Our journey through infertility, failed adoptions and now parenthood through the miracle of embryo adoption/donation.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

In the "club"

I have been on the infertility road for 11 years. During that time I found myself on the outside looking in. I always felt left out on the mommy talk. They have their own universal language that might has well been gibberish to me. Actually, I understood much of what they were saying, but my responses were largely ignored. I have always loved children and began babysitting at the age of eleven. I worked church nursery and after a semester of college I worked in a daycare for several years and then did childcare in my home. I have always been around children and though in no way an expert, I do know a thing or two about a thing or two. Yet if I piped up and commented during a mommy discussion they looked at me as though I had grown a second head. As though the day you give birth you are given a knowledge that no one else possesses. I realize that I have not raised a child, day in and day out, but I am not a complete idiot. I hated that feeling of always being on the outside of the "mommy club" and looked forward to the day that I was a part of it.

Now that I am pregnant I find that women that have never spoken two words to my infertile self now want to include me in their conversations. And that "club" that I so wanted to be a part of no longer interests me. Yes, I am excited to have this baby, but this baby does not make me important or valuable. I am important because I am me, infertile or fertile, the woman God made me to be. Why am I now able to discuss diapers or formula when I still have done neither? Just because I am going to face these issues means I am now allowed to have an opinion?

Tonight we visited a church and the pastor's wife and I have been friends for a little over a year. I love her to pieces!!! She was my friend before I got pregnant and has been extremely supportive in spite of her very fertile self. She has never treated me differently and I love her for it. I enjoy discussing mommy things with her because it is not the only subject we discuss. My fertility, or lack thereof, has never been an issue.

I think that I am going to start my own club! All woman that possess sensitivity and compassion are allowed regardless of the state of their fertility. Wanna join??

8 comments:

  1. sign me up!! i have had the same weekend. it is a little stranger for me because it is our surrogate who is pregnant. when people saw me having a glass of wine right after someone else told them we were expecting, well let's just say life got REALLY weird.

    ilcw

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  2. Count me in!! I know exactly what you are talking about, I too babysat as a teen and had my own licensed daycare in my home and also was a licensed foster parent even after adopting my boys it seemed as though I only received a partial pass to the mommy club, now that I have been pregnant and given birth I have been "granted" full membership. Go figure! I like your club way better!!

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  3. I too find it irritating that I wasn't good enough before. luckily, most of the women I hang out with know very well about our IF journey and don't discount it.

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  4. I'm IN :) !! Even as an adoptive mother, I have been treated TOTALLY different as if I don't know EVERYTHING since I didn't give birth! WELL, now I am. You are so right! God values us as His chosen ones whether fertile or not! HUGS! He also leads us to those people he KNOWS we need to be around during certain times in our lives. People that will build us up-I love that about HIM!

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  5. Hi I just found your blog :) I have yet to join the IN crowd, but I totally know what you mean by mommy talk! I always just nod and smile and eventually walk away, completely and utterly confused.

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  6. I'm in too :) I remember when Michael made me go with him to school things. I didn't mind going with him at first. After all I am his wife and I wanted to be a supportive wife. But eventually going to these functions became awkward when the Professor's wives would get together and all they would talked about were their kids, and I became invisible.

    Now, I still go with him to school things (more so now that he is the Interim Academic Dean), but I mostly hangout with the students. They are much more fun to hang out with and they don't talk about kids.

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