I was really reluctant to take a pregnancy test. They are expensive, annoying (I hate having to hold my urine for as long as I can in the night and limit my fluid intake in order to have "perfect pee" that is not too dilute to test accurately), and have done nothing but disappoint me, or falsely get my hopes up (ie. you find out you're pregnant and then less than a week later start miscarrying).
I knew I wasn't going to screw around with the non digital type of pregnancy test this time though after what happened last time . Of course, digital tests are much more expensive, but with something this life changing, I didn't want to mess around.
Was my period just obnoxiously late from the miscarriage I went through a couple of months ago or traveling or was I actually pregnant for the second time in my life (could lightning really strike me twice?)?
I passed an uncomfortable night last night knowing that if there was no sign of my period, I'd be doing a pregnancy test in the morning (I even bought two yesterday in case I couldn't believe the first one- by the way, two digital pregnancy tests are $30 plus tax in a two pack, yes being a woman is always expensive).
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| Yep, over 30 cool smackers for a two pack of these. Being a woman is expensive in so many ways. |
We waited the few minutes for the results and number of weeks if applicable to pop up on the very clear Clearblue digital screen.
I had told my husband over and over again in the past almost a week that I was not pregnant. It was too remote of a possibility that I would ever get pregnant without assistance again and especially so close to miraculously having done it a few months ago. But secretly, inside, I wondered and hoped if lightning could have indeed struck a second time in this roller coaster of a year. Was I pregnant? Could I carry the baby to term this time and finally become a mother? Or would this test just lead to further disappointment, anger, and disillusionment with my life and this world?
In truth, as much as I have wanted to be a mother my whole life, I was terrified that the test would say "pregnant" because I was so afraid of going through another miscarriage. I doubted that I had the psychological or emotional reserves left to survive another one of these horrors (and it's still too fresh in my memory, I'm still having flashbacks all the time).
Then I felt guilty for not wanting to see a positive result and thought about what my counselor had said about making a good environment for a baby to come into, including psychologically and emotionally. If I was fighting becoming pregnant, would I ever become pregnant and how would my husband who had always wanted children feel if I never became pregnant?
I was absolutely swirling with emotions, as we sat there together in the tiny cramped bathroom, waiting for a result that could either change our lives or further increase our feelings of hopelessness and despair.
And by the way, we didn't tell anyone that we were taking a pregnancy test this time, because we didn't want to disappoint our emotionally ravaged families anymore. Plus, I feel I have no one really left to talk to (except my husband) . How many people know what it's like to fear, loathe, and despise the inanimate object which is a pregnancy test (I've found some of these wonderful folks on the internet, but they're not sitting in my living room, with a cup of tea, able to stare into my eyes, and try to comfort me).
With regard to pregnancy tests, I think that most women fall into the following groups:
1. Oh, shit! I think I'm pregnant and I didn't mean to get pregnant. Guess I better take a test;
2. My partner and I just started trying to get pregnant and we think we are (we haven't been trying long enough to be worried or jaded). Let's take a test;
3. It's been taking a long time to get pregnant, but I think I'm pregnant. Oh my God, I am. (Nine months later or thereabouts) . . . look at my beautiful child;
4. I can't get pregnant and I've never seen a positive test and I never will; or
5. It took me forever, I can't actually be pregnant. Oh my God, I am. No, that can't be true. Oh my God, lab tests confirmed it, I can't believe my luck. I'm going to actually be a mother when I had given up all hope and had started to try to adjust my expectations of what my future life would be like. Oh, wait, I'm miscarrying. I actually might never be a parent, but I don't know and the uncertainty is pushing me further and further towards the edge of that cliff, ever though my life looks perfect from the outside, because it's not socially acceptable to discuss infertility or the pain that it brings, so I must try to look perfect and happy and okay with the fact that I have no children and respond coyly to the questions that everyone is asking me such as if I have children and if not when I will have them or why I don't have them.
Other than my mother, I don't know of anyone else in camp #5. My mother went on to have two children and regularly dismisses my feelings of hopelessness, despair, and disillusionment, telling me that I'm definitely going to have children and that I need to stop worrying and being ridiculous or fatalistic (it's not just her, I have other family members and friends who are in this Pollyanna/denial group). I don't want my feelings dismissed. It's far from certain that I'll ever be a mother. And if I do become a mother, it's most likely that it will be because I undergo expensive and protracted IVF (and remember it's only a 50/50 chance of even conceiving each cycle and I have a 20-25% chance of miscarrying each time due to my age) treatment(s). My mother was able to conceive naturally and gave birth at 32.5 and 36.5 years old; I've only ever become pregnant this once and then I lost the baby and now at almost 36 and half years old, my time is running out, so I doubt that that dream is going to happen for me.
This is the worst thing I've ever had to go through in my life (I would go through all of those over a dozen surgeries that I've had in my life again, just to avoid ever having to go through unexplained infertility and the terrifying and heartbreaking roller coaster ride that it entails. Emotional and psychological pain is way worse than physical pain, but I've had my share of that too on this infertility journey with all of these tests, the hormones, and the miscarriage).
I'm sick of being in this stressful limbo and not talking about it (except on this blog and with a very few friends and family members). I'm a perfectionist from a dysfunctional family, who puts up a perfect looking facade to fool outsiders into believing that my life is rosy and that the birds sing me out of bed every morning, because that's what I got used to doing as a child. Plus, as mentioned above, it's not okay to talk about infertility or how awful it is to be going through it in our society. The dialogue is starting to happen a bit more, but it's still the exception not the rule. Most people don't understand infertility and many don't want to hear about it or understand it. People are incredibly insensitive and ask the most personal questions without considering how the other person might feel. Consider the time that I was at my family reunion two years ago and my aunt wandered up to the table that I was sitting at with some of my cousins and one of my aunts in the huge hall packed with assorted relatives and practically shouted "why don't you have any children yet?" Well, I'm done giving polite, coy, and/or misleading answers that make it seem like I'm okay with what's going with my uterus, like "well, we're working on it" or "we'll see." Next time someone asks about whether or not I have children and then asks why I don't or when I'll have them, I'll be sure to give them an honest answer. I'll tell them about how it took me years to get pregnant for the first time and then how I lost the baby and I don't think I'll get pregnant naturally again, so I'll be paying $10,000s just for the roll of the dice odds of ever getting pregnant and then the waiting to see if I lose yet another baby, bleeding profusely for days and days and days, reminded constantly of what I don't have and may never have. I doubt they'll ever be that insensitive to another woman ever again. If they are, they're a complete sociopath.
I was drawn back into the present moment by my husband's voice. He read the test first, as I was staring off into space, contemplating what this life of mine is supposed to be about and where it is heading. "It says not pregnant," he said gingerly.
I stormed from the bathroom and threw myself back into the still warm bed. It was before six in the morning and the day was already ruined. I felt awful, not just emotionally, but physically. But I knew that the nausea and gastrointestinal upset that I was having were not pregnancy related. That much was certain (or about 99 point something percent certain).
All I could think, as I struggled to get back to sleep, was fuck all this shit. I'm sick of this roller coaster ride. I want to get off. But I can't. And there is nothing worse than the feeling of being trapped, hopeless, and helpless.
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