My First Blog Award!

Presented to me by Sara over at Life Goes On. I had no idea I had won until I did a lil vanity searching recently :) Thanks so much Sara, I'm touched and honored!

The Rules:

• Share 7 things that you don't already know about me.
• Name 7 other blogs to receive this award.
• Leave a comment on each of the blogs I nominated.
• Thank the person who gave you the award.

7 Things About Me

1. My favorite books include: Brave New World, House of Leaves, Kafka on the Shore, The Red Tent, Haunted, Atonement, and The Little Prince.
2. I have watched the sun rise over the Reflecting Pond from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and have seen the sun set over the Pacific Ocean along the Pacific Coast Highway, somewhere between Big Sur and Cayucos.
3. Things I have eaten raw: crab, squid, abelone, tuna, salmon, mackerel, sea urchin. 
4. I have a knack for crafting and pick up on new crafts fairly quickly. My newest venture? Jewelry making. It's easy, it's fun, and if I get good enough at it, I can sell it.
   
5. (Click the links for neat places I've actually been to in all of these states/countries.) I have visited the following states: New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina, Florida, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Wisconsin, Nevada (I'm counting the 2 hours I spent in Las Vegas on a layover - I played a slot machine, it counts), and California. I have visited the following countries: Bahamas, Canada, Iceland (again, counting a 4-hour layover in Reykjavík), France, Japan. 
6. I have been a vivid dreamer all of my life, and keep dream journals. I have recently delved into lucid dreaming with great success. I have several recurring dream symbols: bridges, oceans, tornadoes, being chased, carnivals and museums, the NJ Boardwalk, and recurring several recurring dreamscapes, particularly surrounding the neighborhood I grew up. If I really put my mind to it, I could map my entire recurrent dreamscape if I wanted to.
   
7. I am a closet professional wrestling fan. The Big Show is my favorite wrestler, followed closely by The Undertaker and HBK. I don't follow it as much as I used to a few years ago, but I start caring once the Royal Rumble happens, and definitely try to clue in before Wrestlemania each year.
   

7 Other Blogs to Receive this Award!

1. Jo at MoJo Working: Witty and razor sharp; I've enjoyed her writing style and perspective on life. She is going through a loss right now, so please direct all your love and energy to her and her husband as they go through this tough time.
2. Fertility Chick: A blog I've started reading recently - dealing with PCOS and male factor. Found her via Twitter.
   
3. Bella at Bella and Her Fella: One of the first POF blogs I found- she's now pg with twins (and due fairly soon, I believe). She gives me a lot of hope about finding parenthood despite POF.
4. Kate of Busted Plumbing: This is probably the spunkiest blogs I've come across so far, and I love it. Another Twitter find.
5. Die Frau Ohne Schatten (The Woman Without a Shadow): She's been MIA since a miscarriage mid-last year, and I'm hoping my blog award will coax her back into the blogosphere.
6. IVF and the Newlywed: Props to a fellow Bostonian, who's also started a lovely gathering call the Ruby Feather Social Club. I'm still working up the nerve to actually check them out in person instead of lurking/following the idea on the internet.
7. And my last award goes to Gil over at The Hardest Quest. This one is special to me. I met Gil over on LiveJournal, in one of the infertility communities. I put one of those "omg how do you cope with the pain?" questions out there, and Gil suggested I try blogging. She pointed me to her blog, and through hers I found so many others, and discovered the huge ALI blogosphere in just a matter of days. Pretty soon, I was bold enough to start my own. After years of struggling with IF, Gil is now a proud Maman to a 4-month-old daughter.
   

Thanks again to Sara at Life Goes On - it's neat to be recognized by other bloggers out there. You've just earned yourself another follower and I look forward to reading more about your journey!

Barren Bitches Book Brigade

THIS IS A STUB FOR LATER... I'm out of town at a conference until tomorrow night, so I'm hoping I can post in the airport tomorrow night. Participants - please swing back by Wednesday; I should have this completed by then :)

So I'm participating in an online book club coordinated by the Stirrup Queen herself, Melissa Ford. The book we've read is hers: Navigating the Land of IF. It's a fantastic guide, especially for someone like me who's just been diagnosed.

