I don’t count the days anymore, but yesterday, I realized it’s been five years and five months since we first tried for a baby. I was ovulating on New Year’s Eve. That first time left me feeling giddy, rebellious even. I could have never predicted how quickly that feeling would fade away.
It’s been two years and eight months since our first egg retrieval failed, one year and eight months since our frozen embryo transfer worked. It’s been eleven months since I gave birth to our daughter.
Time means nothing and everything when you’re going through infertility. It doesn’t slow yet the days feel impossibly long. More than anything, time can erase you. I don’t recognize who I am anymore—not since postpartum and motherhood but neither since infertility and IVF.
In the early days of infertility, I listened to music all of the time which I rarely do anymore because it feels too stimulating or too familiar of a life and person I once knew. I used to drive to Northern California from Los Angeles every two months to see my family, escaping because I could, because my husband was in a fire academy and always gone, because I worked remotely and had no one but our dog to care for.
During these trips, I’d pack the car, stop for a coffee, and drive the long stretch of I-5 while listening to playlists. I’d cry and bargain with God. I’d look for signs, like the one time a rainbow split the sky after a summer storm and I hoped that meant everything would turn out okay.
I haven’t been able to fully articulate this on the podcast yet, but I’ve been sharing with Amy how I haven’t processed or grieved IVF and infertility since becoming a mother. As soon as the transfer worked, I held my breath for ten months and blacked out most of my pregnancy because every day it felt like our daughter could slip through my fingers and be gone. When she was born, the birth left me on an emergency operating table and then in a postpartum ward, learning how to breastfeed while holding an iced coffee. It was whiplash. I didn’t even care about what had happened, about where I’d been, because she was in my arms and so why dwell on the fact that my insides had bled out on the floor?
I’d process that all later, I rationalized. But then she was here and the hormones dipped and I went back to work and all of a sudden I was a mother and there was immense joy and also I skipped the whole part where I took a beat and processed what it took to get there. Later, later, later, I kept telling myself. And now she is turning one, and it’s been five years and twenty-nine days.
When I drive in my car, I listen to silence. My emotions are on autopilot after feeling so much for too long. It’s easier to coast and pretend like the happy ending erased the pain. I tell myself I am doing this for my daughter because she needs me to be strong but I know that I’m lying to myself. I don’t recognize myself anymore, though I desperately want to. I’m just scared to reopen that box.
I don’t have an answer for where to go from here, but I guess it starts with listening to music again. At least, that’s what I told myself last night when I put on a playlist for my daughter. I picked the first one on my Spotify feed, and it happened to be a mix of old songs I used to listen to before she was born and during the depths of infertility. The memories rushed in. My body felt heavy and grounded in a way it hasn’t for so long, the fight-or-flight response fading away. I welcomed the tears. The complicated emotions. The relief and joy and rage and brokenness, all in one.
❤️🩹 A few songs that have helped me process my feelings while going through different seasons of infertility, IVF, and postpartum
Collapse by Chance Peña
Overflow by Marianne Beaulieu
Doppelgänger by Lissom
Faith’s Hymn by Beautiful Chorus
breathe again by Joy Oladokun
Seasons by Benjamin William Hastings
Joy In The Morning by Tauren Wells
End Of Youth by Ed Sheeran
Worthy by India Arie
Someone To Stay by Vancouver Sleep Clinic
🎧 This week’s episode: Amy recaps her 5th egg retrieval (pt 1)
In this week’s episode, Amy shares the results of her 5th IVF egg retrieval. She reflects on her new STIMs protocol, insurance battles to get medications covered, and how this round compared to previous cycles. This is part one of a two-part episode as she waits for PGT-A results.
You can also listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
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“Time means nothing and everything when you’re going through infertility.”
I’m trying to conceive having been diagnosed with endometriosis 6 months ago, and the feeling of time has already really changed. To smallest span of the current cycle phase, to longest wondering “can I even conceive at all?”
Those words have really landed, thank you for sharing.
I loved this post so much. Thank you for sharing where you are at in processing your infertility. During my most recent cycle I also drove up the 5 to the Bay from LA crying and listening to music!! A few songs to add to the playlist: My Silver Lining, First Aid Kit; This Will Be Our Year, the Zombies; Maybe This Time, Liz Minelli (or GLEE Cast if you are a millennial)