A Belly Full of Fire, Part Four: In a Perfect World

This is the fourth post of my five-part series on infertility advocacy. Catch up on Part One: Advocate or Abdicate, Part Two: The Wounded Healer, and Part Three: Which Direction Do We Swim?.

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The lights go on the lights go off
When things don't feel right
I lie down like a tired dog
licking his wounds in the shade.

When I feel alive
I try to imagine a careless life,
a scenic world where the sunsets are all
breathtaking...

-Beirut, A Scenic World

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A Belly Full of Fire, Part Four: In a Perfect World

This is one of my favorite songs I've been playing over and over again on my iPhone. I only discovered Beirut last year ago and I'm in love. What on earth does this quirky little indie tune have to do with infertility advocacy?

Let's play a game - Imagine. Let's imagine our careless life, our scenic world.

In a perfect world,
what would the fruits of infertility advocacy look like?

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In a perfect world, we could all afford infertility treatments.

Better yet, they wouldn't cost a penny out of pocket. But if treatments still cost money, there would be state and federal grant programs for infertile couples; treatments could be counted as deductions on our taxes. And all insurers in all states would be required to cover treatments that fall within the latest medical guidelines. In a perfect world, infertility treatment would be regarded as a proactive health approach as opposed to elective and burdensome.

In a perfect world, it would be okay to talk about infertility openly. Oprah and Ellen and Tyra would have regular programs highlighting both the celebrity journeys of people like Celine Dion and Sarah Jessica Parker and Padma Lakshmi as well as real people from all walks of life.

In a perfect world, the racial disparity gap in healthcare would be closing. Conversations about infertility would transcend cultural and religious lines. Lesbian and gay couples would not be left out of the conversations either, because yes, even same-sex couples face infertility crises too.

In a perfect world, primary care physicians would pursue reproductive issues with an aggressive and proactive stance. Women and men would be taken seriously in their doctor's office. There would be widespread support groups in every community: more counselors and therapists who solely dealt with infertility issues. And couples wouldn't be afraid to be as honest as possible with one another instead of hiding behind quiet femininity or forced machismo.

In a perfect world, men are no longer an afterthought in the infertility community. The longing for fatherhood is just as valid as the desire to experience pregnancy and birth.

In a perfect world, we wouldn't be asked when we're having kids the day we get back from the honeymoon. We could complain about being infertile the way pregnant women complain about being pregnant. And if we do get pregnant, it's okay for us to complain and celebrate and do all of the things that would otherwise annoy the infertile community, because we've earned that right too.

And when we do resolve our infertility, we won't forget about the ones who are left behind. In a perfect world, we will proudly tell our friends and family the miracles it took to conceive our children.

In a perfect world, millions of dollars are devoted to research and clinical trials and comprehensive support networks and resources for women and men diagnosed with infertility. Our children will grow up with even greater access to care than we have now. In a perfect world, there is widespread dialogue about the importance of men's and women's reproductive health from an early age; we wouldn't be afraid to talk about the reality of fertility preservation in the context of sexual health education for teens.

In a perfect world, we will find an explanation for unexplained infertility. A miscarriage at six weeks is treated with no less support than a loss at six months. A stillbirth carries the same weight as the loss of a young child. In a perfect world, we will not forget about or ignore pregnancy loss, and instead elevate all loss with greater care and compassion.

In a perfect world, choosing not to resolve your infertility is not a sign of failure or giving up. Living childfree will not be regarded as lack or less than, but instead valued as a way for couples to redefine richness and fulfillment in their lives, and to bring themselves closure. In a perfect world, we will not be defined by our status as parents or otherwise.

In a perfect world, we will no longer be ashamed of or silenced by our disease. We will stop judging ourselves. We will be confident in who we are and where our journeys take us.

In a perfect world, we will conquer infertility.

My G-d, our perfect world is beautiful isn't it? Can't you just see it, taste it, feel all that weight and doubt and worry slip right off your shoulders and out of your mind?

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And now our game of Imagine is over, for we do not live in a perfect world. That's why our advocacy efforts matter that much more.

Every act of advocacy brings us one step closer to a careless life, a scenic world where the sunsets are all breathtaking. What does your perfect world for infertility look like?
. . . . .

Tomorrow I conclude this series with a post that inspires a committed call to action. Stay tuned Wednesday for the final chapter of A Belly Full of Fire, Part Five: Millions of voices calling for change.

A Belly Full of Fire, Part Two: The Wounded Healer

This is the second post of my five-part series on infertility advocacy. Catch up on Part One: Advocate or Abdicate.

Before I get started, I need to 'fess up about something kind of embarrassing. I thought I was being wicked creative with the title of this series, A Belly Full of Fire. Turns out, as I've gone through some of my research, this title isn't nearly as original as I thought it was. I need to fully credit Karima Hijane, Carly Heyman, Maureen Bell, and Mary Beth Busby's 2008 article from the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, "From Fire in the Belly to a Boiling Heart: Fuel for Participatory Research." When I went to start working on this post and leafed through my research, I felt like a putz when I saw their article title. But I like it, it fits what I'm writing about, so I'm keeping it.

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"Some women... turn their pain into a passion to help others in similar circumstances. They become what has been referred to as 'wounded healers,' who can help others heal, and help heal themselves in the process."
Source: Amber R. Cooper, A.R., Baker, V.L., Sterling, E.W., Ryan, M.E., Woodruff, T.K., and Nelson, L.M., The time is now for a new approach to primary ovarian insufficiency, Fertility and Sterility (2010), DOI:10.1016/j.fertnstert.2010.01.016.

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A Belly Full of Fire, Part Two: The Wounded Healer

I felt robbed. Cheated. Empty.

I would revisit the email from my doctor: "[The results], if they are to be believed, indicate that premature ovarian failure is the problem, not PCOS dysfunction/follicular maturation arrest as you, I and your previous caregivers had presumed." I thought that perhaps, maybe this time when I read it, the words would miraculously transform into "Nothing's wrong."

I started this blog as a way to channel these emotions, to fill some of the void that had been etched into my psyche. I found myself compelled to educate others as I started sharing research and informational posts. I wrestled with G-d for a little while, fighting battles between the lines, wielding my typed words as weapons and my faith as a shield. And before I knew it, the end of April had arrived, bringing with it my first National Infertility Awareness Week. I had all of this pent up frustration, anger, and anxiety, its kinetic energy boring holes into my spirit. Why not channel this energy, I thought.

The first thing I did was out myself on Facebook. The message stayed up there for about three hours before I chickened out and removed it. But in those three hours, I got three messages from friends of mine I hadn't talked to in years, each saying "I understand your journey because I'm going through it too." It was reassuring in ways that my blogging had not been. So then I reposted it with a sense of purposeful confidence. This was the first time I felt oddly positive about my infertility, in that I realized it could be channeled as an educational tool for activism.

I even wrote last April:

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.

I keep pinpointing my video and this year's NIAW that launched my advocacy, but looking back through my older entries, I realize it started a year prior. My repurposed energy has refueled my spirit and sustained me through the darker times.

What I've only come to understand recently is that advocacy has helped to heal me. It's not like the emotional compartmentalizing, the escapist video game sojourns, the instant gratification of buying crap I don't need, or the diversional half-assed attempts to "find a hobby" or get in shape - advocacy has been like a bowl of chicken soup. It doesn't make the cold go away, but it fulfills you, helps you get better, and it's a welcome treat anytime you get sick.