Want to join in on the book club fun? Go here to find out more about the Barren Bitches Book Brigade; how you can participate and to read other readers' responses.

Here are my three questions:

RESOLVE Advocacy Day: Thur, June 25th!

If you haven't read already, this Thursday, June 25th is RESOLVE's Advocacy Day. Big stuff to talk about with lawmakers in DC, especially the House and Senate versions of the Family Building Act.

Sadly, the media debacles known as "Octomom" and "John & Kate Plus STFU Already" have tainted the American public's reception to insurance companies funding what appears to be frivolous, elective infertility treatments...

...but we know better! Check out RESOLVE's website to see what you can do to enlighten and educate your representatives, and to advocate for their support of these very important pieces of legislation. And it doesn't take a bus trip to D.C. to join in on the fun :)

Easy things you (yes you!) can do- right now:

1. Donate your Facebook status this week, especially Thursday! Change your status to: Today I'm donating my status to RESOLVE's Advocacy Day--leading the charge for greater access to affordable care for infertility patients. www.resolve.org/AdvocacyDay And if you're feeling bold, become a fan of RESOLVE on Facebook.
2. Tweet your advocacy to the masses! #RESOLVE #Infertility @RESOLVEOrg
   
3. Write/email your elected officials. Find your House Representatives here, or your Senators here.
4. Blog about it! Blog about what you're doing for Advocacy Day, how others can join and help out too, blog about why this is so important!
5. Share your story and photo with RESOLVE! I think names and faces of children brought into this world with IF treatments are particularly poignant, don't you?
   

What will you do to advocate for the IF community this week to the folks in Washington?

Diet Week 1 & Quick Update

Even with our lavish brunch on Saturday with nothing but plates of fine cheeses, fruits, salami, and crackers... I managed to lose 3 lbs last week! Ari lost 4.5! I'm ⅓ of the way there to my first goal (5%). Next step: add a little more physical activity to my life.

My caffeine cut back has been going very well. I had a half a chocolate bar on Saturday afternoon, but even that has less caffeine than the daily amount I was drinking prior to starting the diet. And I still haven't touched brown soda since last Sunday. The closest thing to soda that I've had (and even sparingly at that) is lightly flavored seltzer water. Since I've met my original one-week goal of no brown soda, I'm going to try for a goal of one month now.

In other news... Ari has a job interview on Wednesday! Wish him luck!

And, swing by Bella and Her Fella... they've got some great news over in their neck of the blogosphere as well :)

Feeling renewed

Sorry I've been a bit remiss in posting this week... I've been so caught up in #IranElection I pretty much forgot I had a blog.

Camping was incredible. Fort Z. braved the rainstorm Saturday night, despite very heavy rains for about 10 hours. Saturday day, the weather was gorgeous. Also, our campfire spaghetti dinner on Friday was delicious. Added bonus: I packed two tealights and we celebrated Shabbos in the woods. It was deeply calming and recharging. Friends joined us on Saturday, and we had a ton of fun swimming in the lake (my first time in a lake, ever), playing Apples to Apples, and making s'mores. And then Sunday, I went to a friend's book club she had arranged. It was great to spend the afternoon surrounded by intellectual women.

My birthday massage (rescheduled twice due to life) was amazing. Hot tub soak, hour long deep tissue/Swedish massage... what a wonderful gift from my husband. So wonderful, that we're going back tomorrow for a private hot-tub soak together!

No real updates on the IF front. My next appt is July 10; I'll need to have some b/w done to check out my thyroid levels beforehand, and I might call my Dr. to see if he can order a semen analysis before that appt as well. Recently, I've actually been in a very good place, emotionally; I think I had one random crying jag late last week, but otherwise I've been ok. The cold & cough I had been fighting from last month is finally gone, so I have a ton of energy back. Also, my new Levoxyl dose seems to be working wonders- a lot of energy back.

New blog widgets! My Inspire.com badge to the left. I just stumbled on these boards and found a wealth of new support, as well as a lot of fellow POF-ers. The RESOLVE board seems to be more active than the Inspire IF board, but both are chock full of regular posters. I like finding new support networks.

