BlogHer - Infertile Girls at the Welcome Table - Comments

Thank You

Melissa Ford — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 20:14:19 -0600

Thank you for the warm welcome. I couldn't agree more with Kate W--I was using treatment loosely to mean anything you do to treat the problem: from BBT and timed intercourse and yoga and acupuncture to IUI and IVF and a world of procedures and drugs. "Treatment" definitely has a set connotation though. I wonder if there's a good word to summarize everything that goes into this umbrella topic.

And on that end, some people are also walking more than one path at once. A huge balancing act!

Venting about infertility since 2006
www.stirrup-queens.blogspot.com
and we're not talkin' cowgirls...

So Glad You're Here!

polchic — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 17:47:31 -0600

Mel,

So, so glad to see Infertility finally highlighted here at BlogHer. They couldn't have chosen a better blogger/writer. I echo Pamela Jeanne's sentiments. I am forever grateful to the network and the awareness you have fostered and I can't wait to read more here. How do you keep up?

As for no donor gamete path represented on the BlogHer Ad Network, I'd love to join, but blogger applications are currently closed. :(

www.themaybebaby.com
www.fertilitynotes.com

Another clarification

Pamela Jeanne — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 10:38:09 -0600

Kate, your point is a good one. I'd also like to clarify that even when someone throws everything available at infertility -- natural and scientific measures -- there's no guarantee of success. According to a UK agency that monitors ART, only some 12.5% percent of IVF cycles actually lead to a successful pregnancy. Science is not always the answer either.

My latest post talks about why the term "childfree" when listed with infertility is so often misunderstood. It can often lead to the wrong assumption, so I will spell it out here: I didn't "choose" to be childfree, it chose me.

www.Coming2Terms.com
Pamela Jeanne

Welcome Melissa!

Elana Centor — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 05:53:49 -0600

Regardless of our age we are all touched by women who are facing infertility. I look forward to sitting at your table, listening to your stories and learning along the way.

elana
Blogher Contributing Editor,Business&CareersFunnyBusiness

reply

KateW — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 12:12:05 -0600

I think what I mean is that you don't have to use treatments to keep trying. It may be controversial to say so, but there are plenty of people with diagnosed infertility that do, eventually, get pregnant without using medical assistance. It's definitely more likely to happen quickly if you choose to use the lovely, lovely science, and in some cases, will definitely *never* happen without lovely, lovely science- but not for everyone.
So, there is definitely a path out of infertility that doesn't rely on ARTs, adoption, or making a final decision to not have a child.
And also that there are those for whom ARTs are not an option for religious, financial, medical or ethical reasons, but are infertile and are still trying in whatever ways are acceptable to their religion, bank account, body or mind.
That's all I meant.
-Kate

Amazing, as always!

theidlemindofbeth — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 08:56:58 -0600

What a wonderful opportunity to share your (dare I say, our?) voice with a larger community. Congrats on the new column, congrats on the amazing post, and thank you thank you THANK YOU for the mention!

Cheers darlin! I'm absolutely buying you a Pomegranate Martini the next time you open the lushary!

Welcome Melissa.

lauriewrites — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 22:08:21 -0600

This is an important topic and I look forward to hearing what you have to say about it.
Laurie
LaurieWrites

Hi, could you clarify this?

lauriewrites — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 21:47:53 -0600

I'm a late-30-something with no children but a hope to have a child at some point, very new to these concepts. I thought the options mentioned here were fairly comprehensive. Just curious what you thought was left out, as I am not in the online community that you reference. Thanks!

Laurie
LaurieWrites

Great post - I look forward

ladyww — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 15:39:02 -0600

Great post - I look forward to more!

you know you rock

chicklet — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 15:03:14 -0600

Lady, I'm so glad YOU of all people get to write about infertility here. You not only bring another side to all of this in your blog, but you round us up, you help us all find each other more easily, and you've been there done that so you get it.

BlogHer couldn't have chosen a better IF representative.

chicklet from http://blurbthis.blogspot.com/

great new post!

KateW — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 13:28:46 -0600

Awesome! I'm so glad you're spreading the word about IF around the BlogHer arena.

Oh, and while I recognize that those are the main options for dealing with one's infertile status, it is important to note (especially in an instance where a non-IF community is also reading) that they definitely aren't the only options. Just because you aren't adopting and aren't using ARTs does not mean that you have made the decision to be child-free. I mean, I'm just sayin'.

Anyhow, yay for the great new column! And, really, thank you so much for all the hard work you do to connect the online IF community.

So glad you are here!

erstellen — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:34:27 -0600

You are one of my favorite spotlighters- you are just so wonderful & amazing and shining the light on things that are always in the dark. I so hope that this new column of yours sparks lots and lots of conversations and awareness.

Congrats!

Calliope
http://www.creatingmotherhood.com/

That was a very hearty

bestlight — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:12:30 -0600

That was a very hearty salad. I am so glad you'll be cooking up posts here!

Lori
Weebles Wobblog (http://weebleswobblog.blogspot.com)
Drama 2B Mama (http://drama2bmama.blogspot.com)

Welcome to BlogHer Melissa.

Catherine Morgan — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 09:10:36 -0600

Hi Melissa. Great post and welcome to BlogHer.

