Alone

It's amazing to me that there will be countless people involved in making me become a mother but yet I still feel so alone. I would give anything if just for one hour my dh could live in my thoughts. If he could understand how it is truly impossible to get through the hour without second-by-second reminders of infertility.

I was speaking to someone on the phone in the surrogacy world today and she mentioned a sperm bank that I had never heard of before. When I checked out their website I was really liking their donor selection (a lot of PhD & MD donors, a lot of them tall, which are two main factors we are looking for) until I read that they are entirely anonymous. It's been known since April or so that we will likely be needing a donor, at which time I spoke with dh about all the factors we have to consider when selecting a donor and he replied with the infamous "I'll think about it" remark. So, nearly five months later, I ask him "What do you think about using an anonymous donor?" He replies "Yea, that sounds good. Can you scratch my back?" I just looked at him, I couldn't believe any decision regarding such an important aspect of our child begins with "Yea". I scratched his back. He asked what my thoughts were & told him. If we use a donor that will allow his identity revealed upon request of our child, our child will always have that option. Selecting an anonymous donor removes that as an option forever. We should keep all options available for our child. He replied, "Oh, ok, that sounds good then."

My voice started to get louder, my patience shorter, and my words stronger. How do you just vacillate between those two options so easily? Haven't you considered these options? What exactly did you mean 5 months ago when you said that you would think about it? Was that simply a rhetorical statement meant to appease my sense of urgency? When were you planning to think about it, as M is pushing our baby out of her vagina? When our teenager is walking across the stage receiving his high school diploma? Perhaps neither of those times, perhaps you would put off thinking about it until I unilaterally make the decision which frees you from any further obligation toward that particular topic. And then, when we need to have discussions with our child about his genetic background, I'm sure you'll assume that I'll handle those discussions also because, afterall, I'm the one who decided to use a particular donor.

"What would you like me to do? I can't think like you. How do I think like you?" Ahh, perfect question my dh posed. So, I thought briefly, how does he think like me? How do I think about such things? I propose:

Divide the day into 15 minute increments. 5 minutes of those 15 are completely dedicated to thinking about a baby. It can be any variety of baby related topics. You now have 10 minutes left. A diaper commercial will come on TV, so you change the channel and the local news is talking about a potential "labor strike" at a local manufacturing plant. However, since you're me, hearing "labor" makes you think of a baby, which makes you think of M, which makes you think that you can't believe you are putting another woman in pain for your benefit. It makes you think about how you'll ever repay her. Speaking of repaying, how the hell are we going to fund this surrogacy journey? Back to the labor. We should write a birth plan now. I wonder if M knows if the hospital she's working & will deliver at is surrogacy friendly. I wonder if they'll give us our own room. We should include that in the birth plan. I wonder if both of us can stay in the room with her if we can't have our own room. What if she needs a C-section, will she still have one of those big labor rooms? Speaking of C-section, we should get M some help after the baby if she needs to have a C-section. That's enough, I'm turning the TV off. I should do laundry. I wonder if I can make my own laundry detergent that is safe for the baby, like dreft. On my way to the laundry room I walk through the office, the unsigned surrogacy contract sits inside a special folder on my desk; dozens of infertility, surrogacy, adoption, menopause books sit on the bookshelf. That can't be normal for a 26 year old. Oh, and about menopause, here comes another hot flash.

15 minutes is up. Repeat daily in 15 minute increments until you're a mother. That, my husband, is how you think like me. Now, you must devise a plan to still function as a semi-normal human being and fulfill all other adult obligations while having a brain that is incapable of thinking of any thought without somehow connecting it to our baby.

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It's not him, it's me. It's not normal to be like this. Seriously, not normal. It's actually part of what is so depressing about this situation...I've turned into a person that doesn't live a normal life. Everyone is pregnant right now and that is not helping. I thought I had triumphed over the "everyone is pregnant" stage last year when both my bff and 2 SIL's were pregnant at the same time. But, it's happening again. My neighbor is pregnant with baby #2, a very close family friend is publicly discussing her readiness to begin "trying" (if she only knew the depth of that word), another family friend is pregnant, my cousin just delivered (and no one wanted to tell me she was pregnant so I found out at a family function when they said her mom couldn't make it because Erica had just delivered. Delivered what?, I asked), my bff's brother & wife are pregnant, even M's SIL is pregnant. Everyone is preparing for a baby and I'm arguing with my husband about which other man's sperm we'll use to try and make our baby with another woman's eggs. It's too much to wrap my head around at times...