Also, if you click on the any blog post title, there's a Tweet This button at the bottom of the post. Feel free to tweet me into the tweet-o-sphere.

You may have noticed my weight ticker on the right. That's right, I'm on a diet. Ari and I are doing Weight Watchers together. We did it last summer and both lost a good amount of weight... and then the last 5 months of craptitude happened and we put a lot (and then some) back on. If I'm going to have kids, and if I want to be a successful candidate for IVF, I need to lose some serious weight. So I'm starting with my first goal: 5% of my current weight so far. Baby steps. I've almost made it through my first week, and I've been a little grouchy. That's probably b/c I also stopped consuming caffeine, entirely, 5 days ago.

Why the caffeine cut? Well, I drank WAY too much soda before the diet (no soda, not even diet, for 5 days now). And the soda eats away at the calcium in your bones, and since POF messes with your bone density, I really needed to wean myself off. I really need to think of soda as the occasional treat as opposed to daily staple. The first 2 days, I had a bad headache, and was walking around like a junkie looking to score. Now I'm more of in that calm, Zen-like acceptance, although I've been craving oolong tea really badly. I'll see how many days I can go w/o caffeine, period. My goal is to start at a week, and go from there. I've already noticed a huge difference: I sleep like the dead at night, hot flashes have decreased significantly, and that general sense of anxiety doesn't feel like it's looming over my shoulder every 10 minutes.

So that's life right now. Not thinking too much about babies, or my inability to have them. And it's a nice feeling, for a change.

Show and Tell: Fort Z.

It's time for...

My virgin S&T post! I don't know how frequently I'll be doing this, but this week, I feature Fort Z., the affectionate name of our ridiculously large tent for 2 people. Since we're going camping this weekend, I thought it would be appropriate.

Let's take a look at this wondrous specimen of outdoor adventure, shall we? I nabbed these pics from the Kelty website.

The Kelty website describes our tent as a "reasonably priced... roomy tent that comes outfitted with a bonus screened-in vestibule with pull down shades. If you want protection from insects and critters, this tent is an obvious choice." An obvious choice indeed, b/c, as much as I love camping, bugs and critters scare the bejesus out of me. This tent was actually on our wedding registry (we registered with BB&B and REI), and someone actually got it for us. Word.

But Miriam, you say, that tent's not so big! Allow me to put on the rainfly. *fusses with rainfly* Ta-da!

That's right, there's a vestibule. Ari and I have joked on many an occasion that one time when we're camping we'll have margaritas under the vestibule. (What actually happens when we camp is that we just leave our shoes in there. Not as exciting as cocktails with umbrellas.)

But Miriam, you say, that still doesn't look that big. Oh really? Well, our tent can hold four, yes four coffins with decapitated heads inside!

(For the record, I find this floor plan horrifying.) What actually happens is that it's just Ari and me, in a corner, on top of an air mattress in our sleeping bags. I can't fathom camping without the air mattress.

So where exactly has Fort Z been? Let's take a look at its travels:

• Shawme-Crowell State Forest in Sandwich, MA (June 2008): The inaugural raising of Fort Z. This was only the 2nd time I'd been camping in the woods... in my life. Also, this was the emergence year for Brood XIV- the 17-year cycle of cicadas appearing en masse to the New England region, particularly the Cape. There were literally millions of cicadas at the campground. Thankfully, not in the area we were staying, but we had to walk through hundreds of cicadas divebombing our heads at one point to get to the camp store. I shit you not, I almost had a mental break. Also, it rained.
  
• So-Hi Campground in Accord, NY (July 2008): We went with 2 other couples, one of whom was 7-months pregnant at the time with their first child! It was an amazing time... but solidified our need to camp at State Parks only. We had some very lovely Eastern European neighbors (read: ~50 Ukrainians from NYC spread over 2 campsites with nearly a dozen tents pitched- TOTALLY not allowed at the campground) sharing their native folk tunes with us (read: cars parked with stereos blaring non-stop techno until 3am each night). Also, it rained.
  
