Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Proof

I kept my IF troubles to myself for the first few years. I was a typical IFer that was embarrassed of my IF. I didn’t completely understand it and was still very naive of the whole process. I only told one of my sisters and two friends what we were going through. Some people knew we were thinking of trying or maybe thought we were actively trying but they didn’t know the extent of treatment or what all we were going through.

My mom is insanely very Catholic. So I was a little worried about telling her of our treatments. When our 7th IUI worked we told my parents that I was pregnant around 6 weeks. I am pretty close to my mom so I knew that I wouldn’t be able to keep it from her for much longer and I really thought it would stick. At that time I told her about all the treatments to date and to my surprise she was ok with it all. She asked questions and seemed genuinely interested. It was a huge weight lifted with everything out in the open. Then I miscarried at 10 weeks. She was very motherly and concerned during the miscarriage. I am lucky that she was there to support me and to make her yummy chicken noodle soup. I decided to keep her vaguely in the loop for the last three IUIs, IVF, and FET. I didn’t share every detail with her but she knew the stress I was under and the high cost of the medication. She has offered their financial support if we need it. I think by offering money it made her feel better – like she was doing something to help me in this helpless situation. I really appreciated the offer.

With all that being said…Here is proof that my mom still has no clue…

Last week she forwarded me an email from my ex boyfriends mother. (Yes – my parents still are friends with my ex’s parents. Our dads are in similar lines of work and they meet with each other regularly. This is my ex from high school. We have been broken up for 15 years. Our parents being friends has not really bothered me or my hubby (I hope). We still live in the same city and have a few mutual friends. About once every two years we might run into him at a bar or football game. He got married about 6 months ago so you can probably see where I am headed with this.) Back to the email…of course it announced the news of them expecting twins and how they are shocked because twins don’t run in their family. I am still a little surprised that my mother thought I cared or thought it was a good idea to send this to me at work. It doesn’t matter whose announcement it is I am never really that happy for a very fertile couple that gets the gift of twins. It always makes me a bit of a mental case when I hear a pregnancy announcement.

I guess I can’t expect people to understand if I don’t educate them. I guess I have some work to do with my mother. Maybe she will never get the emotional end to IF and just keep offering me money. I guess I could handle that.

16 comments:

  1. Oh man! That's so hard!!! I completely understand that feeling of becoming a mental case when hearing pregnancy announcements. I live in this constant state of fear of hearing another family member of friend tell me they are pregnant. It eats away at my sanity! LOL!

    By the way, I just started following your blog and love it! :)

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  2. My ex, who I am friends with still, he was that one ex that when we are both single, the universe does everything to get us together (aka first real love/HS bf)... anyways, he is getting married on friday. I am just holding my breath as I am sure they will get pregnant within the first year.

    But I know what you mean... my family knows my whole entire story, and they still tell me who's pregnant and who just had a baby. 6,000 miles away and I can't really get away!

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  3. Take the money!!!! I'm just kidding!
    It took me the longest time to understand that people who aren't dealing with this or haven't dealt with this have no idea what to do or say. They may want to understand it really bad or they may not care at all and either way you're going to hear something stupid come from them. And from my experience it doesn't stop once you get the bfp. Just this week I had a friend complain to me that she and her husband have been trying for Baby #2 for 5 months and she is about to lose it. Yep...that's like 1 millionth of the time it took us--and I am still terrified of miscarriage on top of that...anyway, I don't know what the point of my story is except to say I'm praying for you and try to realize that the general population just does.not.get.it.

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  4. Wow, so my Mom sounds very similar to yours. Insanely Catholic is putting it mildly :O)
    My mom too also tells me about birth announcements as if I am "normal." Maybe she thinks I would find out anyway, but I just wish maybe she would deliver it at least with some understanding that this news could be painful for me.
    Like you said though, if we do not tell them how we feel, they may never know.

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  5. Like you said, maybe you just need to educate your mom a little more. Maybe she's one of those people that don't really know what to say and then over compensate by saying too much of the wrong thing at the wrong time??! I'm trying to give her the benefit.

    I'm sorry she forwarded that annoucement to you. It's never easy to hear. ((Hugs))

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  6. Sometimes I feel that, unless people are told, they will not know how to act or respond in the correct way. My mother-in-law is like that. She is the one who will cry to me about not being a grandmom, when I am the one who is IF. I found that when I educate her on IF and what it really means, she got better. Same goes for my parents. Not only are they emotionally supportive right now,but financially as well. Good Luck! Patience!!!!

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  7. Ah, how mothers can be *so* insensitive. My mother just doesn't get the pain we're going through and will routinely tell me about different pregnancies of people oh 5-8 years younger than me and I just don't want to hear it. Plus, she routinely tells me that she doesn't understand why we're having a hard time because she got pregnant the first time she tried with ALL FOUR of her children. (Um, wow, mom, can you be more insensitive?). Anyways, I have to believe that people try to be for us in the best way they know how and that unless they've been through it, they can't really understand. I've since told my mother to refrain on telling me about all the uber-fertile people she knows and that has helped.

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  8. Oi. I don't go out of my way to try and educate my mother anymore, I just deal with it as it comes. You'd think after so long she'd get it... nope. I know she (probably) means well, but it's hard on me to constantly correct.

    Sorry you have to deal with that, or any of us do. It does add a new layer to everything.

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  9. That pregnancy announcement must have really stung...I'm sorry!!!

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  10. Thinking of you! Pregnancy announcements suck no matter where they come from and especially if they're SURPRISE twins.

    I say do some venting and then maybe some self-pampering.

    Atleast your mom has some idea. My M-I-L is sooo EXTREMELY Catholic that when I started to open up to her about our issues she informed me my husband couldn't get tested because Catholics don't believe you should (do what men have to do in order to provide a SA) (actually she used the Catholic term for it). Yeah, she had the audacity to tell me that. Now she forces adoption on us every time she sees us.

    Oh...and then I would take the money and run ;)

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  11. Sorry to leave 2 comments on one post, but I wanted to let you know that I left you a blog award! http://mymusingsd.blogspot.com/2010/09/my-first-blog-award.html

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  12. people who haven't been through what we're going through will never understand. it sucks. i do hope that you are able to educate your mom a bit more so she refrains from saying things that might be hurtful or stressful. when i came "out" to my boss, he was super sensitive and he even cried and then he said "you're coming back to work after you have the baby, right?" and i was like "uuuuummm, first things first." i know he meant it in a sweet way (he loves me and has no idea what he'd do without me) but he also had no idea how that was the last thing i wanted to hear. oh well. that's why we have each other! we understand!

    p.s. maybe they're pregnant with twins because of ART. you never know.

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  13. Rome sounds like so much fun:) I would def talk to your mom....I felt unless I fully informed people of our happenings that I really couldnt get mad at them if they did things that seemed obviously wrong...I only would get upset when they knew the situation and cont with such things then I just knew they plain didnt get it...thats people I guess:( Take Care

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  14. Oh, I'm sorry. Such emails are so painful.
    You might really try to tell your mom how hard this is, if only to avoid more forwards of this sort...

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  15. Ah bugger! That kind of stinks. Sometimes even the closest people just.don't.get.it. Sending you good vibes.

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