The Infertility Aftershocks

I was driving to work the other morning when a random song played since my Apple music was on shuffle. It was a song I'd never heard before. The song was Hold On by John Smith. 

What got me was the chorus...

Hold on 
Take my hand now, take it easy
Hold on
When you hold me, hold me steady
Hold on

I was immediately brought to tears as I kept listening to this song. My thoughts were brought back to a really hard night when we found out my sister and brother-in-law were having a baby. We spent most of that night holding each other and just crying. Neither of us had any words, but we both knew what we were feeling. I remember the feeling of pure hopelessness and just wanting to scream out all of this anger. We were so excited for them, but feeling the utmost jealousy and anger at our situation. We wanted so badly to be announcing our pregnancy to the family. We have had to quite literally "hold on" to each other through all of this. While I was listening to the song, I also thought of other really dark times, times when I couldn't even get out of bed I was so sick with depression. 

I thought back to all of the negative tests. 

I thought back to all of the pregnancy announcements along the way that would always sting.

I thought about all the times we would go to social settings with a bunch of kids around and how it would just make me so angry that we couldn't have that. 

I thought about us not getting any answers or reasons as to why this wasn't working for us. 

I thought about the time our first IVF cycle got canceled because we caught Covid and how devastated we were. 

I thought about the devastation our first failed transfer brought. 

I thought about the trauma of being in the surgical room at the IVF clinic several times waiting to be put to sleep for the next procedure. 

I texted Dan the song and talked to him about some of the feelings that came up when I listened to it. Not only did I think about all of our hard times, but I also started thinking about where we are now. We are pregnant. We finally have a baby on the way. We've made it to where we've wanted to be for so long. Yet, I haven't really enjoyed it. It's hard for me to even type that and admit it because I think I have a lot of guilt from feeling this way. I just haven't been in my right mind. I don't know if it's my pregnancy hormones. Or maybe it's the aftershocks of everything we've been through. Maybe it's the anxieties and the "what ifs". I'm not really sure, but it's been so hard on me and our relationship. Even though we're on the other side of infertility, it doesn't take away the trauma of what we've been through. I'm still constantly waiting on the next thing to go wrong. I'm still looking for signs at any moment that something's not right. I'm still in disbelief that everything actually seems really good with our baby. It's awful to be in this state of mind. 

I'm really hoping the second trimester will give me some peace. I do feel myself coming out of it. I do see a light coming. I'll get back on with a 12-week update! Did I just say that? 12 weeks??