Just Keep Swimming, Just Keep Swimming, Just Keep Swimming........

Aaaah hello dear blog. We meet again.

Yes yes ok I might have had some wine..... But I have a confession to make. My last blogpost (here) was quite an angry and bitter one and was also, dear readers, written almost two months ago but due to the complexities of my job and the ridiculously busy time of year I find myself in professionally at the moment, the earliest chance I had to 'finesse' it (if that's even the right word. Do you 'finesse' a blogpost?!) was earlier this month. And so that's when it was published. My feelings about the situation have changed slightly in the sense that I am now at peace with how things lie. She can go and lead her life and I shall lead mine. I will try my darndest (altho I guess I make no promises) not to blog about her again. I am not going to waste any more energy on her.

So. For what purpose am I turning to my little outpost this evening? And after wine no less! Well, the glorious Salt in the Womb who is not only one of my favourite twitter posters but also writes one of my absolute favourite infertility blogs (here is my very own little fangirl post about it) posed a question the other day that piqued my interest. She tweeted the following:

"Friends, I need your help. Which subjects don't get discussed enough re #infertility? Cost? Emotions? Relationships? Speak yo mind"

To which the two most pertinent topics that responders mentioned, to my mind, were:

• Family dynamics when siblings have kids when you're not/can't, and parents (would be grandparents) not handling it well
• Parents can't understand/identify what you're going through

And:

• The effect infertility & IVF has on relationships, intimacy & sex in my opinion
• Sex is a big one for me. It's hard to know if we will ever get back what we had
• Ditto for us! I'm not sure you can ever go back, just create a new normal
• How to avoid drifting into being roommates. How to get that feeling back?!

Both of these are utterly relevant to me. Issues with the first set of responses hit home recently whilst trying to sort out the arrangements for my youngest nephew's birthday (his falls just five days after mine). My own mother told me that since we were childless all we had to do was worry about work so surely we were the ones that should be flexible. Way to kick a girl when you're down. Thanks mum.

However it was all the comments on the last post that really hit me where it hurts. I have been there, ladies and gentleman, and I have the t-shirt. The comment about drifting to roommates particularly resonated - is that what hubby and I were on the verge of due to our lack of intimacy? I've written about this before here and the pain that comes with that situation I understand very well. Despite the love and affection, without the intimacy that one would associate with a marriage is the relationship just a friendship? We were in that limbo for over two years. It was only earlier this year that we broke it and things are starting to return to normal. Or at least a semblance of normal, a different normal that (at the moment at least!) seems to be working out just fine. It doesn't help admittedly that hubby works shifts and his pattern means that there are at least two or three nights every week that we don't see each other. And the ones that we do he is invariably knackered. But you push through - you don't force things but you don't give up on things either.

I want to give hope to those that posted the responses above - it CAN happen. You CAN get it back. It might not be the same, but it is infitely better than where you were..... Keep going :)

No Way Back......

I find myself short of words again, but for a very different reason this time. Not so the joys and memories of Cuba (here!) but the absolute insensitivities of someone who is supposed to be my friend. Altho, to be honest, what exactly connects us now?! I'm not getting anything out of her friendship-wise and, altho I naively tried (here), she's getting nothing out of me either. I guess I just call her a 'friend' as that's what she was and is therefore the label I give her. It's not exactly accurate anymore but hey ho. We are where we are.

There are a lot of you who will already be familiar with the girl of which I speak, I've written about her a lot lately as she plays on my mind frequently. She has always been very matter of fact about what she's doing and seems to have lost all sense of perspective. I found out a couple of months ago that she had one more frozen female embryo left and would therefore be going back to California in May for transfer. Just her - no hubby. How on earth she disguised it this time I have no idea. Last time it was labelled a 'holiday' for the two of them (and therefore bugged the crap out of me - it was not a holiday), but there is no need for him this time.

Now, I don't wish to assume too much here as this is dangerous ground to be making such assumptions but he's in his mid-40s, from a few conversations I have had with other friends on the subject I'm not sure he wants more children but loves her too much to say otherwise as she so clearly wants this and he wants to make her happy. But, like I say, it's not as if I've actually talked to either of them about this so I could be completely wrong - he may want a football team. But as the sole financial provider for the family I wouldn't hedge my bets on that one.....

Question is, if this transfer is successful how will her relationship with her three boys change? I'm sure she won't love them any less but once she has the girl she has always dreamt of will she just leave the boys alone? "I don't want you now...." I realise that's callous as I'm sure she genuinely does love those boys but for some reason she prizes a girl over all of them and so something will surely shift if she gets her wish, no?

