my fertility

A very personal title for a very personal topic. Wow. I never knew how fraught this kind of this would be for me. I was one of those girls with the super human ovulation timer that never failed. Never a minute late, never a day off and never a case of PMS. Not to mention the totally painless deliveries and supernatural recoveries. I was the woman who was put on earth for the sole purpose of birthing children. I am tempted to write it on personal profiles and get to know you questionnaires "I crank out perfect children after perfect pregnancies and then they sleep and nurse and do long division right on schedule without so much as a menstrual cramp.

That was then. Now is a different story. Now the story is about betrayal and a stubborn defiant ovaries who have ganged up against me and decided that I shall have no say in the reproductive future of my nether regions. This act of war was responded to swiftly in the form of high doses of Provera a treatment of progesterone that should make Al Pachino sprout a vagina and bleed. No dice. You're supposed to take the progesterone to force the bleed so that you have a day to start counting from and then on day four you start taking the pills that force your ovaries to attention and make em kick out a perfect ripe egg or two. My body is in full mutiny. It will not respond to any of it. Not that we needed to check John but we did anyway just to have that special feeling of utter mortification when you leave your deposit and walk out avoiding eye contact with all humans. John's count was high and that just confirmed what I already knew. My womb is a rocky place where his seed can find no purchase. It only makes me sad when I think about the fat faced baby girl who will never inherit my eyelashes or call me every day when her kids are driving her crazy. I just want my Friend For Life. Weather we acknowledge it or not, we live in an extremely matriarchal society. A daughterless mother becomes an over-involved mother in law. Our boys are bound to marry and join their wives families because thats the way it goes.

The worst part of late infertility is that I don't get the luxury of complaining about it. I have two healthy perfect children born of my own body. How dare I feel sorry for myself that I didn't get more? I want to feel grateful for what I have and focus on what is. What is is blessings so great that they can't be spoken. Children so precious and of infinite worth that I have no business associating with let alone raise and teach and let them call me mother. I'm too blessed to ask for more but in the very moment of humble gratitude a little riot breaks out in my chest and screams JUST ONE MORE! ILL DO ANYTHING FOR JUST ONE MORE!

I guess if I were really serious about getting another kid cooking I would start making all kinds of invasive appointments and loading up on hormones and supplements. Perhaps the fact that that sounds too exhausting to bear is a good indicator that maybe a newborn isn't the best answer at the moment. No amount of sound logic can calm the heart of a baby hungry woman.