Sorry about the radio silence. Partly I’ve been super busy, and partly I haven’t really known what to write beyond: things are normal. Because frankly, I’m not used to writing ‘things are normal’, not used to writing about ‘normal things’ and writing weekly that ‘things are still normal’ doesn’t seem overly interesting.
[However, the main update is that the 20 week scan was normal, we had a 22wk checkup with the obstetrician yesterday which was also normal, and we met the doula who will support us all during and after the birth. She seems fabulous and is going to be a godsend.]
Also, it’s more complicated than that. I still have an enormous amount of conflicting emotions bouncing around which are difficult to write about when I know my surrogate is reading here. It isn’t as though I don’t share most of them with her, I do, and I know she respects that I’m finding much of this process hard. But laying out a list of difficulties and struggles might sound like a litany of complaints (not just to her, but also to other IFers, of whom I wish to be particularly respectful) and I don’t want to seem ungrateful and churlish. So, I could come and talk about all the good stuff. But then talking only about the good stuff and leaving out the hard stuff feels like lying (by omission) and also a bit like rubbing IFers noses in it, both of which make me feel uncomfortable.
So I don’t write anything. And that’s hard too, because I don’t have any forums left where I can talk freely about what is going on for me emotionally through this process. The IF group I remain in (until the baby is born) don’t welcome such talk, and I respect the rules of the group. I’m not on the ‘other side’ and don’t feel comfortable discussing this experience with my (mostly) ‘other-siders’ online group because I’m not particularly close to any of them, and none of them have experienced surrogacy which is completely different to IVF and egg donation journeys. I am part of Surrogacy Australia on facebook, but as yet (even though I have twice requested it) there is no section of the group that is private for intended parents, so conversations about how the IPs are feeling as we go through this is pretty limited because no one wants to appear to be ‘dissing’ a surrogate. Not that anyone would, on an individual level, of course. It’s just that they have a god like status on all these online forums, and I would fear being pounced upon and told I was rude or ungrateful if I voiced any feelings that were negative, even in a general sense.
Thankfully I still have my weekly therapy to offload on and Mike is always there for me. But I do miss the sense of having a group to share and discuss with, to hear lots of points of view from people who have travelled the same road. It is a lonely place, out here on the fringe, and I feel as though I am shrinking further and further into myself.
Which brings me to the final reason for sharing less (here and elsewhere): control; ownership; privacy; independence. Ever since my first ectopic pregnancy in 2005, I have had to open up the process of TTC to a lot of people. It was no longer a private journey shared by my husband and I. We had to ask for help, and by doing so, opened ourselves up to a shitload of advice, scrutiny, judgement, requirements, regimes to follow etc et al. We’ve seen an astounding number of alternative therapists, medical practitioners (specialists, phlebotomists, IVF doctors and nurses, different obstetricians) a psychologist, three different counsellors. We’ve included three egg donors and their partners into the process (even though none were successful). A surrogate and her husband and four children. Three separate lawyers. We’ve spoken with heads of various organisations (Concept Fertility, Reproductive Technology Council, Keogh Institute) to ask for help and to make sure we continued to meet their requirements (whether we liked them or not). Now we have an obstetrician, his practice midwife, the hospital midwives and a doula. Plus the mandatory counselling required by the RTC continues.
And every conversation with any one of these people necessitates me opening up my private journey to lay on the table and be scrutinised to some degree. Perhaps ‘scrutinised’ seems like rather a strong word, but it is how I feel. And I am getting to the end of my tether with this. I am impatient for the day when Mike and I and the baby can be together, alone, and not be dependent on anyone else’s say-so. I’m not implying I am never going to ask for help, that would be a ludicrous suggestion. I’m sure we’ll have rough times like any parents, but the help will be asked for on OUR terms. None of this past seven years of the nine year journey has really been on our terms. Always I am considering someone else’s requirements or feelings before my own. And I am SO tired of it. Exhausted, weary, worn out to the bone tired.
We have four months of the pregnancy to go. This entails quite a few more obstetrician visits, and a counselling session. Then M will stay with us for a week or so before the due date. Then we have to get through the birth (thank GOD for the doula, whom we met yesterday and is going to be such a fantastic support for all of us). Then the post birth week or so when M will stay with us and the baby before going home. Then the post-birth counselling session. Then the parenting order which requires a court appearance by all the parties. It could be as much as even a year from now until I can be free of having to answer to anybody else, to consider anyone else’s needs in conjunction with creating or parenting my child. To have obligation. I’ve had to hand over so much of this process to other people for such a very long time that I am really struggling with the concept of forming ideas about what I might like/want/need in regards to the relationship with our child. All I am left with is a sense of proprietary about my story so tight that I feel I have to grasp it with every fibre of my being and not let it out of my heart, my mouth, my hands. Not share it with anybody I don’t have to.
Because it is the only thing about any of this that is mine, and mine alone.
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