I cannot tell you how aware I am that I could be in a different place...but I do know that I am here and it truly is a better place!
Better Place (by Rachel Platten)
I'll tell the world, I'll sing a song
It's a better place since you came along
Since you came along
Your touch is sunlight through the trees
Your kisses are the ocean breeze
Everything's alright when you're with me
And I hold my favorite thing
I hold the love that you bring
But it feels like I've opened my eyes again
And the colors are golden and bright again
There's a song in my heart, I feel like I belong
It's a better place since you came along
It's a better place since you came along
I see the whole world in your eyes
It's like I've known you all my life
We just feel so right
So I pour my heart into your hands
It's like you really understand
You love the way I am
And I hold my favorite thing
I hold the happiness you bring
But it feels like I've opened my eyes again
And the colors are golden and bright again
And the sun paints the skies and the wind sings our song
It's a better place since you came along
It's a better place since you came along
Now I'm alright
Now I'm alright
Everything's alright
'Cause it feels like I've opened my eyes again
And the colors are golden and bright again
There's a song in my heart, I feel like I belong
It's a better place since you came along
It's a better place since you came along
Michaela,
ReplyDeleteToday I am so grateful for you. You put on a recent post that you don't know if you could become someone's angel, but today you have in a way become mine.
I have been through 6 failed cycles of donor egg IVF (2 failed IUIs before that), miscarriage at 9 weeks, and a failed international adoption that happened this spring when Ethiopia closed their doors to all adoptive parents (including a couple hundred like my husband and I who had been waiting 2 years for a referral), the day before our 6th DEIVF cycle failed. We then got on the list for domestic adoption which we've been on for 3 months.
We have been in a fairly unique situation in that our egg donor and my husband's sperm made 13 blastocysts. We've used 9 already, and have 4 "B" embryos in the freezer still. We thought we were done, then it's been haunting me to have those 4 embryos still in the clinic, thinking of how I should feel lucky to have so many chances to become pregnant, and experience the massive PTSD of infertility because of the guilt not using them, the crazy "it finally worked on the 10th try" stories, and terrified because I don't think I can put my body through cycling anymore. During these 6 DEIVF cycles and just under 3 years, I've also had a basal cell carcinoma removed from my thigh, a herniated disc injury that has taken 9+ months to fully recover from (still in PT), a detached retina that required emergency surgery (idiopathic), and 50 pounds of stress added to my belly and thighs and such.
You said "the only way this ends is if I end it" and talked about leaving fertility treatments behind to focus purely on waiting for a match for adoption....and then the following spring you becamse a mama. And I thought about the fact that when you wrote "So This is How it Ends" in 2013, your birth mother was probably right around the time she found out she was pregnant.
And I cried harder than I have ever cried. I think I needed to see that someone else had ended their journey (and not some traditional IVF story, but someone with both embryos still in the freezer and DEIVF in their treatment history). Your blog has given me permission to say goodbye to this chapter. I told many people I had ended it after cycle 6, but as long as embryos are in the freezer, I'm just kidding myself thinking I've moved on, because I haven't.
Now I can, and I am eternally grateful for finding your blog. See how that worked? You ARE an angel. Through your journey, your words, you have paid it forward.
Thank you, thank you.
Aimee / theecofeminist.com