticed–this need to apologize for your grief. This need to diminish your loss by comparing it to the loss of others. To be embarrassed to admit that you cry over a not-yet-child when there are others mourning the loss of a husband or wife that has been in their life for years and years.

I’m guilty of this same kind of thinking. I would cry and then in the same breath admonish myself for crying when there were people who had lost their whole family. What was my pain in comparison to theirs? I would lurk on the message boards and then feel guilty because I had only been trying for ten months, and how could I think that I was worthy to sit at the Infertility Girls Popular Lunch Table when those girls had been trying for three years AND had been through fertility treatments.

You know what–it did nothing to minimize my pain. You can’t talk yourself out of mourning. You can be distracted from mourning (and yes, infertility brings with it both literal mourning over the loss of a not-yet-child AND figurative mourning over the loss of how you viewed yourself as a woman/man), but it always has a way of creeping up on you in the dark. Damn those night time monsters under the bed…

Therefore, YOU belong here–and I’m saying this to all of you who have stumbled across this blog and later to all the people who stumble across the book. You have something valuable to add. You have something you need to vent. You have a story that will help others know the best possible way to support another person. Please keep posting in the comments section or writing us directly (thetowncriers@gmail.com). If your heart has ever hurt you belong right here.

I love babies. I love it when a new parent asks if I want to hold their baby (why, yes, I do). I like celebrating with people and baking cakes and sending cards. 9 out of 10 days, this is the state-of-mind where you’ll find me.

Unfortunately, you never know if you’re hitting me on that 1 day out of 10, therefore I encourage all people wishing to tell me their happy news to use my SQ method for passing on information that is Potentially Heartbreaking for the Listener (otherwise known as a PHL). The thing is knowing when something may be a PHL or when something is considered ordinary news. And that’s the thing about SQs and SPJs–every person has a different threshold AND that threshold changes based on the relationship to the person.

I don’t want people to walk around on eggshells around me. I’m not a china doll. I won’t break if you tell me your good news. In fact, once I process the information, I will be very very happy for you. But the mantra of the non-infertile (and all people in this world) should match the Hippocratic Oath taken by doctors: first, do no harm. And the comments on this blog have spoken–face to face communication is not the best way to break the news.

When we were trying to conceive, we knew some people were also definitely trying and others fell into the possibly-trying-because-I’m-making-assumptions camp. We warned some people in both categories that the best way to tell us would be to send it in an email or letter. It may not have the warmth and energy that comes with telling your happy news face-to-face, but it allowed us time to process our feelings, set them aside, and jump into the celebration. I didn’t do very well when confronted with the news (especially in a group) and expected to instantly jump over the processing part into the celebrating part.

I still prefer to receive news about pregnancies in this fashion. My one exception to the rule is when the news comes from SQs and SPJs. Is that totally biased and hypocritical? Of course. But we all have a sliding scale of happiness.

Other things I prefer not to know: that it was an accident. That it happened on your first try. That you didn’t even know you were pregnant for the first two months. These things may all be true, but you don’t need me to know them in order for me to be happy for you.

Other things I prefer not to hear/read: how you hope I one day get to experience motherhood. How I’m “next” (because y’all know that G-d has a pregnancy roster and he’s just calling down from Heaven: “get in the bed and baby dance because you’re neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeext!”). How I’m so lucky that I’m not pregnant because you already feel fat.

Things I do like to hear: “I understand that this may be hard for you to hear so take your time with the news and let me know how much you want me to share with you.” “I’m going to be sending out email updates about my pregnancy and wanted to let you know about it so you could read it if you wanted. But I won’t be offended if you ask to be taken off the list.” “When the baby is born, how do you want to be told?”

And this is just me, but once a SQ always a SQ. Yes, I want to celebrate with you. Yes, I’m happy you’re having children. But tell me my way if you want my first interaction with you to be one of big hugs and laughter rather than stunned silence. The rest of the pregnancy will be all-about-you. Just let this one piece of your happiness take into account my situation too. After all, you wouldn’t call someone recently widowed to crow about your engagement…

Keep those comments coming.

Because the myth that all artists are starving should be replaced with the seemingly more accurate “all artists are infertile” (last I checked, Da Vinci wasn’t actually starving. But have you seen him reproducing lately? I think not! Take that, art historians!), we’d like to put a plug in for a reader’s film about infertility.

Andrei Kirilenko (local filmmaker) made a film called Technostorks that chronicles the journey of three IF couples (all local as well). I watched the trailer this afternoon and it looks amazing. Very emotional. Especially the woman who admits that she fears her infertility is the result of something terrible she once said or did. I think we’ve all had the “what am I being punished for” thoughts. You can read more about the film, view the trailer, and purchase the DVD on the website www.technostorks.com.

Support a fellow SPJ who is mapping the emotional geography of Infertility Land.