Fertility Journey - staring down the devil (or facing reality?)

Welcome back to my blog, I appreciate you taking the time to visit and read through my journeys, as crazy and difficult as they may be.

I started this blog and website on the back of my very difficult fertility journey as a way of sharing experiences without judgement for anyone going through something similar.

In all honesty, as I was going through this process, I found basically nothing other than online webinars and books to read through for support, and felt like I needed something else. I needed someone with a shared experience to engage with or at least to read a real-world blog from a real person as some form of understanding. Hence The Cotswolds Girl was born.

I started blogging to express myself, almost as "self therapy" going through the gruelling process of IVF and inevitable acceptance of what will not be.

The infertility journey, the IVF process, the failure of pregnancies and the inevitable grief (aka the process) is so hard to discuss with people who have not been through it. Not from a lack of wanting to understand but from a position of just not quite "getting it" emotionally. When I say that, please understand that it's about trying to make another person understand feelings that they have never experienced and gain an appreciation of something that is incomprehensible unless experienced. It is a frustration that only someone who has been through it, can get. Try as people might to understand, it really only is at surface level. I know that sounds harsh, but it is reality.

Following on from the last fertility post and the update on our Adoption journey, things haven't really progressed. We put the Adoption on hold due to a number of factors, first and foremost is that Jack was really unsure after our first session with the social worker. I honestly think that he hadn't really processed the thought of Adoption properly, internally. Secondly, he also doesn't feel that we have tried every other option (again, completely valid). Thirdly, with me being new into the family business we are not in a position for me to be on parental leave just yet, again completely valid. However, it now leaves me (personally) caught between a rock and a hard place. Neither outcome ends with a family.

For the first time in a very long time, I have to admit my age, and have to be realistic between what is possible and what is not (mathematically) possible. As much as it breaks my heart to do so, but I have to for my own mental and emotional wellbeing. I am the sort of person who needs all the information, to process it, and then move forward.

So, here I am, sitting watching terrible TV on a Saturday night writing this blog, facing down an invisible enemy that I can't escape, and that there is no way to out run. As with anything in life, there is never enough time.

I have been doing a lot of emotional heavy lifting (personally) to get to a point where I am OK with the inevitable outcome of not raising children, either way. Perhaps we are just one of those couples that the universe does not grant that honour to. We would not be the first nor the last, and that is OK. I am OK with that, now.

Next steps you ask? Well, I guess we will see. I have a couple of really exciting things on the horizon (that I cannot disclose just yet) and we are looking forward to hosting family and friends in the new year. We have a couple of holidays booked (including one back to Australia), so between then and now the focus will be on the business and our new ventures. Keeping busy. Keeping active. Keep moving forward. It is all you can do.

Thank you for joining me on this journey, I will be writing more as Christmas descends and as things start to evolve.

My key learns from all of this:

1) Don't have unrealistic expectations of understanding or empathy from people who have not had these experiences themselves, as frustrating as that can be. Experience is limited to ones own actual experiences, so seek out those who share the experiences for deeper support. You can't make people feel things that they have not experienced on their own.

2) As hard as it is, facing reality and accepting it, is far easier than living on a promise with false hope. Practicality and reality is the way forward.

3) When things feel lost and hopeless, keep moving forward. Book things, do things, find things, but don't dwell. Don't sit and stagnate because that breeds rumination. When you start ruminating, looking in the rear view mirror rather than keeping your eyes on the road ahead, you will never move forward in any meaningful way.

With love, light and big Ol' hugs

TCG xxx