Several decades ago, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross described the five stages people often experience when coming to terms with a terminal illness: denial, anger and/or guilt, depression, bargaining, and acceptance. More recently this has been updated to shock, denial, anger and/or guilt, depression and acceptance. Or variations thereof.
I have read some of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s books on grief after losing Ben. I read a lot then, it really helped.
Anyhow, I have come to realize that going through infertility is a very similar process to going through a grieving process. In fact, I think the reason why I coped so well with Ben’s death, or rather should I say the reason why I managed to move through the cycle fairly quickly is that his death was part of a longer grieving process, the one I have been going through for four years, infertility.
All the experts will tell you – there is no way around the grieving process, you can only go through it. It has been generally accepted that the five stages of grief pretty much cover the grieving process and most people will go through each of these stages, some longer, some shorter. Plus it need not follow in that order and you can go back and forth between stages.
If I look at the various (infertile) people I interact with, I can see clearly that different people are in different stages in the process. I was speaking to a friend last night who has done 15 or so IVF’s, number 6 gave her son. She is in the same headspace as I am – acceptance. We are both very calm about this, but we have both been through the stages. Interacting with the various people on the bulletin boards illustrates this quite well.
Shock/denial
I certainly did not spend too much time in this stage. I took myself self off immediately to a fertility specialist, after 3 months of trying. What can I say – I am an instant gratification type of girl. But for many, there is an initial period where they either are too scared to go see a doctor for fear he will diagnose infertility, or there are others who simply can’t believe that there might be something wrong with them. They just carry on, month after month, with the horrible suspicion that there might just be something wrong deep in the back of their minds, yet too scared to face up to it.
Anger / guilt
I spent a lot of time in this stage and it was ugly, very very ugly. I found the anger the hardest thing to deal with and this is what eventually sent me to therapy and on AD’s. I was so f’ing angry about infertility and the failures. I was angry at God, angry at fertile people, angry at the world. I could hardly talk to my friends or family. The deep, dark anger inside would threaten to choke me. I remember talking to my (very fertile) sister on the phone and nearly choking on my anger, for no reason other than she was fertile. It was a dark time.
This is the time when bitterness and frustration set in. You see this in many people on the boards. They are angry, mad at the world, and who can blame them. This is the stage where you don’t want to, in fact you simply can’t, be around ‘normal’ people. Or heaven forbid around babies. You are super sensitive to every thing any one says and you take every thing very personally. Anger is a terrible emotion, it is soul destroying.
And then there are some who spend time in the guilty phase. ‘I am suffering from infertility because of something I did in my past – that abortion I had, or the fact that I slept around, or because xyz’. Logic has no place here – these are the crazy conversations in your head.
Depression / despair
Then you see the girls that are stuck in the depression / despair phase. It’s fairly obvious what this stage feels like. You feel completely down, that things will never work out. You feel lonely and alone. You withdraw from you normal life. You creep deeper and deeper within your own misery.
Thank goodness I did not spend too much time here, but I must say, AD’s helped. I saw it coming and I made sure I did not spend too much time here.
Of course the bitch about infertility is that each cycle is like a mini grief cycle in its own. You need to go through a mini grief cycle after each failure. The shock, the anger, the depression and then the acceptance. It makes it very difficult to move completely out of it all because each cycle puts you back in it again. I think this is why so many people give up, they just can’t handle the pain of going through this again and again. However the good thing is that the time it takes to move through the cycle gets shorter and shorter as time goes on.
Acceptance
And then you come to the stage of acceptance. What a liberating place it is to be. Acceptance comes in many forms. You can accept that you will live childfree. A decision I admire but one that I can’t contemplate. This is the stage where you can look at babies and not feel pain, but rather feel joy and hope or peace.
Or you can be like my friend and I are. And many of my other friends. You accept that this is your lot in life. This is my cross to bear and I can either throw myself on the floor and cry and yell and scream, or I can say ‘well, I am infertile, what can I do about it’. It almost becomes like a job. Infertility is who I am and what I do. Thank god it is only infertility. Thank god I don’t have cancer. Infertility sucks and it’s a pain in the f’ing arse, but hey, its there.
I just believe that shit happens. Its got to happen to some people. I don’t say ‘why me’ any more, why the hell not me? Who am I to be so special as to avoid shit in my life? Every one has shit in their life. I have a sister who is super fertile (two and a half kids – i.e. one on the way) but is unlucky in love, I have a friend who is gorgeous, is getting married, doesn’t want kids, but can not find a decent job / career, work and money are her cross to bear. Then my other friend (who reads this blog) is clever, good at what she does, has a beautiful daughter but can’t find her prince. Being on her own (until she finds her prince) is her cross to bear. I have a wonderful husband, a good job, enough money, but I am infertile. It is my cross to bear.
I wont let it get me down, I will succeed. I will conquer this and I will achieve my dream. Fuck you infertility, I’ll beat you. You watch!
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