I've had the privilege of being in touch with Dr. Lawrence Nelson at the NICHD, undoubtedly the leading researcher of POF/POI in the nation. He sent me the article containing the above quote and the words "wounded healer" resonated so strongly within me. Wounded healer is such an apt description for patient activists. If you take a look at even just a handful of executive directors of major infertility organizations and companies, they each have some deeply personal connection to infertility. With the silence that surrounds infertility, it only makes sense that former patients rise up to become leaders within the field.

Whether we are lobbying on Capitol Hill or connecting with other bloggers, we are each in our own way wounded healers.

The online ALI community has truly rallied around this concept, even if we don't formally call ourselves wounded healers. Things like the LFCA, blog hops, blog awards, online forums: we celebrate and support one another, we share tips and tricks and recommend books and websites. A friend comes to us and says, "A coworker of mine just told me she's about to do her first IVF cycle. Do you mind if I give her your information?" In helping to heal others, as Cooper, et al. notes, we heal ourselves.

It's about repurposing energy. Advocacy becomes a way of transforming pain into positive action. Suddenly you're finding little victories everywhere: your parents help you out at a volunteer telethon and send your organization a check for $250 (thank you Mom and Papa!). You get asked to guest blog or become a contributor. A senator to whom you sent a semi-form letter actually writes back and responds to your concerns, or their staffer calls you back when you leave a message to let you know that yes, your concerns will be passed on to the senator. An letter-writing campaign that you were a part of produces desired outcomes. These little victories add fuel to your reserves.

Are they an equivalent check and balance for a loss or a negative beta? Of course not. But at least you're not running on empty. And you use up that fuel to propel you forward, to keep you going.

I'll speak plainly: advocacy has saved my life. I don't walk around feeling so effing empty. I sat myself down and told myself if I can't create life, I can at least create purposeful living.

. . . . .

Today I wrote about advocacy as a way of personal healing. Take this weekend and invest in a little healing of your own. Come back Monday when I'll talk about how you can figure out what advocacy style best suits you.

Stay tuned for A Belly Full of Fire, Part Three: Which Direction Do We Swim?.

Photo by Clay Junell via Flickr.

A Belly Full of Fire: A 5-Part Series on Infertilty Advocacy

This week into next, I'm going to get up on my soapbox and talk about something that has really shaped and defined my life in the last few months: infertility advocacy. I invite you to read along and follow this five-part series as it posts each weekday between today and next Wednesday. (And yes, it's deliberately timed with this month's ICLW.) So take a seat and get comfy - I'm not one for brevity when it comes to topics about which I am passionate. Prepare to do a little digging in your soul to find out what moves you, what drives you - what fuels the fire in your belly.

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"We are being ignored."
-Barbara Collura, Executive Director of RESOLVE

"If you're not going to fight for yourselves, how is anyone else going to fight for you?" -Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D–Fla.)

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A Belly Full of Fire, Part One: Advocate or Abdicate

If you haven't read SELF Magazine's article on infertility in their August issue, do me a favor: click on this link, open it in a new tab or window and read in its entirety after you read this post. When I first read it earlier this week, I felt like I had been punched right in the stomach, my eyes bulging, my face red and contorting as all the air escaped from my lungs. Had I been doing all of this advocacy work for nothing?

When I tell people that no, I don't do infertility advocacy for a living, they are shocked. This blog, RESOLVE of New England, my video- I do it all in my free time. I work for a small private college in the housing department. My days are spent dealing with roommate conflicts, programming forms from RAs, and developing a comprehensive new First Year Experience program for our incoming freshmen this fall. I'm in this line of work because that's where my non-committal communications degree lead me. Between working 35 hours a week and devoting every waking hour to my advocacy efforts, I have be blunt with y'all: it's exhausting. I have been running myself ragged for the last couple of months, but I do it because advocacy is vital. Advocacy feeds my soul.

Advocacy is necessary because of the veil of shame and silence that surrounds the 7.3 million people in this country who cope with infertility every day. Jennifer Wolff Perrine raises this same question in her article for SELF: "It’s a strange dichotomy: how can a health issue that gets so much ink be shrouded in silence?"

Infertility is a sexy media topic right now, one that has been taking a substantial amount of heat recently. Take for example yesterday's article in Newsweek: Should IVF Be Affordable for All? After the Nadya Suleman fiasco, celebrity gossip surrounding stars like Celine Dion, damaging trite portrayals in Hollywood like Jennifer Lopez's The Back-up Plan and the public's critical gaze on affordable healthcare in a gloomy economy, this Newsweek article just adds more fuel to the fire of opposition on infertility treatment coverage:

Whether infertility should be classified as a disease or a socially constructed need is a dilemma at the center of this debate... A complicating factor, according to St. Luke’s (Dr. Sherman) Silber, is that up to 80 percent of infertility cases are caused simply by increasing maternal age. “It’s hard to call infertility a disease. It’s normal aging,” he says.

Dr. Silber, I hate to argue with an MD, but infertility IS a disease. Just ask the World Health Organization: "This recognition from WHO of infertility as a disease represents a significant milestone for the condition." (Source.) With distorted media images of wanton career-driven thirtysomethings and desperate perimenopausal women salivating to have their own baby bump, Silber's statement is not only inaccurate, but irresponsible as a cited expert in the field. Thank you Dr. Silber, for setting back 25+ years of hard work in the infertility advocacy movement.

With all of the vitriol being directed by the media at infertility- its patients, its treatment, and its very validity as recognized medical disease- our advocacy efforts are needed now more than ever.

And it requires infertility patients to take the biggest, most difficult step of their journey. Infertility patients need to start speaking out publicly.

Look, I'll tell you right now: it's not easy to come out of the infertility closet. I was diagnosed on March 18, 2009. The first phone call was to my husband. That evening, we called both our of parents and I called my sister. Two weeks later I sent out an email to two dozen of our closest friends explaining the situation and shared the link to this blog. If infertilty was the new game, I wanted it to be played by my rules. Not once have my friends judged me, asked "so when are you having kids" or told us to relax. We receive a bevy of advice- some helpful, some not- but always extremely well-intentioned and expressed with sensitivity and compassion.

I know Larry and I are the extreme example in this case. I know there are plenty of couples who do not have this same level of support. But you'll never know if you don't try. To this day, I don't regret ever telling friends that I was infertile.

Not only did we find out just who indeed were the folks that cared about us, but just how much they cared. When I uploaded my video and finally blasted it out across the internet, people I never thought would bat an eyelash came out of the woodwork to tell me their stories, to thank me for being so brave to put my name and face out there with this label. I was floored. People I had worked with, gone to high school with, a friend of friend... they picked up on that energy and finally felt comfortable enough to share their stories with me.

I asked in my video: "What if I stopped hiding behind my fear? What if my story can help millions?"

If my story- this one little random woman from Boston- could touch hundreds and hundreds of people (seriously: there are hundreds of emails in my inbox and I'm still getting emails and comments from people who have come across my video)...

Could you imagine if we had 100 people willing to publicly speak out about their experience with infertility? What if we had 1,000 people running a 5K charity race? 10,000 people marching on Washington?

Grassroots advocacy is there for our taking right in front of us and we as a patient community cannot get out from behind our own self-imposed sense of shame and silence.

Oh yeah, I totally just said that.

