Well time has been passing slowly but we are now hopefully just a month away from cycling with our egg donor. We have nearly finished the mandatory counselling sessions and if my doctor is happy with everything we will be able to cycle straight away. We have met our wonderful donor and her family and it was such a positive experience. Her generosity and desire to help others makes me want to be a better person. No matter what happens I know we'll be better people for having met such a selfless person and beautiful family.
I've been struggling with knowing who to tell about using an egg donor. We became so open with our IVF journey but I'm not sure if I want to tell people about our egg donor just yet. I'm definitely not ashamed- far from it- but instead I just don't think I can deal with having to tell people if it doesn't work. That is my biggest worry- that this won't work and we'll have to look at other options. For once I'm trying not to think that far ahead and I'm just focusing on hoping, hoping, hoping we take home a baby/babies in the next year or so.
It is funny how comfortable I actually feel about the whole process of having an egg donor now. The earlier gut-wrenching grief I experienced over the loss of the dream of a biological child has reduced significantly. It will probably always be with me to some degree but it definitely doesn't upset me anymore...it's more of a sad feeling tucked away that I become aware of sometimes.
In a bitter-sweet way I've come to realise that genetics isn't everything. My own family has definitely not been my biggest support through this whole process and as hard as that is to process sometimes it has also made me more aware that relationships are more than blood and genes. Connection with others is not dependent on whether a person shares some of your DNA but instead about how you make that person feel and how they make you feel. I know if I'm lucky enough to be a mother that I'll do whatever I can to have a positive, loving and supportive relationship with my child in the hope that our connection is just as strong as anyone who has a child/parent that shares a genetic link.
I have to admit I'm not in a good place in regards to my relationship with my own parents and siblings. I hate to feel so bitter...but I do. I would feel awful if they knew it but I just don't really want to spend time with them any more. If we are successful at getting pregnant will I be able to forget that they have barely spoken to me about this whole process even after I have explicitly asked them for more support? Will I be able to play 'happy families' and just pretend that I don't care that they ignored me during my darkest periods only to re-emerge (as I predict) if things go well? I do feel awful for these feelings and try to tell myself that I do love my family members and I don't want to regret anything, and so I make the effort to sound cheery when I do speak to them or see them every now and then. We've become masters of extended small talk on these occasions and it makes me sad.
Sometimes I read the blogs of other people going through infertility and I feel there is so much more positivity on their pages. I want to write happy blog posts but to be honest I'm so sick of pretending in real life that I can't be bothered doing it online as well.
Having said that my ray of sunshine is always my beautiful husband and the special people (including my egg donor) who we have met along the way and whom we would never have known if not for our IF journey.
To quote a great movie: "It can't rain all the time".
So now we are just waiting for the rain to stop...
