“We should be happy” and other lies.

This weekend we make the five-hour driving trip to see the in-laws. It was supposed to be a get-away for R and I so that we could take E to see his grandparents and escape yet another crappy, failed cycle. Part of the reason we were going was to visit the New York State Fair. Another reason was that my brother-in-law was in his first triathlon on Saturday and we were going to a little get-together to celebrate his success. So, we drive the five hours and I’m just so glad to be getting away from thinking about not being pregnant for the 18th month in a row. It's like a weight is being semi-lifted from my chest. Internally, I'm making all sorts of vows to myself to stay upbeat, put the past behind me, focus on the new month. All of that. Yet...

We are not at my sister-in-law’s house for more then five minutes when they announce that they are, yup, you guessed it: Pregnant. Oh, the sheer fucking joy of it. I felt like a trapped animal. My first overwhelming instinct was to run. I just wanted to get out of that house and run as far away as I could. I went outside to get something from the car for E and I just sat there and sobbed. R saw me leaving the house and followed me out. I’m sure he could tell I was upset, so he gave me a hug and the first words out of his mouth were “We should be happy.” I can’t even begin to explain how that cut me. We should be happy? Why, oh WHY should I be happy for them when I’m still stuck in my own personal infertile hell day after day? R proceeds to remind me that they’ve been going through almost exactly what we’ve been going through and that my sister-in-law knows how I’m feeling because, as he says, “she’s been through it when her friends got pregnant and she didn’t”. So, why is it that she suddenly gets amnesia about the pain and humiliation of someone else getting pregnant when YOU can’t? R tells me that they have the right to be happy and to celebrate the fact that it worked for them. Yes, I agree. You can be happy ALL YOU WANT. Just find a more humane way of breaking the news to those of us that are mentally destroyed by your oh-so-happy news. Don’t announce it to the whole fucking room so that we have to find a way to cope with your joy in public.

See, that’s the part that bothers me the most. This is the same sister-in-law that was snippy to me last month about why we were going straight to IVF after this month and not trying injections first. This is the same sister-in-law that told me I should enjoy my son. I don’t know why I thought she would be a friend in all of this torture. I don’t know why I thought she would be more compassionate about breaking the news if she got pregnant first. I guess it’s because I know I would have thought more about how it would have affected her if I had gotten pregnant before she did. I would have broken the news to her in private; I would have made sure she was comfortable first. If she’s ‘gone through it with her friends’ before, why the hell couldn’t she remembered what that pain was like? I guess I’ve been lucky. All of my friends that have ‘gone through it’ and gotten pregnant before me have been sensitive about how it might make someone else feel. They actually remember what it was like to have that feeling.

So, with that one announcement, my entire weekend was spun into a newer, deeper shade of hell. Now I was pissed because we were on vacation and because I started my period on Saturday, we were going to pass the deadline for the injections or IVF cycle. Which means I have to repeat another Femara/IUI cycle. Considering the outcome of the last four IUI cycles, I don’t have much faith that this month is going to be any different than the last four. Call me pessimistic, call me negative, whatever you want. I’m just plain angry and sick and tired of all of this.

This morning I had the joy of another baseline ultrasound and more blood work. I don’t think that I’ve mentioned it before, but another one of the wonderful side effects of having to get blood draw every week is that your veins start to become sensitive. It’s starting to really hurt every time they stick me. I’ve tried alternating arms, but it’s the same. Or maybe it’s just psychological. I don’t know. I just know it hurts and the bruises are lasting longer and longer. I barely have time to heal before they have to stick me again.

R and I are meeting with the RE tomorrow afternoon to talk about moving on next month. We’ve basically decided that we’re sick of not getting answers about my lining issues. Every month I’m told that I’m responding beautifully to the medications and every month my lining is thin and we don’t get pregnant. I think that we’ll probably undergo one month of injections before we start to push for IVF. I’m afraid of what the RE will say tomorrow. I know he’s going to want to push for injections instead. I’m just tired of waiting. I’m tired of crying about all of this. I just want something to work.