In Vitro Fertility Goddess.
The following is an article by author Allison Rushby who contacted me if I wanted to respond to her piece. My response follows. Both articles were published in the January 2008 edition of Australian Parents magazine.
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Allison Rushby suspects that naturally fertile women are the new pariah…
I am fertile. Disgustingly fertile. Pregnant within a few weeks of trying, no complications, full-term babies, first labour three hours, second labour 40 minutes, one girl, one boy. Like I said, disgustingly fertile. And I never thought I'd be marginalised for what is, of course, a very run-of-the-mill thing to be, but ever so slowly this is what seems to be happening. Apparently IVF is the new black. So, I wonder, what does that make me and my hard-working ovaries.
Suddenly terms like ‘smug pregnants' are being bandied about the place and the fertility goddesses are being accused of ‘flaunting' their pregnancies. Did I ‘flaunt' my pregnancies? I didn't think so. But if ‘flaunting' meant that I wore fitted maternity clothes rather than tent-like constructions, maybe I did. The thing is, at week 39, it's hard to hide three kilos of baby attached to your mid-section. The infertility goddesses may have snazzy Mercedes convertibles, but I'm hardly going to ask them to keep them garaged at all times just because I fancy having one too.
It's now so not the done thing to be fertile, that I had to stand by and watch recently as a girlfriend of mine hid her third pregnancy. She managed to keep her ever-growing belly a secret until the 22-week mark. And the reason for her reluctance to tell her family and friends? Her sister-in-law was in the midst of IVF round three and she was too scared to come clean about her fertility, having just had child number two nine months ago.
Of course, I don't think being unable to have a baby is anything even close not owning a Mercedes convertible. And I feel terribly for women who want children and suddenly find themselves in a place where it's looking like an impossibility. I have to admit I was shocked, however, to find myself the spring chicken of the private obstetrician's waiting room at what I thought was the grand old age of 29.
It seems that while there are lots women who can't start having kids till later in life for varied reasons, there are also many who can, but who are choosing not to. Instead, they decide to focus on their careers, or come to the conclusion, year after year, that it just ‘isn't the right time'. And there's nothing wrong with this - as long as you know full well what you might be giving up. Inconvenient and scary as it may be, the ‘right' time to have kids is during the early to mid 20s. Are we as a society starting to forget that our fertility peaks in our 20s? Perhaps if we spent as much time planning our families as we spend planning our mortgages, we wouldn't be in this mess.
In hindsight, I've realised I'm extremely lucky to have had children easily. It was only after I had my two that all the horror stories came out - women who gave birth to stillborn babies and had to spend the night in labour wards listening to other, luckier people's babues cry, women who miscarried time and time again, women whose babies mysteriously just stopped moving at 38 weeks. So, so sad.
The infertility goddesses accuse us of being ignorant of their plight, but I don't think this is true. The fertility goddesses know and we care. It's just that there's not a whole lot we can do other than listen, and when someone else has something you so desperately want - well, sometimes listening just doesn't cut it, does it?
I guess if I sound slightly riled, it's because I am. Like some of the infertility goddesses, I'm reaching the end of my tether. I'm getting tired of being stared at with accusing eyes that say I'm not really deserving of my children because I didn't struggle to have them. That I don't appreciate my kids because they came to me easily. Yes I'm fertile. Disgustingly fertile. I'm a fertility goddess. But please don't ask me to apologies for that.
Allison Rushby.
And my response…
I am infertile. I will always be infertile even though I've had a child. You see, I didn't have the child in the way nature intended. I had the child courtesy of that great 20th century invention, In Vitro Fertilization. And I consider myself one of the lucky ones, as IVF doesn't work for everyone. Many of those who sign up for it leave the clinic empty-walleted, empty-armed and broken-hearted.
Three percent of babies born in the western world today are the result of IVF and over one in six couples of reproductive age find it difficult to conceive. Yet until recently when the media has picked up on the issue, who would have known?
People certainly don't discuss their fertility problems. During the years I worked as a flight attendant I was the unwitting recipient of every gory birth story and every pregnancy tale told by my fertility goddess colleagues but not once did I hear anyone's infertility story. And I ask, why? Why, if it's kosher to be infertile, is it something you don't talk about? To not tell anyone you've had a miscarriage or are undergoing IVF? To not tell anyone how you've been trying for five years to have a child with no success?
I went on to write a book about my bumbling quest to become a mother, because of this and because there is scant literature available for those who struggle to reproduce. Whole shelves and even sections of bookshops are devoted to pregnancy and babies but you'd be lucky to find one book devoted to infertility.
To the pregnant women I lampooned in my book, I'm sorry. It was the IVF drugs I was taking, combined with the ragged mental state I was in after those years of trying to conceive. I know you don't all purposely flaunt your pregnancies, (those that do, you know who you are). Now that I've been pregnant and rejoiced in it, I can understand why you wouldn't want to hide it and nor should you. And I don't for a minute think that pregnancy wear should be confined to curtains for the stomach, i.e. smocks. Goodness knows there are enough fashion obscenities out there already without adding to them.
Yet I must explain on behalf of the other fertility-challenged women out there why we are like we are to the point of occasional militancy. Why we shun parties where there are young children or babies, why we can barely manage a smile when you say you're pregnant, why at times we can't stand the sight of you.
It's nothing personal, but it's borne of an aching emptiness, like a hunger pain that isn't confined to your stomach but cuts to your very soul. And like a hunger pain it gnaws at you day and night. We can't control it, it exists as part of our being and once unleashed it's impossible to bury it. There is no cure for it either, except of course a baby.
So when we're out and about the sighting of a pregnant woman or a baby is like a sighting of someone tucking into a hamburger when you haven't eaten for days. The pangs you feel are similar but a hundred times more intense.
If and when we do manage to have a child it is like being presented with a gourmet meal when you've been starving for a long time. It's only natural therefore to think that the person who's only been waiting a few hours for food perhaps won't savour and appreciate every mouthful in the same way. It's not based on fact but on feeling.
Had I known that my fertility would take off to an uncharted destination sometime in my thirties and not left a forwarding address, I would probably have done things differently, not attempted to get ahead with the mortgage and enjoy my career. How could I have known though, when nobody talked about it? Media coverage was practically non-existent and women's magazines focused on things like ‘Multiple Orgasm', not ‘Multiple Birth as the Result of Fertility Treatment'.
Similarly had I been offered half the information about miscarriage and IVF at work that I received about episiotomies, I'd probably be the mother of two teenagers now.
Yet many women don't have the luxury of choice. Factors way beyond their control contribute to the postponing of motherhood, for example finding a partner who has not only evolved to a Homo Sapien, but is willing to have children NOW.
So please don't judge us but listen to us instead. You've been talking for years and we've just found our voice.