But so does the SELF Magazine article. Wolff Perrine writes:

Women's silence hurts more than themselves. It ensures that infertility remains an anonymous epidemic, with less funding and research than other common medical problems receive.

She cites Lindsay Beck, founder of Fertile Hope:

Because no one wants to discuss infertility, "nothing gets done about it," says Lindsay Beck, ..."Infertility is where breast cancer was in the 1970s—completely in the closet... For the average fertility patient, there is no united front."

And as a patient community, we're shooting ourselves in the foot when even those who successfully resolve their infertility choose not to acknowledge their past pain:

However someone resolves her infertility, the tendency is to want to put her struggles behind her. "People want to forget," says Collura of RESOLVE... "We do our damnedest to instill in our members that they need to take a stand and help the cause or the same thing is going to happen to the women who come after them."

Infertile couples who have found resolution owe it to their children to speak out, to own their disease and walk with it even after they have beaten it.

So what's an infertile to do?

Take the pledge. Start using your real name. Share your blogs with your family and friends. Talk to the media. Call your legislators. Volunteer with your local chapter of RESOLVE. Write grant proposals. Stop caring about what other people think and instead focus on what other people can do to help.

Ladies and gentlemen: I give you "advocacy in a nutshell." No seriously - that's really all that it is. You don't have to have your advanced degree in public health. Patient activism is pretty simple: just tell everyone your story and why it matters.

If all of this seems like too much, then just start by going to RESOLVE's website and take the pledge to do something. RESOLVE says it best: "It's time to stop, look, listen and act. It's time to pay attention." Then get your support network of friends and families to take the pledge. Don't be embarrassed - just send those emails and I'm sure you'll be surprised to see who's willing to stand by your side in solidarity.

Our stories are long overdue to be heard by the public. But we have to tell our stories out loud if they're ever going to be heard.

The bubble of silence, shame, and ignorance surrounding infertility is ready to burst.

Either we publicly advocate for ourselves or we abdicate the right to demand change.

. . . . .

If this post has moved you, please share it online: tweet it, Facebook it, blog about it... This is how a grassroots movement begins.

Today I wrote about why advocacy matters on the community level. Tomorrow I'll talk about why advocacy matters on a more personal, healing level for infertility patients. Stay tuned for A Belly Full of Fire, Part Two: The Wounded Healer.

Photo by Natalie Lucier via Flickr.

The Mass. Infertility Mandate Needs Your Help!

If you live in Massachusetts, you have it pretty lucky when it comes to infertility coverage (unless of course your employer is self-insured). Mass. leads the nation as the gold standard for infertility coverage, but it has built up over twenty years of tarnish on its outdated definition of infertility. As the mandate currently stands, women who experience recurrent miscarriage can be caught in a perpetual cycle of coverage denial because of a technical loophole. MA S. 485 seeks to update this definition and bring it inline with the current guidelines and definitions as issued by the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. The bill is currently sitting in the Senate Ways and Means Committee and desperately needs your help to be passed favorably out of committee.

The best thing to help give this bill a boost is an aggressive email and phone campaign to the committee members. Legislators actually DO care about personal stories, so speaking up by sending them either an email or calling them is one of the most effective and simplest advocacy strategies you can do.

If you live in Mass., please take five minutes to read my latest Examiner article on 3 things you can do to help in just ten minutes.

Photo by Emmanuel Huybrechts via Flickr.

The New England Infertility Blogger Network

Do you live or are based in the New England region (Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut)?

Do you blog about infertility?

Pull up a seat: we need to connect.

This may look strikingly similar to a post I made last month recruiting Bay State IF Bloggers. The first task given to me as the newest member on the RESOLVE of New England Board of Directors is to start culling blogs to build a New England based infertility blogroll. So I'm ditching the Bay State IF Blog Network and expanding it to become the New England Infertility Blogger Network.

What kind of blogs would be included?

• Patients facing infertility or treatment or parenting after infertility
• Their spouses and partners
• Their friends and family members
• Physicians and nurses specializing in fertility treatment
• Fertility clinics or other organizations that blog about fertility

What are the benefits of this blogroll?

• Promotion and visibility with RESOLVE of New England
• The chance to network with other professionals, resources, and bloggers
• The possibility of a meetup or round table at the RESOLVE of New England Annual Conference
• For businesses and providers: increased online exposure and social media opportunities for the only consumer infertility conference in the New England region
• For the amateur blogger: add credibility with support and visibility from a local non-profit organization

A lot of the details are still being ironed out. For now, I'm in the information gathering stage, and simply trying to find and connect with whose out there right now. As of right now, you do not have to be a member of RESOLVE of New England to be included in this blogroll.

Interested in being a part of this project? Fill out this short survey at the bottom of this post!

Readers and followers: this is where I also need your help. I could do a little Googling, but that will only get me so far. I need you dear readers, to send me links to infertility blogs in the New England region. I need you to dig through your Twitter followers and Facebook friends and colleagues: who out there lives in New England and is blogging about infertility? I need comments and retweets and leads in that same viral spirit that brought over 20,000 pairs of eyeballs to my What IF video. The simplest way is to just link right back to this post directly so they can fill out the interest form below.

Thanks in advance for your help and I look forward to connecting with other infertility bloggers in the New England region!

Just when you thought you'd seen it all...

We got a package in the mail today, rather unexpectedly. Larry handed me the Christmas decorated box, and we looked at each other quizzically when we saw who it was from: my super Evangelical uncle who made a right ass of himself at his own mother's funeral last month.

We were nervous opening it - I've never received mail from either of my uncles ever. I thought it was either some memento of Granny's that he randomly decided to pass on to us or quite honestly, a New Testament only Bible. You know, because we're Jews.

Oh no. It was neither of these things.

It was a pink onesie and a green jumper. And a card that read, "Welcome to your new baby girl."

Way to go Uncle S, you sent it to the wrong niece. You know, the one who just happens to be unable to have her own children.

I called my mom and she was as speechless as I was. We both agreed that my uncle is just one dumb redneck and to not bat an eyelash at his ignorance. I decided that I will indeed pass the gift on to my sister, but I just can't let this go without some kind of response on my part. This is where I need your help, dear readers: how should I respond?

Do I...

+ write them a thank you note saying, "Thanks for the lovely gift. I'm sure my niece will enjoy these!"

+ write them a thank you note saying, "Thanks for the lovely gift. I'm sure the adopted child we hope to have in the future will enjoy this. Let's hope we're matched with a little girl!"

+ send them a blank donation card to RESOLVE of New England and a copy of RESOLVE's Infertility Etiquette Guide.

+ send them a note with just the URL to my video (or better yet, a DVD of it).

+ send them a picture of my sister and I, with our names clearly labeled and descriptions reading, "Keiko: Can't have children" and "Jasmine: Just had the baby, dipshits."

+ just let it go.

What do you think? Do you have other creative ideas or responses? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.

Anyone else hear that ticking sound?

EDIT: Thank you to whoever submitted my good news to the LFCA this weekend! Much appreciated :)

Finally home after a crazy busy weekend. We spent Saturday in the hospital with my sister and her husband, oohing and aaahing over my little darling niece and watching the USA v. Ghana game. It was crazy to realize that we were meeting a brand new human being who wasn't even 24 hours old yet! My sister was definitely tired and sore, and my brother-in-law was quite the doting father. They all look so absolutely happy to finally meet the little lady they've been waiting for nine months.

