The Fourteenth Circle of IF Hell

My dear K., while being supportive throughout this little adventure, has never been one for the details. I would explain what was happening and why (courtesy of my Google M.D.) and he would nod and smile and say something optimistic. Irritating, no?

Suddenly, some kind of switch has been flipped on. Now, he's researching fibroids and FSH and progesterone issues. He's reminding me that we need to head for the bedroom. And he--get this--discussed all of this, including his emotions about the situation, with a male friend yesterday. I am floored. Honestly.

I am thrilled that he has become a more active partner in the minutiae and planning required by IF. And I am also grateful that he's begun to acknowledge his own grief and struggles with this and even seek some support from empathetic friends. (Now, if he'd just start reading some blogs).

But,

I cringe for him, knowing just how hard the blows are, how far the fall can be when you've let Hope in the door. When you begin to consciously, actively think about what may be happening in each cycle, on each day, that's when the pain of IF really starts to settle in and spread across the rest of your life. After you've digested the initial disappointment of not getting pregnant easily, I think you naturally move to the state where you believe that you can exert some control over it, that something you do or think or believe can make a difference to the outcome. But it doesn't. Not predictably at least and certainly not enough to count on. But then it's too late. You've opened yourself up to the larger pain of realizing that IF has become the primary organizing principle of each day that everything else has to fit in and around. In a very real and overwhelming sense, it is your life. I haven't found a good way out of that hole and I'm not sure that there is one.

While I could use the company, I hate that now he will be there with me. I wish one of us could have been spared.