• Acadia National Park in Bar Harbor (Bah Hahbah), ME (September 2008): This time we went with about a dozen people, all connected in interesting ways to one another. We just so happened to camp the weekend that the remnants of Hurricane Ike made landfall in Bar Harbor. In addition to hiking a 1270 ft. mountain that weekend, we also camped through a hurricane. We were lucky our tent didn't float away in the deluge.
  

I feel it important to note here, that these 3 trips, including the first time I went camping in October 2007, it has rained every single trip.

This weekend we're headed to Wells State Park in central MA. And what is the weather forecast? Well, have a look for yourself:

Well, if Fort Z. made it through a hurricane, than it can sure as hell make it through a couple of thunderstorms. Make sure to swing by Mel's to see what the rest of the class is showing!

Pregnant job seeker - The Job Doc Blog - Boston.com

Pregnant job seeker - The Job Doc Blog - Boston.com

Posted using ShareThis

The comments alone are worth the read. What a ridiculous article- astoundingly poor professional advice.

Holy "cum hoc ergo propter hoc," Batman!

Allow me to diverge into a moment of logic, Cum hoc ergo propter hoc. Here's what Mr. & Mrs. Wikipedia have to say:

The cum hoc ergo propter hoc logical fallacy can be expressed as follows:

• A occurs in correlation with B.
• Therefore, A causes B.

In this type of logical fallacy, one makes a premature conclusion about causality after observing only a correlation between two or more factors. Generally, if one factor (A) is observed to only be correlated with another factor (B), it is sometimes taken for granted that A is causing B even when no evidence supports this. This is a logical fallacy because there are at least four other possibilities:

1. B may be the cause of A
2. some unknown third factor C is actually the cause of both A and B
3. the "relationship" is coincidence or so complex or indirect that it is more effectively called coincidence (i.e. two events occurring at the same time that have no direct relationship to each other besides the fact that they are occurring at the same time).
4. B may be the cause of A at the same time as A is the cause of B (contradicting that the only relationship between A and B is that A causes B). This describes a self-reinforcing system.

In other words, there can be no conclusion made regarding the existence or the direction of a cause and effect relationship only from the fact that A and B are correlated. Determining whether there is an actual cause and effect relationship requires further investigation, even when the relationship between A and B is statistically significant, a large effect size is observed, or a large part of the variance is explained.

Right.

So, in putting on my Dr. Google hat today, I discovered that Hashimoto's thyroiditis (A) can not only cause POF (B):
"One other cause of infertility in patients with thyroid disease is the uncommon condition of primary ovary failure"

...but POF (B) can cause Hashi's (A):
"Infertility is the result of this condition [POF], and is the most discussed problem resulting from it, but there are additional health implications of the problem... There is also an increased risk of heart disease, hypothyroidism in the form of Hashimoto's thyroiditis..."

*facepalm*

So, my high ATA count and negative Fragile X results are good, but that doesn't mean I can have my own genetic children yet. B/c, and I suddenly realized today, I could have a totally busted ovary regardless. We could be past the point of no return in terms of my own eggs. My guess is that my doc is going to recommend (hooray!) more blood tests on Friday.

Staying inspired and motivated

In keeping up with other blogs (I'm slowly getting back on the commenting horse - I will successfully complete an ICLW damnit!), I came across this post at The Hardest Quest. I credit Gil for inspiring me to start my own IF blog, after I read her blog shortly after I was first diagnosed. I came to the whole IF blogosphere via LiveJournal; we both happened to be in the same community and she reached out to me after an introductory post. And the last 2 months are history ;)

In the post linked above, she's generally updating on her pregnancy, and shares this particularly inspiring, beautiful passage:

Hubby has been feeling Petit move as well. Just the night before last, he was lying in bed, arm around me (as he frequently does) and while I slept, Petit kicked him. And last night, Petit made a spectacular show of skills as Hubby's fingers felt every move. For more than an hour, the two of us lay in the dark and giggled and grinned, smiling as Petit reacted to Hubby's voice and the occasional poke. I am humbled by the experience; I wish nothing more than to remember exactly what this feels like. I wish nothing more than to let all of us experience these moments. We deserve it. We ALL deserve to experience this.