There is infinite joy to be found in a growing family. But then that old green-eyed IF monster rears her ugly head from time to time. In these moments of happiness are also these deep, instinctual longings, something I thought I'd squelched a bit. This highly emotional weekend certainly brought up a lot of emotional baggage from the last year. It's this yo-yo-ing that gets to me more than anything.

Friday, I could hardly sit still. We all knew that my sister was getting induced first thing Friday morning, so we were all waiting patiently for updates. My mom drove up there to meet them at the hospital and offer moral support from the waiting room. I got the phone call when she was induced, when they broke her water, and when she got the epidural. My mom filled me in about about 6pm when it was go time. Larry and I had 3 home tours scheduled for Friday night (and all three were a bust... I don't know if we're too picky or we need to start looking in a different area). I didn't hear anything for two hours; I was starting to get worried. I finally called my mom at about 9pm and she told me the good news: Willow was here, my sister was fine, and I was an Auntie!

At first, relief - I was so glad nothing was wrong. And then excitement - I couldn't wait to meet her this weekend. And then all of that baggage that comes with infertility, all of those feelings I'd thought I'd really worked through and processed. Like every birth announcement, there's a rush of joy followed by this overwhelming jealousy and self-loathing. I got up from where I was sitting and marched into the bathroom, overcome with emotion. Larry followed right behind: "You don't have to hide from me." I cried, I rambled, I was so excited and embarrassed with myself for feeling this range of conflicting emotions. After a few minutes, I was fine. It was just a total emotional overload for a few minutes, but I was worried how I might be at the hospital the next day.

I was fine, actually. Larry was too. We were so happy to meet our niece and so glad to see just how happy Jasmine and Neal were. The only thing that made me uncomfortable was seeing a nurse come in with a needle in hand for some vaccine for my sister. I high-tailed it out of the room: Keiko don't do needles. But it was a lovely visit and the love that filled the room was really just beautiful.

And then, on the ride back to Larry's parents' house... I started hearing it: this incessant ticking in the background of everything. Even though we're pretty much decided on pursuing adoption, it was like my uterus and ovary just started screaming at me: "Baby. Now." This often happens in baby scenarios like showers or after friends announce their pregnancies. As much as I've resolved that yes, I can still be just as much of a woman without experiencing pregnancy or birth, it doesn't mean that my biological clock shuts off. It had been dormant for months now, and all of a sudden my niece's birth wound it right back up again.

This isn't necessarily a bad thing, just frustrating and annoying. I'm daydreaming about names and nursery colors. I see these big round bellies on women walking down the street and think to myself: I would look cute with a little bump like that. I'm thinking about what time of year it would be nice to be four months or nine months' pregnant, or what zodiac sign our baby would be if I were pregnant right now. It's this crazy, hyper-feminine alter ego that crawls up out of the depths of this otherwise confident, assertive woman and starts to henpeck away at my brain. Gah! Enough already!

And yesterday, we went to a wedding of very dear friends of ours. Larry was in the wedding- what a beautiful ceremony and evening. We were surprised at the emphasis on procreation at the ceremony (I think the bride and groom were just as surprised as well!) - there were a few moments where Larry and I exchanged knowing glances at one another. A few of the blessings and wishes for the couple and their future children just landed very differently to our ears. It's a marked difference from Jewish weddings, where wishes for children aren't typically mentioned. Thankfully, a night of libations, dancing, and merriment drowned out that relentless tick tock.

...but in those quiet moments, I can hear it, feel that butterfly in my stomach idyllic hopefulness and excitement, and feel a deep longing in my chest. That Biological Clock - she is one harsh mistress.


Photo by Alvimann via MorgueFile.

What IF: Two Months Later

It all started two months ago with #ProjectIF.

Two months ago to the day, I posted my What IF? video online.


What IF? A Portrait of Infertility on Vimeo.
Two months ago, I thought I would merely post on my little corner of the internet and let the blogosphere pass me by. Two months ago, I came out of the infertility closet. True, my friends and family were more than aware of who was writing this blog. Yet, I put my name, my face, my contact information to these What IFs, to a story that's told over and over and over again in the infertility community. Two months ago, I became an infertility advocate the moment I hit "record" on my digital camera. Standing here, two months later, and looking back, I marvel at the distance I've traveled in just two months' time.

I'm writing this post as part of WEGO Health's June Blog Carnival: Your Best Health Activist Moment. Click the link to read more and to find out how you can participate! This post has allowed me to explore some of the true highlights of the past two months in my health advocacy. It's hard to just pick one: so much has happened and I've been deeply affected by them all.

The first moment was when my video went viral. In just 11 days of publishing my video online, it received 10,000 plays. Currently, it has about 17,500 plays, and grows little by slowly. A lot of that initial momentum has dropped off, to be expected. That was when I realized my advocacy work was generating buzz: people were talking, tweeting, sharing.

The second moment was when I received a call from Rebecca Flick at RESOLVE's national headquarters in Washington. You often think of national organizations as nameless, faceless giants with no real person-to-person connection between Organization with a capital O and its members. All of that bias I held was erased the moment Rebecca and I began talking. RESOLVE really is here for its members, and they work tirelessly for them whether it's providing education and support or lobbying for change. The work alone to keep RESOLVE current with social media trends is exhausting enough. When Rebecca told me I had RESOLVE's full support to spread this video to the masses, this was when I was first beginning to realize that I had embarked on something much bigger than I had originally thought.

The third moment was when I was contacted by Dr. Lawrence Nelson of the NICHD. Dr. Nelson was the first resource I turned to after I was first diagnosed with premature ovarian failure: a quick Google search brought up much of his literature and even an informational video that I posted as one of my first handful of posts on this blog. Dr. Nelson has become one of the leading experts on POF/POI in the nation, and his passion to develop comprehensive and compassionate treatment for the disease is inspiring. We have since been corresponding on ways I can bring my experience with post-diagnosis coping and healing into some kind of treatment protocol for other women diagnosed with POF/POI. Apparently, I've handled my diagnosis remarkably well for a woman of only 26 at the time. In this moment, I realized that my experience mattered to other people.

The fourth moment happened right here in my own backyard after meeting with a networking group of regional infertility professionals. I made some great connections and contacts and had a chance to brainstorm ideas, raise issues, and get feedback. The real honor came when I was asked last month to apply to the RESOLVE of New England Board of Directors, of which I was unanimously voted in last Thursday. This was when I realized the possibilities ahead of me with local advocacy efforts.

But of all the moments in the past two months? My childhood best friend sending me a message on Facebook telling me she is a three-time egg donor. A work colleague of mine (who I just goof off with 90% of the time I see him) closing the door in my office and confessing that his son was a miracle after recurrent miscarriages. The blogger who reposted my video who works in the healthcare field who changed her mind about mandated infertility treatment coverage and how it really should be covered by insurance companies. The dear friend who I had no idea was having trouble conceiving a second child. A friend of mine who I'm still getting to know who pulls me aside after a gathering one night and thanks me for posting on my blog that it's okay to feel mean and jealous and spiteful of all those big round bellies that aren't hers. The long emails from strangers telling me their stories: all of their heartbreak, triumph, and waiting- finally sharing it for the first time with someone other than their partner.

Like a sudden rain across still waters, the ripples growing and colliding with one another, the water a network of waves and movement - it was these moments of personal connection that have impacted me the most in my activism. These personal connections begin lacing and crossing one another, creating a network of support, education, activism and research that grows stronger and tighter with each connection.

