January 26, 2006

If I Ever Write This Letter

I sat on my therapist’s couch earlier this week, trying to get it all out of me. I’m not big on keeping secrets from him-I can keep secrets from the whole fucking world about myself, but I am honest with Aidan and my therapist. I have nothing to gain by lying to either one of them, and everything to lose. So honesty? The best (and only) policy.

I had to come clean to him this week. I finally told him about IVF, that we were about to go through with it, that I had gone through with it in the past. I don’t really know why I hadn’t told him about it before, it’s not as though I am hiding it, it’s just not something that I felt I wanted to talk about with people in “real life”. I can blog about it, but at the end of the day to all but a handful of people, I’m anonymous. To those who do know me, they live far away and I cannot see, in their eyes, the absolute pity that comes along with IVF.

It’s the pity that I can’t stand.

And it’s their inability to relate that makes me keep things to myself.

In our “real life” the only people that know we’re thinking about going through IVF are two of my colleagues that supported me two weeks ago, and my father. I had to tell my father as the other half of my family knew about the IVF (hence the move to this private site). But of all the people in my “real life”, only the lovely friends I stayed with last weekend and Aidan know the dates that we are kicking off the treatment. D-Day. Te day it all starts.

So I decided to tell him the truth. After all, if he’s the one who’ll be sitting across from me while I’m hopped up on hormones, perhaps he should know why the behavior is about to be erratic.

Sitting there on the couch in front of him, the sunlight flooding the room and me in floods of tears, I told him everything. About my sister’s pregnancy, about my loss of my two babies a few years back, about the fact that the last week of March we start IVF. He was amazed.

And then I told him about the type of IVF that we will be doing. To help another person out and-I have to be honest-to bring the cost of IVF down, we are donating half of my eggs to another woman. After my system is suppressed into fucking menopause and then slingshot into egg production, half of whatever I produce will go to a woman who, for whatever reasons, can’t produce her own eggs.

I’m actually pretty excited about that part of it, and I really hope good things happen for the other woman. I haven’t gotten far enough to figure out what to do when pregnancy does or doesn’t happen-if I get pregnant the other woman will be allowed to know if I am. However I have the right to find out if she gets pregnant or not, and if I don’t get pregnant, I’m not too sure I want to ask that question, in case it leads to feelings of absolute sadness and happiness all in one strawberry-flavored mix.

But there’s still something I haven’t done in preparation for this egg share. I have been provided with a long, carbon-copy sheet the color of institution green. It’s a page of information that I am supposed to write down, a sheet that will be provided to the other mother should she get pregnant. It’s the one sheet of paper that she will have to give to her baby, the only info that they will have until the child turns 18 and can rightfully look me up and search me out.

I am not at all bothered by the idea of being looked up 18 years from now.

What I am stressed about is, what do you write about that can hold and sustain someone for 18 years?

I’m not allowed to write my name or any identifying characteristics that they can use to find me, but I can write about anything else. I’ve thought about it so much-do I tell them my medical history? The average height of my family members? My favorite ice cream flavor? That when I was a little girl I wanted to be a doctor?

What do you write on a piece of paper that may be the single most important thing I ever write in my life?

I have been stressing about it a great deal, and I have yet to put pen to paper. Sitting there in my therapist’s office, I told him about it, my hands twisting in knots.

He looked at me. “That’s the most amazing thing I have ever heard about.” He looked out the window, the sunlight bathing his face, and then back at me. “That’s absolutely, truly amazing.”

And looking at him, I realized I’d been looking at the whole thing all wrong. He was right. It is amazing. It is absolutely amazing.

My stress disappeared, and even though I still haven’t decided what to say, it’s no longer something scary I have yet to do. It’s now something I look forward to doing, something I want to do.

Posted by Vanessa at January 26, 2006 11:24 AM | TrackBack
Comments

The more I hear about your therapist, the more I love him.

You are an amazing writer whose voice really shines through on the page. Whatever you end up writing, I know you will be able to convey your personality onto that page, and I think that is something the reader will truly appreciate.

Posted by: Ornery at January 27, 2006 05:02 PM

just write whatever you feel in the moment, and that will be the truth. You write so beautifully. It will be perfect. I just hope you don't run out of space.

Posted by: caltechgirl at January 27, 2006 01:14 AM

It is truly wonderful! I have no doubt you'll find the perfect words. It doesn't have to be perfect - it doesn't have to be "special". It just has to be you. I'm very glad you have this new home where you feel free to discuss and share your feelings. Best wishes to you!

Posted by: Kris at January 26, 2006 07:09 PM

I love your therapist just like I love my own. It took me forever to find one that could do that, and now, I'm afraid to let him go should I need to move.

I'm so glad that he could give you that perspective, which, if I were in your position, I would have a hard time realizing on my own also.

Posted by: amber at January 26, 2006 04:04 PM

It is amazing that you are giving up half your eggs. You will be helping another woman's dreams come true and that is such an amazing gift. (If I use "amazing" one more time, you are going to think I'm related to Tom Cruise!)

Please know that from me, there is no pity. I understand the aching and longing you feel to have a child, and I feel badly that you have to go through it, but I don't pity you.

You are strong and brave and you WILL be a wonderful mother one day very soon!

*hugs*

Posted by: donna at January 26, 2006 03:58 PM