Why I Thought I Was Fertile

**Note: this post probably won't contain the super cool timeline I promised. I mean, you can scroll down and look for it, but really, it's probably not there** So, this infertility stuff came as somewhat of a shock to me. I mean, check out, for example, Exhibit A: I mean, this is incontrovertible proof that I am like, the fertilest person ever, n'est pas? This picture was taken exactly 8 months and 5 weeks after the first and only time (until last year) I had ever had unprotected sex. Who knew this gorgeous creature was a total, complete FLUKE never to be repeated again? Granted, some explanation for why this procreation business has proved to be a one-time thing for me might be found in the fact that my little miracle currently looks like this: So it turns out that fertile at 17 doesn't necessarily mean fertile at 32. Huh. Who knew? Except that I always assumed this shouldn't matter due to Exhibit B: These are my parents (and me, of course). It's supposed to be obvious from this picture that they're like, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay older than me. They were 39 when I was born. Here's how that happened: it was the Fall of 1975. My mom had 3 kids aged 15, 12 and 6. The six year old, my brother, had been an unwelcome surprise 6 years earlier. She acted like a total ass when she got pregnant with him. She still tells the story to this day - as if my brother wants to hear about how his existence drove her to tears for weeks on end until the Fuller Brush lady knocked on the door and asked her what was wrong (she could hear the weeping from outside the door). She told the Fuller Brush lady she was pregnant and didn't want to be. The Fuller Brush lady shamed her by telling her she had 6 sons and that the eldest was missing in Vietnam and she prayed every day for his safe return. Humiliated, my mother decided to quit her bitching. Wouldn't you love to hear that story over and over all your life? It's probably part of the reason why he's been home a total of about 10 times in the 21 years since he left for college. Anyway, back to 1975: my mom wanted to have a hysterectomy because she was having horrible, lengthy, heavy, crampy, yucky periods. She had gone back to college to finish her degree and so she wanted to wait until the Spring '76 semester was over to have the surgery. For the meantime, her OB/GYN gave her an experimental birth control injection. A few months later she complained of a flu that just wouldn't go away. Ha! It was no flu - it was ME! Imagine how she acted when she found out she was having yet another "blessing"! So anyway, feelings about my mother aside, she had babies way older than I am now! And with NO trouble! She had babies she didn't even WANT, for Pete's sake!

Alas, none of it matters because it turns out I'm no longer fertile. Maybe it's the 60 pounds I've gained, but I no longer ovulate. You might say, "Hey, Amy - what do you say you try losing those 60 pounds and see if that does the trick?" But I probably wouldn't listen (I certainly haven't been listening to myself!).

So, there was really no point to this post (aside from showing off my daughter who looks so cute in her Pom costume!) except to whine about my secondary infertility. I hope I do not come off as insensitive to my fellow infertiles who didn't happen to choose the path of getting knocked up after school one day in the second week of the twelfth grade by an abusive, goony, loser in a double wide trailer. I know that the pain of my new-found infertility is tempered by the blessing that is my daughter. I appreciate the miracle of her life even more now that it's not so easy (or free) for me to have another child. I just want us all to have the babies we so desperately want. Sigh. That's my dream.