What a different place at which I stand two months later... and I cannot wait to see from where I stand a year from now, so see how far the ripples have spread.

Photo by Hiroyuki Takeda via Flickr.

Team RESOLVE Choice Awards: Best Infertility Blog & Book

The annual RESOLVE Night of Hope recognizes leaders making strides in the infertility fields, from doctors, nurses, and clinics to advocates, researchers, and employers. Hope Awards are given in a variety of categories, for Service, Advocacy, and Innovation, to name a few. There are also two awards voted on by the community: Best Infertility Blog and Best Infertility Book. Excerpts from each nominee in each category are available. Voting ends this Thursday, so make sure you go vote now, and spread the word via Twitter, Facebook, your own blog, and wherever else you post. It's an incredible award and I know the very deserving nominees would appreciate your votes!

The Best IF Blogs were selected from over 185 entries to Melissa Ford and RESOLVE's collaborative blog project during National Infertility Awareness Week back in April. #ProjectIF asked ALI bloggers to put their "What IFs?" of infertility out there, and then answer those questions. From those response posts, five blogs were chosen as nominees for the Best Blog category. Their What IF posts, and I have read each of them- are powerful, moving, relatable, beautiful. Do take the time to read them before you vote.

The Best IF Books were selected by nominations from the ALI community. A call from RESOLVE was put out for Best Book, and bloggers, readers, and everyone in between submitted their favorites for RESOLVE to select five nominees. Excerpts of each book are externally linked from the voting website- again, really great nominees and totally worth the read and vote. I have a couple of books now to add to my reading list this summer.

By voting, you're helping to support not only an organization that does so much for our community, but helping to recognize those leaders within that community that stand out and have made substantial contributions to the community as well.  Like submitting news to the LFCA, voting for the Team RESOLVE Choice Awards is just good karma in the ALI blogosphere.

Have I inspired you enough? Well, get out there and vote already! ^_^

Dude, it's Men's Health Week!

Spread the word about Men's Health Awareness! Do it for your brothers, your sons, your dads, your husbands, your uncles, and your best boy buds. June is Men's Health Month and this week is Men's Health Week. It happens every year the week before and including Father's Day. I wish I had prepared for this week, because I would have lined up some male-factor IF posts. I do plan to post about the elusive male point of view in the next month or so. Until then and in celebration of Men's Health Week, I'll list some great infertility resources for the men in our lives.

I've also posted an article about Five Myths of Male-Factor Infertility on Examiner.com. Check it out!

Male factor infertility is the sole cause of a couple's infertility issues in about 30% of cases. Female factor accounts for another 30%, and the rest are either unexplained or a combination of the two (source: RESOLVE.org). Infertility is not just a woman's problem, and even when the issue is female factor, it doesn't mean it's not affecting her partner. Here are some great resources that I've come across:

+ Men’s Health Week: A Time for Men to Step up to the Fertility Plate: Dr. Geoffrey Sher of the Sher Institute and puts a call to action for men facing infertility. Read the complete blog post at IVF Authority.

+ Men and Emotions: "Despite the fact that approximately 40% of infertility is attributed to male factors, it appears that men are not as willing or as able as their female partners to talk about their experience. Perhaps this is because we traditionally think of children as a woman's province." Read the rest of the article here at RESOLVE.org.

+ The Semen Analysis and the Men's Infertility Workup: What to expect from your doctor (via RESOLVE.org)

+ Psychological Issues in Male-Factor Infertility: "In general, the man’s reaction to infertility has been viewed by mental health professionals as taking less of an emotional toll than his partner’s... Little room is left for dealing with his own feelings of loss and sadness. This conforms to society’s gender expectations in which men are not given permission to express deep feelings of loss..." Read the rest at the American Fertility Association website.

+ Get Thee to a Urologist!: The title says it all (via AFA).

+ Fourth Anniversary of the Death of My Sweet Baby Boy: A brilliant resource out there for men coping with loss. The articles and entries shared on this site are a resource for men and women alike (via GrievingDads.com).

+ Making Sex Fun While Trying to Get Pregnant: Mandatory sex is no fun. About.com offer's some advice to spice it up!

+ Coping With Mother's Day and Father's Day: With Father's Day approaching, this can be a tough time of year for men and couples struggling with infertility. RESOLVE has some great advice to make it through the day.

+ Add your resource in the comments below! Blogs, articles, websites: all are welcome.

Have you been Lost and Found?

I'd like to take this time to pimp out something I feel is rather important in the ALI blogsphere: Mel's Lost and Found Connections Abound (LFCA). Think of it as a semi-daily digest of all the happenings in the ALI blogosphere: quick announcements of our joys like birthdays, and anniversaries, to our lows like loss announcements and remembrances. New blogs get their shout outs and folks who just need a little extra support for whatever reason get their love too. New projects or questions to the community are also announced. It is a phenomenal resource out there, exposing us to new blogs and journeys, allowing us to reconnect with others, and generally feeds into a greater sense of good karma.

You may notice the brown LFCA icon a little ways down on my right sidebar, "Please submit my news to the LFCA." That's because the LFCA only happens because we make it happen (and because Mel is awesome in compiling it all together). It requires the active engagement of the ALI blogosphere to not only bring the news of our peers to our peers, but to share that news and comment appropriately. Like I said, it's some seriously good karma to be a part of the LFCA.

"But why participate?" you might be asking. I'll explain why I do it with a little diversion into Judaism. In Judaism there is the concept of tzedaka (charity). I use the term charity loosely as it's not a choice, but an obligation. When I converted to Judaism, I remember scratching my head at the required donation to the synagogue as part of my formal conversion ceremony. My rabbi explained it thus: "Instead of dollars, think of it as good things. You put good things out in the Universe, you get good things back."

So why participate? Well, you have a chance to put good things out in the Universe. The LFCA only publishes about 3-4 times a week, so what I do is when I get on my Google Reader binge, if I find something appropriate that I think should be shared, I submit it. In fact, I usually open two tabs: my Reader in one and the LFCA in another so I can quickly copy and paste the info over.

I'm not posting this fishing for mentions on the LFCA, because trust me, if I want to, I'll submit my own news (and I have in the past). You can submit your own news too: don't be shy, and don't count on other folks to necessarily do it for you. If you need the support, submit your news. Worst that happens is that you and someone else submit the same news, and Mel will pick which specific blurb will go in that particular edition.

The reason I want to highlight this is because this is actually a very simple act of advocacy you can do right as you're catching up on your blogs. By supporting others, you're helping out the whole community. And if you're not "out" about your IF status, this is a great way to be able to advocate for others while still remaining anonymous (all LFCA submissions are anonymous).

Catch up on the latest edition of the LFCA here. Click here to submit your news. Not sure what to submit? News breaks down into the following categories: Miscellaneous news (questions, non-IF announcements, community projects, invite only, etc); Birthdays, anniversaries, or blogoversaries; Loss remembrances; Loss announcements; Miscellaneous support or celebrations (directing support where it is needed); Bedrest babes; Pregnancy announcements and news; Birth and adoption announcements.

Now start spreading the news and pump out good things into the Universe!

Call me Little Miss Muffet

...as I apparently need a tuffet *awkward pause* for my bum.

