LIFE GOES ON

Going to work felt like I was coming out of rehab, telling co-workers I was “taking it one day at a time.” I tried to stay present and devised an insanely neurotic mindfulness practice of labeling everything I was feeling and doing in a given moment. Now I’m walking through the halls. Now I’m searching for my keys. I feel sad but my face looks neutral. I don’t want to be here but I am.

I sat at my desk, staring at all my unread emails and I thought about how the only time I feel safe and comfortable is when I’m at home, alone, thinking about the day our last embryo died. I didn’t want to talk to people and hear them tell me how much they “admire my strength.” What does that even mean?! I didn’t want to open the email that announced yet another new baby or invited me to a baby shower invite. I just didn’t want to do it. But I have to. This is life. This is my job. This was my life and job on IVF. I imagined hell as being forced to wear a wool turtleneck and go through IVF cycles for eternity, but hell may actually be rejoining society the week after an IVF failure or a loss, and wearing a wool turtleneck for eternity.

There is a specific moment when your immediate experience becomes part of your past. Being home in the disappointment and sadness, it was still happening. Being at work and describing what happened and saying, “I just didn’t have any embryos to transfer back in,” all of a sudden turned my present into a story. I was officially one step removed. I wondered if, like a trauma narrative, retelling my story over and over would help me feel less traumatized, as it became something I lived through rather than a reality that was constantly assaulting me. I couldn’t talk about it much; it was still too raw. So I saw my clients and I did my paperwork, and I continued my neurotic mindful labeling.