I was suppressing
tears when I left Dr. M's office. His simple solution, try to have a
baby now, was the furthest thing from simple for me. Obviously, he
could not know or fully understand that. He doesn't have a front row
seat to my imperfect life.
He initially didn't
fathom my reluctance to try to get pregnant right away. If I want a
baby, his thinking goes, just do it.
Noticing my
distress, however, he paused and said sympathetically, “I guess it
would be easier if you were married.”
Uh-huh.
Then he said what
many well-meaning people say when they hear about my situation: “What
about your boyfriend. You've been dating for three years, what's he
waiting for.”
That question
always stabs me in the heart. I've worked hard to make peace with the
fact that D already has too much on his plate trying to manage his
existing family to feel willing to add more to his brood. It's a
reasonable, legitimate and responsible position for him. No one
should be pressured into having children they don't really want. I
get that. I fully understand it and respect it. Plus, I'm not even
sure if creating a new blended family for us at this point is the
right thing to do for all of the people who would be affected anyway.
The timing is just not right.
But sometimes, when
that “why doesn't he want to?” question is put to me, my
rational, measured, patient perspective crumbles.
The
question hits me at the vulnerable spot in my psyche shaped by
decades of romance stories and fairy tales. Suddenly, Cinderella
awakens and whispers insistently in my ear, “If he really
loved you, he'd slay dragons to breed with you.” Or her evil
step-sister hisses, “Clearly, he's planning to dump you when he
finds someone he loves more. And you watch, he'll have a baby right
away with her.”
Possessed by these
voices in my head, I shrugged at Dr. M's question as if I didn't care
(the best defense against inner emotional turmoil), and tossed out,
“I don't know. Maybe he doesn't love me.” I was trying to be
irreverent, tough, anything to swat back the army of tears Cinderella
had summoned.
It didn't work. Her
powers were too strong. Before I got the last words out, I cracked.
My hands shot up to my face to cover the sniveling mess I was about
to become. Shit. I'm crying like a little girl in the goddamn hallway
of the fertility clinic. Can I be more cliched? But these attacks
come on suddenly and strong. I have little defense against the
initial onslaught.
Dr. M put his hand
on my shoulder to comfort me. “Well, it might be the time to figure
that out,” he said. I nodded, unable to form syllables at the
moment. And he continued, perhaps encouraged by my nod. “Don't you
think you deserve to be loved?”
Jesus Christ. He is
good at twisting that knife. He was taking tough love to a whole new
stratosphere.
“Yes,” I tried
to say confidently, although it came out small and feeble. Yes, I do.
The thing is, I
know my boyfriend loves me. And I love him. But when it comes to
making a baby, the world puts that love on trial.
I've already gone
through all the reasons why he and I are not at the place where a
young couple would be when their lives are yet to be written, or
where an older couple would be if they were both still trying to
create the family they never had.
Yet I often
encounter (in myself as well) a belief that we should apply the
mindset of those types of couples onto the lives of people in a much
different place. The assumption is that love means wanting to make a
family and a lifelong commitment to that family. And we judge the
quality of love by testing the equation in reverse... If he does NOT
want to have a baby, than he must not love you.
Perhaps
that simple equation works better in our 20s and 30s when the big
decision is who
to create a family with and not if
you want to create a family. But using that same equation on people
in their 40s often fails to compute. There are just too many new
factors involved that complicate the math.
I can't blame
anyone for making these assumptions. It's the common human experience
of love, marriage and family. My experience puts me in a super small
minority, and very few people can imagine how the circumstances of my
life change the rules for me.
Of
course, if I didn't love D and his kids as much, I could more easily
go out and try
to find a partner willing to create a family with me. But I've
already explained the lottery winning odds of finding that person in
the short time I have left to get pregnant. Leaving behind the love
and relationships I have and deeply value for the unlikely chance
I'll meet a fantasy idea of a my more perfect Prince Charming in
three months does not feel like a wise trade off. I must embrace the
good things I have.
Even writing this,
I cringe. I hate the calculating aspect of this decision. Every
outcome is imperfect. Fairy tales princesses didn't have to face
these kinds of choices. If she did, she was swept up in glowing
sparkly magic dust and *poof* her prince appeared right in front of
her – ready to impregnate her. All the difficult, complicated,
disappointing stuff in her life was washed away and the story ends in
the land of dreams. Everything becomes easy, simple and perfect.
Happily Ever After.
But even fairy
tales admit their happy endings require magic. And while I like to
believe in magic and luck, I also know reality is just as powerful. I
wish I could solve all my problems with the wave of my Fairy
Godmother's magic wand, but alas, I musta stayed out past midnight
too many times to warrant her attention anymore.
So like it or not,
I must face I do not live in a fairy tale world. A perfect Prince
Charming has not poofed up at my side. My life is complicated and
imperfect and difficult. It's real life. And I really hope
Cinderella's ghost will stop haunting it someday, cuz she definitely
succeeds in terrorizing me on occasion.
I know I am not
alone in this battle. The only thing that Dr. M said during his
seminar that actually made me feel better, in a misery loves company
sort of way, was that regularly in IVF treatment for older women,
partners (usually men who already have children) are less than
enthusiastic about having a child.
“Ah-ha!”
I thought when hearing it. “I am not
alone. Other women face this issue, too! Thank fucking God!”
None of us should
feel like the only unloved woman in the world because our partner is
reluctant to have a child. We should not feel shame or embarrassment
if our men say no because they already have too many family
responsibilities or other reasonable objections. Someday, if we talk
about it enough, and help the rest of the world see love does not
always equal baby, maybe we won't feel the pitying eyes of others
when they hear our stories. We won't hear them say, “Honey, open
your eyes. He doesn't love you. Find someone else. You deserve
better.”
Sure, yeah, I
deserve better. I also deserve to drive a Porsche and own a private
island.
This
is an increasingly modern problem for couples to have. With more
women delaying motherhood into their 30s and 40s, we are also
increasing the likelihood we will fall in love with men who already
have children. That means more and more women will face the same
issues I now face. Some might make decisions to leave their
boyfriends who don't want children, others might chose to stay like
me. Regardless, we should not judge our boyfriend's reluctance to
have a child as a singular red flag that he does not love us and
destroy the relationship because of that. It's unfair to him. And
it's unfair to us. True, his lack of love might
be the reason he doesn't want to have a child, but it also might not
be the reason. Bottom line, though, it is not the litmus test
Cinderella and her evil step-sisters would have us believe.
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