Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Survivor's Guilt

Now that I'm pregnant, I sort of feel guilty that so many of my online friends are still struggling with infertility. Maybe guilt is the wrong word, but as much as I want to be supportive to them, in some ways, I don't feel I have the right anymore?

I keep telling myself when I was going through it, I was generally happy to see a fellow woman finally achieve success, so I should keep offering support. But I don't want to come across as "If it can happen to me, it can happen to you!" because that is just not true and not helpful.

The truth is when you are struggling with infertility, you don't know if you will ever experience pregnancy or parenthood and that is where the pain and fear come from. You want to be a mom so badly, and you don't know how things will end and when you will be able to wake up from this nightmare.

But I have been there, and I do have a story to tell. And I feel a connection to infertile women no matter where they are in their struggle. Infertility is a part of my life and has changed me.

2 comments:

Lisa said...

Thank you so much for recognizing that the "it happened to me, it will happen to you!" comments don't help!! I'm truly happy for you!!! And, I will absolutely continue to follow your story, especially since you're not coming back and saying the dreaded line above, which makes me cringe and want to scream everytime I hear it!

Mimi said...

This feeling doesn't leave you entirely, but then you remember when you were among them and know that they are happy for you. Yes, they're still waiting and that's pretty much out of your hands. When you hear someone's story and can share some experience, that may just be something that they need to hear. Without giving false hope your experiences does give some that otherwise wasn't there. :-)