I'd been having consistent back pain for over 10 days now, this hot dull ache right at the base of my spine and, well, *awkward pause* between my bum cheeks. Depending on which side I would sleep on in the night (I'm a side-sleeper), the opposing hip joint would be sore the next morning. Icing it didn't help. Heating pads and hot showers didn't help. Ibuprofen and naproxen sodium would help, but both make me pretty woozy; I have a pretty low tolerance for OTC analgesics. Yesterday, when getting out of bed to turn off my alarm, it felt like someone had both simultaneously stabbed and electrocuted my lower back. I'd had enough. It was time to go to the doctor.

I could only get in my doc's last appointment of the day, so I toughed it out and held off taking any pain meds so I could accurately decribe both the location and quality of the pain. I have a very weird gift for describing pain, something I developed when I was in middle school after numerous repetetive sprained ankles. I told her that there was an everpresent hot dull ache at the base of my spine along the coccyx and radiating outward along the lower end of my hip bones. When moving, sometimes the pain felt like a hot knife being dug into the appropriate muscle. Other times, it felt like a hot electric shock around my entire lower back and down the side of my leg, all the way to my pinky toe.

After a few movement tests, having me sit, stand, and lay on my side, my doc determined that I had mostly likely developed bursitis in my sacrum, aka, joint cushion swelling in my bum. Since everything is inflamed down there, it's pressing on the cluster of sciatic nerve, causing the electric shock sensations. She recommended continuing with the anti-inflammatories (basically 3 advil as soon as I come home from work) and to- get this- sit down on a pillow anytime I had to sit down. Hence: the tuffet reference.

I'm writing this post at work, and let me tell you, it's weird sitting on one of my couch pillows on my office chair. Also, my chair is so crappy that the pillow isn't really helping.

We both think this happened from me sitting on a very hard stool for about 5 hours last Monday, while I was handing out keys to summer housing. I was in a res hall lounge, so the only furniture to sit on were these crappy little stools that offered no support. The long line of students checking in kept me glued to my seat for an hour or two at a time before I could get up. The sustained pressure causes the bursae (little fluid filled cushions between your joints) to become inflammed, thus causing the surrouding tendons to also inflame. Note to self: um, get up off my chair every hour.

So I've got a busted bum and I'm walking around feeling a bit like an old lady. The plan is to see how I'm feeling in a week and go from there. I'm glad this isn't POF-related, as were my intial fears. POF carries a substantially higher risk for osteoperosis and osteopoenia, but my doc isn't worried. My baseline bone density exam last year came back normal.

In other news... some stressful stuff going on that I can't really divulge too much into here yet. But I will say that I am very sad and worried right now. If you can put your good, peaceful thoughts out there in the Universe for me, it would be much appreciated.


(Illustration by Blanche Fisher Wright from The Real Mother Goose, 1916.)

Examining Infertility

As I announced last week mostly via Twitter and Facebook, I've become Examiner.com's Boston Infertility and Miscarriage Examiner. Essentially, I write about all things IF in the Boston region... and they're paying me to do it! I'm rather excited about my first paid writing gig. While the articles may be a bit more locally focused than some of the broader things I write about here, I hope to keep the content fresh, unique, and approachable to all of my readers. One of the first things I'm planning on doing is a series of interviews with some of my recent new contacts I've made in the IF field here in Massachusetts.

I'll always keep links the latest articles on the top right sidebar, but I'll also start posting some teasers here with links to the full stories as well. So far I have two articles live: Infertility and its impact on mental health and Massachusetts Senate bill S485 impacts access to infertility treatment. If you haven't checked them out, please do! And please feel free to retweet them and share them on Facebook as well.

You may have also noticed that I've started doing these "Read More" links on my main page. In an effort to streamline the look of my blog, I realized I write... a lot. And that's a ton of dense text on the page. I figured the "Read More" hack cleans things up a bit (although it won't retroactively do it for all of my posts, so it only really works with yesterday's post). I've also started adding more pics to my posts, because, well- who doesn't like pretty pictures? I'm also learning the wonderful art of photo attribution. It's like learning APA or MLA all over again, so you may notice lots of photo credits from this point out.  It's my way of being a good web citizen.

Hope y'all don't mind the changes around here as I start refining this blog. I'll still post updates on our journey (like yesterday's lengthy and stressful post, The Game of L-if-E), philosophical and motivational musings, and like the interview series I plan to post of Examiner, I hope to bring the same kind of current news and trends in the IF world as well to all of you here at this blog. This all relates to my bigger mission of continuing to be an advocate for infertility awareness as I advocate away through a variety of channels. The more ways I can spread awareness, the better.

(Photo by Erik Stabile via Flickr.)

Women's Health Matters: Period.

Sit tight: this post is a doozy.

I'm a Vagina Warrior.

I realize this is quite a startling way to begin my post, but being a Vagina Warrior drives me, it shapes the way I look at the world, and fuels my passion for women's health advocacy. What exactly is a Vagina Warrior? Well, it stems Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues; I performed in five productions of the show throughout college and two years after I graduated at the first college where I worked. The mission of the V-Day movement is near and dear to my heart, and a Vagina Warrior is someone who fights for women, women's rights both home and abroad, and for the safety and health of women and girls everywhere. My work in health advocacy, particularly around infertility, is how I assign my Warrior status (and when I say Warrior, think dorky Xena sporting Old Navy rather than leather-plated skirt).

So I've got three things my inner Vagina Warrior wants to cover in this post, all related to our periods: Tampons. The Red Tent. Project Vital Sign. Sound interesting? Read on.

So I was thrilled when I saw the new Kotex U commercials:

I am in no way being compensated for this. This was too damn awesome not to share.

Thank you, Kotex, for keepin' it real. I haven't had a "real" period in months, technically years if you count that fact that while on birth control, it's not an actual period as a result of ovulation, rather, it's withdrawal bleeding from a drop in hormones. I'm still experiencing breakthrough bleeding on my HRT (the pill), and I had to use a tampon for the first time in over a year last month. I stared at it like, "You want that to go where?" amazed at how quickly I had forgotten all about this strange feminine product. So when I saw this commercial I appreciated that it wasn't trying to sell me this flowered up idea but was like, "Hey. Hey you, you with the XX chromosomes. You're of menstruating age and you need a practical solution to your monthly biological phenomenon. Here, have a tampon." 

I appreciate Kotex's candor, because women don't like to talk about our periods. It's something society doesn't talk about... like infertility. (Funny how women's problems are marginalized into silence.) Which brings me to my next Vagina Warrior subject: the Red Tent Temple Movement and the forthcoming documentary: Things We Don't Talk About. 

 Anita Diamant's The Red Tent is an inspiring fictional retelling of the story of Dinah, Jacob's only named daughter in the Bible. The Red Tent was where the women of Jacob's tribe gathered for their monthly cycles, for births, miscarriages, and shared sisterhood. (If you haven't read it, go do that this summer. And keep a box of tissues handy when you do.) 

ALisa Starkweather has taken the fundamental ideas of The Red Tent and translated them into a movement of women gathering in sacred spaces to share in each other's sisterhood. Our temples are bedecked in red fabrics and welcome to women of all ages, menstruating or otherwise; the Red Tent Temple Movement is about restoring women's dialogue and celebrating the feminine life experience. The Red Tent Temple has allowed me to restore what I felt was lost- my sense of monthly cycles. While I may not bleed every month, I gather with my friends, my sisters near each new moon at the Salem RTT, and that sense of womanly rhythm has returned to my life. Isadora Leidenfrost will be exploring this movement in her forthcoming film, Things We Don't Talk About: Healing Narratives from the Red Tent. I get the sense that this is going to be an important film, and wanted to put this on folks' radars.