We do deserve this, Gil. We do. And that's what I need to tell myself whenever I get down, when I tell myself this is going to be too hard: that this is worth it.

National Infertility Awareness Week: April 25 - May 2, 2009

RESOLVE is sponsoring National Infertility Awareness Week, starting this Saturday. Not only do they have a list of 7 things you can do in 7 days, they are also doing 7 days of free teleseminars on various subjects surrounding IF, as well as many local face-to-face events around the country.

I've signed up for the first seminar on Sunday, 4/26 at 4pm: Getting the Support You Need for the Journey Through Infertility - I think that's a good starting point for me anyway, especially since I'm getting my Dx confirmed in 3 days. But there are 7 days worth of excellent topics from affording ART/adoption to egg donation to advocating for family building legislation. I'll try out this first seminar and see how it goes before I register for more.

The ol' college activist in me is feeling inspired. I think it's because by involving myself in some kind of advocacy role, I reestablish a sense of control. Man, IF is a bitch if you're a control-freak like I am. ;)

Oh, and I deleted the post on my FB page about NIAW, b/c I don't think I'm ready to share this yet with people I haven't seen since kindergarten and semi-professional networked contacts. Yeah, yeah, I know folks could have seen it before it was deleted, but whatever. Maybe it's just superstition that I don't resign myself to this yet before I'm "officially" diagnosed on Friday.

EDIT: I re-outed myself and reposted the link/announcement on my FB page, after I found out someone from high school messages me to tell me they are in the same boat. If my voice can give courage and support to others, than it's super important for me to speak out.

Family Building Act of 2009 (H.R. 697)

Fertility issues are about to make their way onto the floor of House of Representatives in Washington. This piece of legislation would require insurers to cover fertility treatments. Obviously, this is a pretty big concern in the IF community.

Don't know when this is going up for a vote, and apparently this has had other forms in both 2005 and 2007, but it's worth being informed and contacting your Representative to co-sponsor this Act today.

Family Building Act of 2009: Full text here

Currently sponsored/supported by the following Representatives as of 4/8/09:
Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN)
Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA)
Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)
Rep. Steve Israel (D-NY)
Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA)
Rep. Nita Lowey (D-NY)
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY)
Rep. David Price (D-NC)
Rep. Allyson Schwartz (D-PA)
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL)


Is your state lacking support? Contact your rep via RESOLVE's online form here.

Made the Blogroll!

Thanks much to Melissa over at Stirrup Queens! I just made the IF blogroll over there, so I'm looking forward to lots more clickers :) SQ has been so helpful in finding other experiences and stories similar to my own, so I hope my story here can also help others out there.

Also- we're home-home now with family for Passover. It has already felt awesome to see both of our families. I feel much more comforted, relaxed, relieved. I feel like I can let go of this big breath I've been holding for the last couple of weeks. I feel a little more back to center.

Chag Sameach folks.

Happy Passover!

Fascinating post on BlogHer: The Perfect Storm of Holidays: Infertile at Pesach (found via her blog, Stirrup Queens*). Got me thinking about religion, faith, and the Jewish perspective.

Passover starts tonight at sundown. Last night A and I had a really long, thoughtful discussion on faith and God. Initially, I didn't want to celebrate Passover, which, for the most part to me, is attending 1-2 seders and keeping KFP for the week (kosher for Passover). But I've realized over the last week or so, that one of the things I love so much about Passover is that it brings together family, and instead of turning away from the ritual aspects of the holiday, I can instead try and find meaning.

The linked post talks about how Pesach is so enveloped in the idea of children, but I disagree in that it is solely about children- for me, it's about more than children- it's all about family. Since I wasn't born Jewish but rather converted (2 years ago on April 20th!), we only usually have 1 family seder with A's parents. And literally, 9 times out of 10 (b/c I think I've been to at least 10 seders at his parents' house), there are usually no children. The only time I can think of is literally once, and she was maybe 9 years old and unrelated to the family anyway. Add to the fact that I'm open about the IF issue with both of our families, and I'd like to think I've dodged the "So, when are you having kids?" bullet.

