In chatting with friends and others going through fertility treatments, I’ve noticed a common theme. We sometimes get these pings of guilt. For a whole variety of reasons, but sometimes it’s because we think that we don’t deserve to feel bad. I’m honestly not for being in a chronic state of wallowing in self-pity, but there’s this feeling that what we’re dealing with is somewhat a choice. We think about how we’re not dying, as much as infertility is a disease and the majority of the time related to physical disabilities within the body, but no, there’s not a death connection. We think about how everyone is dealt different cards in life - maybe my finances are okay, or I have a loving supportive family, but I can’t have a baby, and so I shouldn’t feel bad because others have crappy finances or unsupportive families but can easily have a baby. We think about how we have friends who are still single in their 30s looking for someone to spend the rest of their lives with, and I’m complaining about how I can’t have children when they’re not even there yet! If we have secondary infertility we might think about how at least we could easily have 1 child whereas some people spend years trying for their first. We keep thinking about how it could always be worse.
This isn’t something that others say to us. No friend or family member actually feels this way about those close to them who are infertile. It’s totally something felt inside. In conversations that we have with ourselves or our partners. But maybe this is also our way of seeing the positive things in our lives too. It’s important to remember them. And we can be thankful for our health, our loving partner, our jobs, friends, family, etc.