Still with me as I talk about all these "woman" problems? You are? Great. Because my biggest problem is calling Aunt Flo a problem. She should be a welcome guest, not a nuisance! CNN recently published an  article online about women's attitudes toward their periods. The article is (fairly) balanced, but the thing that got me was the general tone that "Ewww! Periods are icky and gross and cumbersome." (Yes, I know for some women, they dread their period: heavy flows, debilitating cramps, nausea, and worse.) It was the title that got me: Periods - who needs them anyway?

Who needs periods? Every woman does, that's who! This leads me to my third and final soapbox moment of this post: Project Vital Sign. Sponsored by Rachel's Well, a non-profit women's health organization, Project Vital Sign is working to create a national movement for educators and health professionals to recognize menstruation is just as much of a vital sign as heart rate, blood pressure, or temperature.

Allow me this divergence... I'm still reconciling my feelings on hormonal birth control pills. On one hand, it kept my ovarian cysts at bay all throughout college, after I had already lost an ovary to a torsioned cyst. On the other, it masked my POI for what could have been years. Now they replace the hormones my body cannot produce naturally. I've had this weird give-take relationship with hormonal birth control, so I'm still not sure where my allegiance lies. The point of this brief divergence is to say that eliminating our periods or masking them is a dangerous game, as we lose a basic sign of our reproductive health. My personal thoughts on birth control aside...

Our periods give us a clear picture of our reproductive health and even our overall health. The fact that the media and society paint our periods as nuisance, gross or insignificant is infuriating: it sends the message that we should do away with them entirely, reinforcing broader social constructs of shame, embarrassment, and silence surrounding women's health issues. I know I'm not going to change society, but I'll be damned if I don't try. And look, don't take my word for it (cue Reading Rainbow music) - Dr. Lawrence Nelson at the NIH/NICHD agrees in a recent piece on NPR:

"There's this disconnect," says Nelson. "The menstrual cycle is just seen more as a nuisance by many women. But actually, [when periods are regular] it's the sign that the ovaries and the whole endocrine system related to reproduction is working the way it should."

My points, after this whole long, ranting post?

Love your period. 

Celebrate your womanhood. 

Advocate for women's health issues.

Because women's health matters. Period.

Calling All Bay State IF Bloggers!

Do you live in Massachusetts?

Are you living with infertility or have struggled with infertility in the past?

Do you blog?

I am looking for you!

I'm working to create a network of Massachusetts-based infertility bloggers. We are extraordinarily lucky to live in a state with comprehensive mandated IF coverage, and while we lead the nation in terms of what's mandated, it's not perfect. This is where I'm hoping that our collective voices can help make important changes to the current mandate parameters regarding infertility.

If you are a Massachusetts-based infertility blogger, please take a moment to fill out this form. I'm in the data-gathering process right now. The information will be sent directly to me and shared with no one else at this point. In the future, I'd like to be able to share this network with RESOLVE of the Bay State, the media, and legislators. You can opt out of sharing any or all of your information on the linked form. I know IF is one of those rather personal things you might not want out there: I know not everyone is in a position to be as "out" as I am, and I totally respect that.

Please feel free to tweet this, repost this to your own blogs, Facebook, or message boards. The more places I can get this post out there, the greater the chances of building up this network!

I'm a Person With Passion!

I am honored to be featured today as a Person With Passion at Lisa Marsh's blog, Your Great Life. Lisa and I have been in touch since NIAW and she inspired me to write a post about Transforming from Patient to Advocate for her blog.

Lisa is a Circle+Bloom Fertility Coach, based out of the UK. Stop by her website to find out more about her work and to see how she can help you in your journeys. Lisa has a lot of great posts on her blog, so do peruse her page! You can follow her on Twitter @yourgreatlife.

Decisions and Definitions

I've been rather existential this week, from contemplating motherhood to ruminating on the value and purpose of human existence. I tend to get a little introspective in the weeks leading up to my birthday. I have never been a fan of my birthday. It's always overshadowed by Memorial Day here in the States, so trying to do any kind of getaway for my birthday is a wash. Peak season prices go into effect. Everyone is on the road. No one wants to come to parties because they've made plans for the holiday weekend.

This year, my birthday is on the same day of the week I was born: Tuesday, May 25. I'm excited by that, rather than the birthday itself. I like patterns and repetition.

But I digress.

In this time of redefining myself, I was drawn to an article in January's issue of Wired magazine. There was a brilliant statement about a woman who, with a significantly increased risk of both ovarian and breast cancers, chose to have both a complete hystorectomy/oopherectomy as well as a double mastectomy. A mother of two, she endured these radically preventative measures as the result of thoroughly weighing her options. She utilized the process of a decision tree, something which the Wired article goes into more depth. The statement that stood out for me the most:

For Smieja, the decision was traumatic to navigate. But ultimately it came down to her desire to reduce her risk through all available means. That meant waiting a few months to wean her baby, then having the procedures. “I’m done with that decision,” she says. “This is what I need to do. I need to be around for my kids. I am not my ovaries. I am not my breasts.”

In a truly physical way, Smieja redefines herself. An inspiration, a pause for reflection. A moment to simply appreciate.

What does your decision tree look like in your infertility journey?

Make This Mother's Day Me Day

I've been getting such beautiful comments about redefining motherhood for Mother's Day this year. Alex writes that motherhood is "the wanting to take care of someone. It's the desire, more than the ability." This year, she's in limbo in the 2ww during Mother's Day. It's a unique place to be in; go visit her and wish her luck! Kakunaa considers herself "a mother...maybe not to my own children, but I am the mother of my friends, to my furbabies, and in my heart." And Sonja puts it so simply and eloquenly when she says "mothering is a state of mind." She says further: "It might not be the definition of the term "mother" that I grew up with, but you know what? This works for me now." Kudos to those of you who are board with redefining motherhood this year!

I'm fortunately in that don't have the same Mother's Day blues as many other women. I'm blessed and thankful that my mom and mom-in-law are both living and well. And since we were never actively trying, it's not like I'm missing out on something, as though this holiday is leaving me out. For others, they become the afterthought at Mother's Day gatherings, the room oohing and ahhing over the moms and then stopping at The Infertile One and going "Oh, right, well have a lovely day too dearie!" Danya shares how painful the experience can be:

Like many other woman I dread Mother's Day. But mostly because I dread other people's pity. I'm always someone's "afterthought" on this day. Especially at church. Everyones running around exchanging flowers and gifts with cries of a "happy" Mother's Day until they notice me, get "that look" on their face and go, "Oh yeah, ahem, Happy Mother's Day to you too, Danya! Cuz you'll be a mother someday too! So you can celebrate too! Ummmmmm.... Oh! Here's an extra flower! You can have one too!" Gee thanks. I've always wanted an afterthought Mother's Day flower drenched in your pity.