Passover tells the story of the Exodus: the Jews are freed from Mitzraim (Egypt), wander around lost for a little bit (read: 40 years) and find God (that whole Mt. Sinai thing). What a great parable for anyone coping with infertility, even the non-religious. Look at the metaphor of "Exodus > 40 years in the desert > Mt. Sinai" as "Diagnosis > Coping > Coming Out a Stronger Person" somehow. To simplify it is not to invalidate the gravity of IF or the profundity of Exodus, but rather to draw a parallel meaning. Thus, re-contextualizing the way I look at the practice of ritual right now allows me to find that meaning, that guidance that I still feel a bit raw over in approaching God directly. Perhaps this Passover marks my Exodus out of a question of faith and toward my Mt. Sinai of accepting God, and thus, this situation (b/c all the Jews at Mt. Sinai chose to accept the 10 Commandments- interesting sidenote here. The Torah was given, but it was up to the free will of each person to accept the Torah).

I'm not dreading Passover. I was this past weekend, but really, I have no reason to. I'll be surrounded by family that loves and cares for us, and thankfully, I shouldn't be around too many wee ones. And if I am, I'll manage. I'm really looking forward to spending the time with family. I think A and I could really use it, especially since this will be the first time we're seeing them since my Dx.

This post has gone on long enough, but I have a whole other post to do re: the Infertile Matriarchs.

*PS... Stirrup Queens is one hell of a resource when it comes to finding other blogs out there about IF. If you haven't checked her out, and are looking for other women, couples, and *gasp!* the elusive male point-of-view, I suggest checking it out.

Understanding My Quest to Conceive

While we are not officially on our TTC journey yet, this document captures so much of what I've been thinking and going through since my Dx. It's a bit long to post here, but can be found here online:

Understanding My Quest to Conceive
(originally published 2000, Getting Pregnant When You Thought You Couldn't, pgs 199-205, Helane Rosenberg and Yakov Epstein)

We will be making more concrete decisions about family planning after my appt on 4/24 with Dr. Gross. We just yet don't know enough about my own ovarian reserve to know whether or not it's worth it to just try on our own or to use ART (Assisted Reproduction Technology). We just need to talk things through with our medical professional first.

Things I Wish I Could Tell People About Grieving My Infertility

Through various online support communities, I came across the list below, originally published here. I wanted to reproduce it in my own blog, expanding with my own thoughts. The bolded items are the original list, and I've added my thoughts below each point.

1. I wish you would not be afraid to speak to me about my losses, my infertility, and to ask what you can do to help. Sometimes I feel like people think I have some kind of contagious shame. It is incredibly lonely to bear this burden with just my husband, and to be honest, it's nice to get support from someone other than my spouse.
2. If I cry or get emotional when we talk about them, I wish you knew that it isn’t because you have hurt me. The fact that I have suffered has caused my tears. You have allowed me to cry, and I thank you. Crying and emotional outbursts are healing. As I said in my last post, I cry. A lot. I don't think I've ever cried so much before in my life. And it helps in ways I can't describe. And yes, sometimes I like to put Radiohead and Ben Folds and other emo music on loop and cry it out for a set period of time. Because it really does help.
   
3. I wish you wouldn’t pretend that nothing is happening to me, because it is a large part of my life. I need my friends and family by my side. POF is more than just about infertility. It carries lifelong health risks that are just as terrifying as not being able to have your own children. My Dx does not define me, as I have been told, but it does make up a large portion of who I am, and thus, occupies my thoughts. A lot.
   
4. I will have emotional highs and lows, ups and downs. I wish you wouldn’t think that if I have a good day, my grief is over, or that if I have a bad day, I need psychiatric counseling. I can be having a perfectly awesome day and something like seeing matching mother-daughter retro-styled aprons in a store window can totally ruin the rest of the day for me. I literally take this one day at a time.
   
