** Meeting details at bottom of the post**
Ladies and gentlemen…please refrain from standing until the ride has come to a complete stop remember to keep arms and hands inside your car at all times.
No, this is not a message for thrill seekers at the local amusement park…it’s for a ride that is often lasts longer than 2 or 3 minutes. It can make your pulse race and your palms sweat…you’ll likely even want to feel like screaming. On this ride, you will likely sit white knuckled for what feels like forever waiting anxiously to get to the peak, little butterflies tingling in your tummy. Inevitably, you will come speeding down the other side with that heavy feeling in the pit of your stomach. It might feel like the longest ride of your life, or it might feel like you’ve blinked and missed the whole experience. Does your car slowly and gracefully approach the end of the ride or does it come to a screeching halt. When you disembark does it make you want to ride again or ask for your money back?
This ride isn’t featured at any resort with a rodent as its mascot and you find it at your local fall fair but rest assured you’re not alone. See all those people standing in line…they haven’t got their ticket yet.
Welcome to the infertility roller coaster.
I’ve been on drugs that have made me crazy (as in threatening to punch my sister in the face kind of crazy). You know when your husband is afraid to be alone with you, it makes the whole conceiving a baby thing very difficult. I have pulled away from some of my closest friends that have been fortunate enough to have children. I’ve cried when my favourite characters on TV have given birth. I’ve been super pissed off at the mall when yet another teenage mom walks by pushing a stroller. I have felt like a failure as a woman and as a wife as the doctor called to say this month’s blood test has come back negative. Frustration has swept over my exhausted body as I check the bank statement to see if we have enough money saved to do another cycle only to find that I have reached my VISA limit. I have been cynical, moody, difficult to deal with, withdrawn, and just downright sad. I’ve self medicated with booze and wild nights out with the girls. Sarcastically, I have thought – Yes, I’m sure if I just stopped thinking about it, it would happen. Maybe we should just go on vacation…not everything that happens in Vegas needs to stay in Vegas.
What if I didn’t do that thing…or maybe if I stopped doing this…
Isn’t it funny we spend so much time making sure it doesn’t happen, but then when you want it to happen it doesn’t.
Sometimes we spend so much time focusing on the mechanics of infertility…the diagnosis and the solutions, we forget about the emotional side. Which seems strange since the emotional side of things are such a HUGE part of the “ride”. Our next meeting will feature local social worker and Executive Director of Beginnings Family Services, Kerry Vandergrift. Her presentation will include Triggers that make you sad and how to navigate them, as well as From losing hope to finding new paths. For whatever point you may be at in your own fertility process, this is sure to be a worthwhile discussion you won’t want to miss.
Meeting Details:
Unitarian Congregation – 122 Harris Street (corner of Harris & York Rd. Guelph)
Time: 7 – 9pm
Men and women welcome. Free admission, donations collected to assist with space rental.
For more info or to RSVP, please email infertilityguelph(at)hotmail(dot)com.