Danya's right. We shouldn't be afterthoughts on Mother's Day, or any day for that matter. And too many times in our IF journeys, we become our own afterthoughts: we'll hold of that vacation because we need to save the money for this cycle. I don't need to buy new clothes in case this cycle works. I'll put off using that gift card I got for XYZ holiday/event/birthday because I don't need to go shopping now. A fascinating NYT article from December of 2009 reports on a psychological phenomenon known as pleasure procrastination. We do it all the time, letting gift cards expire before ever cashing them in, never visiting local tourism like museums, monuments, and parks because we kind of take them for granted. In think in the IF community, we are always putting our pleasures, our joys, hell, our lives- on hold.

Here's the thing: when we pamper ourselves, do even just one little something for ourselves that makes us feel good, we feed our bodies some delicious feel good brain chemicals. I'm no scientist, I have no idea what they are, but I'm going to say comfortably that this happens. (Why yes, I do have a PhD in Making Up Scientific Facts as Needed. How ever did you guess?!)

So this Mother's Day, if everyone is celebrating around you, without you, despite you: I say, celebrate yourself! In fact, let's change the name. It's now Mother's Me Day. This is a day to do for you. If you have to go to that family function, do it. But get your hair done, paint your nails, buy that pair of strappy sandals you've been eyeing and arrive in style. Do for yourself and make yourself feel good!

And Mother's Me Day is the perfect excuse to go out and splurge a little on some home spa products, or jewelry, or clothes, or books - hell, even a new computer! (I might be speaking from personal experience. Let's just say, there's been a major party shift in the Zoll household and I friggin love my new laptop.) There are TONS of sales geared toward the mommy demographic that are just as applicable to the IF demographic. We read books. We wear clothes. We like perfume and gift certificates and spa packages. All you have to do is replace Mother's with Me and bam: it's a week of sales just for you! Look, I know it's a crap economy, but sometimes, you just gotta splurge once in a while and celebrate yourself. Sometimes even just a couple hours of retail therapy can do wonders.

But like the NYT article mentions, we wait for special occasions to celebrate ourselves, and that we need to let that notion go. Case in point: last week, Larry really wanted cake for dessert. Not cupcakes, not pastries: straight up "frosted all over made in store looks like something you'd take to a potluck or dinner party" cake. And you know what? We bought the cake. We invited a bunch of friends over to help us eat said cake because yanno, we didn't want to be total fatties eating the whole thing ourselves. Did we wait for a special occasion? Nope! We said, "we're having cake because a) we want it b) we're awesome and c) we don't need a reason." You might say we... had our cake... and ate it too... I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself.

This Mother's Me Day, celebrate yourself. You deserve it, you're worth it, and if you're going to wait around for someone to do it for you, you'll have wasted a perfect opportunity to indulge yourself.

Everyone's situation is different, so when I shop it out, others might need something a little more substantial. Be sure to check out these great articles for coping and surviving Mother's Day and Father's Day.

• Coping with Mother's Day & Father's Day (RESOLVE.org)
• Making the Best of Mother's Day and Father's Day (RESOLVE of New England)
• Empty arms on Mother's Day (American Fertility Association Blog)
• Help For When Mother's Day Isn't Happy (BlogHer.com)
• How to Support an Infertile Friend on Mother's Day (surprisingly compassionate article at eHow)

What other things do you do or will you do differently this year to make it through Mother's Day?

Redefining Motherhood on Mother's Day

Mother. [ˈmə-thər] Noun. Etymology: Middle English moder, from Old English mōdor; akin to Old High German muoter mother, Latin mater, Greek mētēr, Sanskrit mātṛ. Date: before 12th century 1 a : a female parent b (1) : a woman in authority; specifically : the superior of a religious community of women (2) : an old or elderly woman 2 : source, origin 3 : maternal tenderness or affection Merriam Webster Dictionary Online, 2010.

This is our working definition of mother, the one we just know, the one we've known from birth when we looked up into that sweet loving face smiling down at us. No matter who raised us, we looked up to her: we called her Mother. For some, Mother was never a figure in our lives. She might be a memory, a photograph, or a story told to us by others. But always, always this connection to somewhere or someone: Mother.

In my video, I posed the question: what if I redefine what it means to be woman, mother, family? Even in my blog header, I proclaim that I'm redefining womanhood. I no longer define my womanhood by my fertility. While pregnancy is an experience for which I mourn and sometimes long, it is no longer a defining experience of womanhood to me. I've resolved to let my experiences and my history define me.

This Mother's Day, I want to redefine motherhood. So how do we redefine motherhood? I may not be able to compete with Webster's dictionary, but I can certainly do my best to work on a cultural shift.

Motherhood isn't just an act of procreation. My uterus may not have borne children, but it shall bear ideas, voices, action. Motherhood is an act of love, of selfless love at that. Motherhood is an act of sacrifice: whether it's the pain of labor and delivery to the sheer act of giving a part of our heart to another. And that's different from the giving of our hearts to our lifelong companions. Motherhood is sacrificing that bit of ourselves, that bit of our hearts, for another. It is more than just loving affection. Motherhood is about fighting and dying for those we love, the primal lioness who protects her cubs.

And our cubs: they may be borne of us or another. They may yet be born in our hearts. They may indeed be furry friends. They may in fact, be our friends.

This week, as we approach Mother's Day on Sunday, I want to write and explore this idea more, this idea of what it means to be a mother. I know this is a very hard time of the year for many of us. I'm hoping this week as I tease this all out more, that we find strength together, that we channel our fears and worries and dread of this holiday into something positive, into action and renewal.

How do you define Motherhood?

ICLW May Be Over, But NIAW is in Full Swing!

I did it. 170 blogs (3 went down since the list went up). 170 comments in 7 days. I made my first Iron Commenter! I have found so many new blogs to follow- check my right sidebar to who I've added. I've found a ton of adoption blogs- check out my left sidebar just to see all the adoption bloggers I'm following. But most of all, I've met and made connections with so many people. The experience of making these connections is just amazing. Iron Commenter is indeed not for the faint of heart, but it is worth it, so worth it.

Like the post title says, ICLW may be over at midnight tonight, but that doesn't mean the comments have to stop. This has definitely kicked my butt into being a better active partipant in the ALI blogosphere. The sheer value in the connections I've made will only last if I keep up my end: reading, commenting, sharing stories.

Just because ICLW is over doesn't mean that NIAW is even close to being done! There's a lot happening on Capitol Hill right now. Melissa Ford of Stirrup Queens has posted her remarks she gave this morning at the infertility briefing on the Hill. They are powerful and inspiring. They remind me of why it is that I'm out and outspoken about my IF: because we need the government to act! She's there today with the executive leadership of RESOLVE. I hope they're making waves.

What else can you do to raise awareness? You can tweet about it, Facebook it, blog about it... make sure you Stumbleupon and Kirtsy and Digg and Reddit your links too! You can be out and outspoken about your infertility. Like Iron Commenter, it's not for the faint of heart, but damn if it doesn't feel good. "But what IF I'm too nervous about outing myself?" you ask? Well, here, let me do it for you. Use me as your stand-in, and share my What IF? A Portrait of Infertility video. Just spread it with words like "Because 1 in 8 is someone you know. This video is about a very important cause." And then leave it at that. *wipes hands* See? Infertility activism and advocacy is easy.

Other ways to raise awareness? Check out all of the blogs participating in #ProjectIF. Retweet @resolveorg or follow them on Twitter. Use hashtag #infertility in your tweets. Link to other bloggers on your blog, or even better yet- on your Facebook.

There's still 4 days left, including today, to raise awareness for National Infertility Awareness Week. Take just a few minutes each day and keep the awareness going!