5. Being an infertile person is not contagious, so I wish you wouldn’t shy away from me. POF is not contagious. It affects a very small number of the population. And while it might be on my mind 24/7, I still enjoy your company and talking about scrapbooking and shopping and Wii Fit and going out to eat and Wrestlemania and just hangin out.
6. I wish you knew that all of the “crazy” grief reactions I am having are in fact very normal. Depression, anger, frustration, hopelessness, and questioning of values and beliefs are to be expected during and following what is happening to me. I'm kind of going through it all at once. Call me a non-traditionalist when it comes to grieving. But every day is different, and I work through each day one at a time.
   
7. I wish you would understand the physical reactions to grief. I may gain weight or lose weight…sleep all the time or not at all…want to surround myself with business or be all alone, all of which may be related to my grief. It's nothing personal. My husband is an extrovert when it comes to dealing with his grief. He likes to surround himself with others. I am an introvert, but I desperately seek validation for my emotions in others.
8. My birthday, anniversaries of the diagnosis, holidays, and the days I find out that this cycle too was a bust, are all terrible times for me. I wish you could tell me that you are thinking about me, and if I get quite withdrawn, just know I am doing my best to cope. Please don’t try to coerce me into being cheerful or tell me that it will be better soon. Arieh has always said that I hold a grudge for life. The day after St. Patrick's day is forever ruined, and not just from the usual post-St. Pat's day hangover. And we haven't even started any fertility treatments yet, so I have no clue what our emotional states will be like once we start that part of our journey.
   
9. It is normal and good that most of us re-examine our faith, values, and beliefs throughout this journey. We will question things we have been taught all our lives, and hopefully come to some new understandings to include those with God. I'm not trying to be pushy, but God and I are not right with each other right now. I'm working through it, and if it looks like I've given up on God, it's nothing personal, and it's not abandonment. I know I'll be back. You can't be angry at something you don't believe in. I just need time.
   
10. I wish you understood that infertility changes people. I am not the same person I was before I experienced it. My entire future family that I have dreamed of sharing with my soulmate has been completely taken away from me. While we may still be parents, it will not be easy for us to get to that point, and it challenges notions of pregnancy achievement that most other couples take for granted. And despite our best hopes, we might never be parents- adoption is not as easy as everyone thinks it is, and it's not for everyone. It is no easy process any way you slice it and will impact so many aspects of our lives, such that, we cannot help but be changed by the experience. I'd like to think that it's not that the old Miriam and Arieh are gone, rather, we are a changed couple with different thoughts on hope, strength, and determination. These things are defined in new ways for us.
    

I have to take this one day at a time, and honestly, we need all the support we can get. And we are so blessed and grateful for it.

Understanding Premature Ovarian Failure

Premature ovarian failure was originally termed "premature menopause." The term premature ovarian failure more accurately reflects what is happening within the body. Essentially, if ovarian function ceases before age 40, it's considered POF. Here's a very informative news segment from October 2008 that serves as a great overview of POF:


Fast Facts: What Is Premature Ovarian Failure?
(Source: International POF Association Fact Sheet)

• POF affects about 1-4% of women before age 40, or about 250,000-1 million women nationally.
• Women are generally born with enough eggs in their ovaries so that they ovulate one each month from puberty until about the age of 50. At that time, the supply of eggs is used up and menopause occurs. But, in girls and young women with POF, something has happened to the supply of eggs in the ovaries at a young age. It could be a loss of eggs, a dysfunction of the eggs or the removal of the ovaries at a young age. Unlike menopause, this is not a natural occurrence. This loss of ovarian function is occurring at too young an age to be considered a natural, although premature, menopause. Premature Ovarian Failure usually occurs in women under the age of 40 and can happen as early as the teen years.
• Many times, the cause of POF is never determined, but can be traced to genetics, autoimmune disorders, or surgical intervention.
  
• About 6-8% of women with POF will conceive naturally, however, many build families using egg donors/IVF or adoption.
• Currently, there is no known way to induce the ovaries to begin ovulating naturally again.
• POF carries increased risks of osteoporosis and heart disease because of the decreases in the reproductive hormones that protect women during their childbearing years. HRT (hormone replacement therapy) is the recommended treatment for women with POF.

For a very detailed document about POF, I highly recommend reading IPOFA Frequently Asked Questions, found here as a PDF. It is quite comprehensive and is a good starting document to really undestand the complexities of POF.