To be honest I am almost more hurt by how she's treated me. She just cannot see it - she has never told me anything herself, has no empathy towards me at all. When I tried to reach out to her and texted her about flights all I needed was a simple 'thank you' reply but of course I didn't get that which just made me beyond angry. It really has got to the stage now where I genuinely don't care if I ever see her again. Which I do find sad. But maybe people come into your life for a reason. I may have met her aged 11, and the reason for meeting her didn't become clear until we were in out early 20s (it was through her, albeit indirectly, that I met hubby!), but now we're in our mid-30s it may well be time to just let go. The hurt is too much, as is the obvious complete and utter disregard for my feelings. That's not how friendship works.

It really is that lack of compassion that just astounds me. Despite me showing some compassion to her - I have stated before that I cannot begin to understand how losing her mum must have been for her. When she is the mum of three small boys and her mum was only in her mid-60s, it must have been gut-wrenchingly heartbreaking. I understand this must have increased her need, nay desperation, for a daughter of her own to replicate the experience she had just lost with her mum. It must be desperation for the destruction and absolute disregard for everyone else's feelings she has caused to pursue this 'dream' of hers.

And in a way that is what hurts more. That is what makes me not want to see her, makes me so completely and utterly ANGRY. If she wants to do this, fine - it's her life. Really it is and she is free to do with it what she wishes. But I am supposed to be her friend. Could she not have a single ounce of thought towards me??!!

Cuuuuuuuuuuuuuba!!!!!!!!!

Oh wow. I don't know where to begin. Really I don't. Which for me is saying something!! The place is amazing, bonkers - completely and utterly nuts, but brilliant. Just, brilliant. We are DEFINITELY going back!

We've been back two weeks now and as much as it feels like the holiday was months ago rather than those two weeks ago, it certainly made an impression. The weather was amazing, the scenery was stunning, the people were lovely and it was the epitome of the perfect holiday. We only had two short rain storms and all they did was clear the air and it was back to being warm again.

By the time we arrived at the hotel we'd been up for 24 hours, our flight was delayed by two hours so we'd missed the last transfer coach by the time we got to Havana so our travel company put us in a taxi. We could barely keep our eyes open on the journey but at one point the driver braked sharply and we were both suddenly awake and sat bolt upright. As we saw a cow saunter across the road in front of the car in pitch darkness..... I do not envy the drivers of Cuba! There are very few road markings or road signs so you really do have to know where you're going. There's also a bridge between Havana and Varadero (where we stayed) which is collapsing and the town can't afford to fix it and so the police man it and only let one car cross at a time - very slowly.

Our hotel was brilliant, not five stars by London standards (but, let's face it, these places never are) but perfectly pleasant. The room was clean, bathroom in full working order and the food was brilliant. Lots of choice, a buffet but still with chefs cooking a few things to order (omelettes and eggs in the morning, meat/fish in the afternoons) as well as a snack bar by the pool. The long opening times of all these places meant nothing was ever rushed, which was a good job really as Cubans are just on their own time zone! Nothing is ever done at speed it seems.

We stayed in Varadero, which is a peninsula two hours drive from Havana. It varies from 400m to 100m in width and has beaches running up each side with a marina at the top of the peninsula and the town of Varadero at the bottom. We did spend a day in Havana and loved it, we had our own vintage car and private guide/driver who really knew his stuff. We saw a lot of Havana by car, which admittedly wasn't ideal, but I'm not sure how else you could do everything in a day! Since we'd been picked up at 8am for the two hour drive to Havana and, due to the cow incident mentioned earlier, the driver didn't want to do the two hour drive back in the dark so we had to leave Havana before 4pm. When we do go back I think we'll spend a few days in Havana to explore properly and then head to Varadero to relax.

Our ride around Havana

The other day trip we did was a catamaran to the island of Cayo Blanco. The staff were nuts and kept everyone entertained both going there and on the return trip to Varadero marina. The island itself was stunning, the complete Caribbean cliche. White sand that was as soft as flour, pale blue sea that was warm - and a pina colada in a pineapple!! Wonderful.

Cayo Blanco

Also, our Zika fears appeared unfounded. We didn't see a single mosquito and, due to some rather strong insect repellent that was so strong it melted my nail polish, we only got three midge bites between us. Which is absolutely unheard of! So, whilst I dream of still being there I look back fondly on all the memories we created. I think how lovely it was to spend that time with hubby (especially after hardly seeing him over the past week due to work commitments) and wonder, hope, that that might have been our last holiday as a twosome. It was certainly a good way to go if it was......

Chillin'

The Return.....

