reality
I don’t know if this is an okay lesson to learn, but I’ve learned this year that the world is not usually poetic. I wanted so badly to have a baby that god picked for me, to have a miracle happen that was invisible and untouched by man. I wanted the egg that was meant to fall drop just as the sperm that was meant to win win. And then I would know that that baby was meant to be the one for me for exactly this moment. I wanted it to happen quietly. No shots, no artificial hormones, no plastic bag full of drugs like Lupron, Gonal-F, and HCG.
When I wanted poetry, I thought that perhaps the world was telling me to either take the path of poetry or be unhappy in this path — if it wasn’t working out elegantly, then it must not be the right direction for me and I should go now while I can. I wondered if perhaps god was opening up a door to leave my marriage rather than undergo an ugly procedure that might literally kill me. I tried that and instead I fell in love with Steve further. I had to accept that any sperm and any egg would do, and that a miracle of science is still a miracle.
But for the first cycle I had to at first hold as true to poetry as I was permitted: very few stimulating drugs and only one egg for that one month. It had a 10% chance of working and it didn’t. That embryo was due, exquisitely, to be born on my birthday.
After all we had been through, the failure felt unpoetic. This was supposed to be our climax. In a poetic world, all that we fought for would bring us to this sweet closure. I had visions of being on Terry Gross’s “Fresh Air” rallying for less drugs with IVF and more acupuncture and fish oil in its place.
But I have had to give up on that undrugged dream for the sake of my sanity–I would rather undergo the full regime of drugs for one month than go through the trauma of another negative result. Instead, I am in the most unpoetic place for procreation I can picture. The first day we took out all the drugs and Steve sucked out Lupron from a jar into a needle and shot it into my leg, I cried for all I had surrendered about what I thought the world was going to offer me: poetry. The doctor will pick my baby. The strongest sperm will not survive, but one sperm will. The egg that was meant to drop that month will not, but in its place will be ten fat overstimulated pieces of me, not on god’s schedule but under the influence of chemicals.
I have a 45% chance this time that it will work. And if I am like 25% of people who suffer through / choose IVF, I will have twins. I don’t know if I am brave to take this path or if I have just surrendered my principles so that I can stay with my husband and still fulfill my dream. But it doesn’t feel so bad. It is not elegant, but we are laughing our way through it. Maybe-maybe-baby poetry sometimes appears in retrospect.