Contributing Editor Catherine Morgan
also at CatherineBlogs.com and The Political Voices of Women

Long overdue. So glad you're here

Pamela Jeanne — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 00:20:35 -0600

With some 7.3 million couples of child-bearing age (in the US alone) struggling with infertility and its aftermaths, it's about time there was some representation of this vast and diverse infertility community here on BlogHer. If there's anyone who can address this wildly complex and much misunderstood subject with the diplomacy and kindness necessary, it is you Mel.

Through your blog and its many annexes and extensions (Emoblopedia, Lost & Found and Creme de la Creme to name a few), you have single-handedly created an immense online hub of comfort, information sharing and understanding for men and women who simply want what others have (and so often take for granted): the ability to create a family. I, and many others, are eternally grateful to you.

http://www,Coming2Terms.com
Pamela Jeanne

Infertile Girls at the Welcome Table

Melissa Ford — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 02:05:09 -0600

It seems a tad strange to begin a new column in medias res as if I've been blogging on BlogHer for years and this post is just like every other post. Sort of like walking into a stranger's house and taking a place at the table and digging into the mashed potatoes without so much as a door knock. So before I start eating your dinner, let me introduce myself as Melissa, the author of Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters, and the new contributing editor for infertility and pregnancy loss.

And now we can jump right into the salad course.

The New York Times ran an excellent article this week in the Modern Love column by Catherine MacRae Hockmuth about her struggle with infertility. Like infertility and the monthly cycle itself, the article ran the gamut from gallows humour,

Some of my friends post sonogram images of their thumb-sucking fetuses on their refrigerators. It’s their baby’s first photo, the one that is sent by e-mail to everyone with cheerful subject lines like “It’s a girl!” We have sonogram photos, too, years’ worth, but there are no tiny hands or perfectly shaped noses in ours. The sonogram image that’s furthest along features two promising little marbles that stopped growing at seven weeks, which was three weeks before we knew anything was wrong. The most recent is of a blank, black space with the caption: “Empty Uterus.” I wonder how people would respond if I were to e-mail that to everyone with the subject line: “It’s an Empty Uterus!”

To the poignant,

It’s not vanity to want a child with my husband’s laugh and spiky blond hair, or for him to want a long-legged girl with brown hair, freckles and gaps in her teeth. It’s love. And of all the baby items we’ve had to find places to store in this apartment, that unspent love is the most unwieldy. Unlike our books, furniture, clothes and pictures, it can’t be returned, given away, or shoved into the corners of our closet. And unlike hope, it probably won’t be found through scientific study to be an obstacle to emotional recovery.

The purpose of this article is not only to connect with other people struggling with infertility, eliciting a head nod and a silent, long-distance hug, but to explain infertility to those outside the experience. She mentions this disconnect between those who have experienced infertility and those who have conceived easily when she touches on a conversation she had with her pregnant sister. Hockmuth asked her sister not to use the names Hockmuth had picked out years ago for her unborn children. She admits that she believes her pregnant sister found the request unreasonable and the rational side of me can see that response. I understand those who would question why infertility should grant a person exclusive usage of favourite names. But my infertile heart sides with Hockmuth when she says, "But how could she have known how precious those names are to us? We’ve been carrying them around in our hearts for years, if not in our arms."

That's the rub with infertility--the imaginary vs. the real, the struggle vs. the ease. And ever-present, the waiting while everyone else who was standing at the starting line with you leaps into the race while you still stand there waiting for the flag to fall.

This weekly column, like Hockmuth's article, will hopefully serve the same purpose. It is certainly filling a widely-growing niche in the BlogHer community, those experiencing infertility or pregnancy loss. It is a diverse niche too from those who knew for years that they would need assistance trying to conceive to those who are still in shock, from those who are fully ensconced in treatments to those who walked away after a few rounds of Clomid, from those who can conceive easily but not carry to term to those who have never seen two lines.

But I also hope this column will be read by those who wish to learn more about the emotional, physical, and financial realities of infertility. After all, according to the CDC, 7.3 million Americans have been diagnosed as infertile which stands to reason that you probably know quite a few people--sisters, cousins, friends, co-workers--who are experiencing infertility or pregnancy loss.

There are four main paths out of infertility: treatments, adoption, donor gametes, and living child-free and I plan to focus on highlighting the best posts from a plethora of blogs in addition to writing about the issues inherent to infertility and pregnancy loss. Strangely enough, my own BlogHer Ad Network reads like a options pamphlet at a fertility clinic. There is Chicklet of Blurb This, who is waiting to start her second round of IVF. Lori, from Weebles Wobblog, who is parenting two children after adoption while Lindsay, from Looking for 2 Lines is just starting her adoption paperwork. Pamela Jeanne, from Coming2Terms is living child-free after infertility. Beth, from The Idle Mind of Beth is at the beginning of treatments for the first time and I am at the beginning of treatments for the second time. The only path we are currently missing is donor gametes, and technically, even that is covered by the incredible Cyclesista--an online support group for those undergoing IUI or IVF including donor cycles.

And just like that, I've started summoning friends to the dinner table. Hopefully, this meal will turn into one big party as we draw more and more women together in a common understanding of each other's struggles and celebrations.

Melissa is the author of the infertility and pregnancy loss blog, Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters. She keeps a categorized blogroll of over 1100 infertility blogs and writes the daily Lost and Found and Connections Abound, a news source for the infertility blogosphere.