So, today it happened. I rejoined Facebook. I was going to do it last week but chickened out, which meant I had to do it this week. When I say 'had' to..... We're off to Cuba next week and a girl's gotta brag, right?! If there's only a few days to go it doesn't have the same effect. Well - that's what I think in my head anyway! So today I did it.

If you've missed the reason I left in the first place, you'll find it here. And for a long while I wondered if I would ever go back, I've not missed it. And Salt in the Womb (whose blog I've always loved) wrote a very good piece on why infertiles should, if only occasionally, leave social media (read it here if you haven't already). And so it has always played on my mind. But I like catching up with old friends, reading what people are up to and keeping in touch with those in far away places that it would be more difficult to keep in touch with without it.

So yes, I have returned but with a renewed attitude towards it. As I said I have genuinely not missed it these past (almost) three months. I have unfriended those that don’t make me feel good about myself and unfollowed those that caused me such hurt as to walk away from it in the first place (sadly, unfriending them would be the proverbial 'hot potato' within the friendship group.....). Also I will attempt, from now on, to be far more honest in my comments and statuses – whilst still aiming to be positive. I cannot abide those who post negative statuses looking for attention and so I will never be one of ‘those’ people, but at the same time I will no longer sugar-coat anything. It is a communication tool, it is not something one should live one’s life through.

Let's just hope I can stick to that ethos! Otherwise the next time I leave FB, it might be for good.

The Ramblings of a Mad Infertile Who Needs a Holiday :)

Sleepy. Soooooooooo sleepy! How are we already in March? Where is this year going? Why am I so tired? Questions, questions, questions. Where are we now? What plans for the future?

Well, our immediate plan is a holiday J and we cannot wait! We're off to Cuba at the end of this month, it's very much deserved and we're very excited. Zika virus aside, obviously. Sod's law eh?! Just as we're getting 'things' back on track we suddenly feel that we have to be careful (oh the irony).

Still, a recharge and a reboot are definitely what is required. We used to go away in September/October but since I've got this new job that's not been possible. Altho, due to my new role, a break at this time of year is most welcome! The job kinda turns the calendar year on its head and goes by a completely different cycle so it's actually worked out quite well to go away at this time of year. We did it last year too and it was lovely. With any luck we'll take a long weekend somewhere in October (Berlin and NYC currently on the cards for that one) but aside from that, and possibly seeing friends over the summer, this is our big holiday.

It's currently in the late 80s over there. And no, I don't mean it's full of shoulder pads and rave music. I work in old money! It's in the late 20s for those that work on the other scale. Altho surely that should mean flapper dresses, gin and jazz?! Anyway, I digress.

I like digressing. I feel like my brain somehow works differently, I go off on tangents and no one else quite gets them. Hubby's getting better, but I do feel like there's something creative in me somewhere. I don't know if it's a book, a film, a piece of art. Or something else entirely. One of these days I will take the time to explore and see what comes out of me, as it were. Altho I have no idea when! 

It's weird, I very much 'fell' into my current job but I absolutely love it. In a warped kind of way I'm quite glad that the old job got so bad (info here) as I don't think I would appreciate this job quite so much if the old one hadn't been quite so shit. As Hubby affectionately says, this job is just the three things that I love - writing lists, organising things and being bossy. Which is pretty much true! Should I admit to that....?!

How long I will do it for I have no idea, I can certainly see me doing it short term and almost definitely medium term. But then what? What could I do with my life? Kids or no kids, I definitely feel like there is more to me. I just need to work out what. In the meantime tho, I'm just going to keep counting down to that holiday :)

The Most Wonderful News - Good things DO happen to good people!!

Now before you read any further please do be reassured that this isn't the news you may think it is! We are still nowhere near that BFP (altho progress is being made....) so this is not a #pgpost and (I hope!) you shouldn't need to protect yourself from the musings in this post.

Those of you that have read my meandering thoughts for a while may be aware that I have a friend who blogs (here) about her wonderful family. It is a daring and searingly honest blog about the past two years or so since her son (their second child) was born profoundly disabled. He doesn't have an official diagnosis and, as far as they are aware, it's a genetic condition of which both her and her husband are carriers. However, after weighing up an awful lot of pros and cons they decided to have a third child - knowing full well all of the risks that that entailed.

It was not an easy decision for her and her husband to make and the past nine months have not been easy for them, however this risk has all paid off. She has found out that baby is developing as it should, all is well and it should arrive shortly. This gives me such a lovely warm feeling inside!! It is so so good to know that when one member of our friendship group is swanning off to the other side of the world to try for a genetically modified addition to her family, and for purely cosmetic reasons, that there is genuine good news for someone that deserves it so much.

Despite everything that she has been through she has always been so wonderful to us. I have written about her before, he responses to things are always incredibly humble and caring. When we first opened up about our diagnosis she was the one who apologised for 'foisting' her children on us - a silly thing to say as we love them dearly but she has empathy in spades and has always always found the time for me. In fact, she is the only one of that group of ladies that is aware of this blog and reads it. I am therefore pretty sure that as she is reading this (whenever she has the time to do so!) her face is going a rather fetching shade of red as she is the most modest person I have ever met but she so deserves this wonderful news.

I am inspired by her positivity and attitude towards the whole pregnancy, the burden that she has had to endure has been immense. I truly hope she realises how much I appreciate her friendship. She lives in the other end of the country and yet friendship is not measured by the miles, I keep in touch more with her than some from the same group who live down the road from me.

So, with a smile on my face and a renewed feeling that all is right with the world I shall plough on into the weekend..... Have a good one folks!!!

A Cry for Help

Howdy.

Just a bit of a heads up, before you read this post it might be handy to read this post and this post. If you haven't already! As I shall refer to both of them. I'd hate to confuse you....

I've not been feeling great of late. I've been very tearful, I've not wanted to do anything at the weekend other than just lie on the sofa and I can't shake the anger that I have inside of me. I found out last month that my 'friend' was flying the next day to California for her treatment. I decided I could be the bigger person, I thought I'd be fine. I texted her to wish her a safe flight, nothing more, but I thought it was the grown up thing to do. In hindsight that was incredibly stupid. I'm not sure I will ever agree with what she's doing and, because of the type of person she is, she will never tailor her responses to anything due to our circumstances. All she needed to do was reply 'thanks hon, hope you're well' or 'that's very sweet of you thank you' - and then both of us would have carried on with our evening and there may still have been hope of resurrecting the friendship in the future. As it is, I'm doubtful we will ever be friends again. Her reply was this -

"Thanks, it's so exciting!!"

Which immediately got my back up as what she is doing is abhorrent, not exciting. I genuinely do understand that she believes it exciting and that it is something she feels she has to do. Why else would she do something that so many people take an issue with? However, how she can fail to understand how I would feel about it, bearing in mind our diagnosis, I have no idea. Well, I do. Empathy has never exactly been her strong suit..... I replied, I thought fairly politely, that exciting wasn't a word I would use to describe what she was doing and again wished her a safe flight. She then made matters worse by saying that she was therefore stumped and had no idea what I was on about. This meant, of course, that I had to put what she was doing in writing which just made it even more real to me. To cut a rather long story short she accused me of being intolerant, of being rude and of spoiling her last evening with her boys before she flew out. To top it all off I then got a message on FB from her brother telling me to mind my own business and to leave his sister alone. That was the final straw. I sat on the sofa and sobbed.

Hubby had been working a night shift this particular weekend so was asleep when all this took place. He woke up, came downstairs, took one look at me and offered to call in sick to spend the evening with me. Which was an incredibly sweet thing to do (he really is the most wonderful man) but I said to him not to, he was due to leave for work in a few hours and I would just go to bed. So there wasn't really much point! I did however deactivate my FB profile the next day. I needed time away. My usual response when I have been hurt this badly is to hide away from the world. Which is therefore what I've done (apart from you lovely folk, obviously!). Weirdly enough I'm not missing it. And not many people have noticed I've gone so maybe I'll stay away..... Who knows.

What I do know is that, for whatever reason, I just cannot let this incident go. I keep playing the conversation over and over in my head and it just makes me angry. Properly, properly, full of rage angry. To the point that, when my mum suggested that what I needed to do was take a deep breath and let it all go I replied that no - what I really needed to do was punch her in the fucking face.

This behaviour is unusual for me. I am not generally a violent person! At all. And yet the rage takes over, I cry and I just want to hit her with a brick. Shake her and make her see what an absolutely immoral and completely idiotic thing she is doing. I hope to God it fails. And then I think badly for feeling like that as I know how much she wants it to work and how it would devastate her if it did fail. I have therefore got back in touch with my counsellor who helped me so much when I was off work in 2013. I cannot let this rage consume me. I need to let this go - I have let go of her, of that much I am 200% certain. If and when I do re-join the social media world I want absolutely nothing to do with her, her husband or her brother.

The past few evenings I've not particularly felt like myself either. I would categorise them as 'Meh'. The weekend was the same (although admittedly things were not helped by the fact we spent Saturday afternoon at a 1 year old's birthday party) and I don't like it. I don't like feeling like this. So I have reached out, I have made the call. I have an appointment to see her next week and I already feel better about things just because I've made the appointment. Fingers crossed that feeling continues.