When Your Infertile Friends Leave the Nest

When I was single (which felt like forever), I have a partner in crime for all my single adventures. Her name was Stacey. We’d go to bars. We’d go dancing. We’d hang out at coffee shops despite the fact that we both hated coffee. We would be each other’s wing-man (or wing-woman) in the quest to meet a sane, employed man which was not as easy as it may sound.

Now, I’m not proud of this but we would often mock people who were in relationships. Let’s be honest: we were jealous. We couldn’t figure out why it wasn’t us staying home ordering in and renting a movie with our “pooh-bear”. Why hadn’t we met anyone? We’re cute! We’re funny! We’ve got a lot to offer! It was frustrating and with every engagement announcement, every bridal shower and every wedding, we’d become more and more snarky and dismissive about the institution.

After years of rejection, online dating and having dinner with men who flossed their teeth over dinner, I sort of gave up on ever meeting anyone. The dates I went on during my “Single Sentence” bordered on science fiction. There was the time I had brunch with a guy who worked for the sewage system and he talked all about raw sewage for an hour while I tried to eat (I’ve never had Eggs Benedict again by the way) or the guy who asked me to guess how old he was and then got pissed at me because I guessed right (he wanted me to guess younger) or the guy who told me outright that he hated Chinese people (I’m not joking) or my favorite, the guy who hid in the bathroom waiting for me to pay the check so he didn’t have to. I think he’s still hiding in the bathroom to this day.

Then, one year, Stacey announced that she was going to get engaged in the next six months if it killed her, me and anyone else in a one mile radius. I thought this was ambitious but I respected that she was setting a goal for herself. Besides, I had already committed myself to a life of spinsterhood so if one of us were to get married; it was going to have to be her.

Of course, a few months after this conversation, I met Sam who is now my husband. Literally out of nowhere, we met through mutual friends and within a month, we had fallen completely and totally in love. Six months after that, we were engaged.

Stacey knew I had met someone and that I thought he was definitely a “person of interest” but when it came time to tell her I was engaged, I was extremely nervous. She was still single and I was officially becoming what we made fun of for so many years.

When we went to dinner and I broke the news to her, she looked at me for a moment in shock and then said, “How did you get engaged? You weren’t even trying to meet anyone? I’m busting my ass and YOU’RE the one who gets engaged! I can’t believe this!”

You’d think I’d be hurt but really, I understood. I knew somewhere in her, she was happy for me (and she eventually said so by dessert) but she was ticked it wasn’t her that had this news. Besides, after all the sh*t I said about my married and/or newly engaged friends when I was single behind their backs, I at least respected that she vented to my face. I was abandoning her and joining the enemy… and I knew how that felt. I couldn’t be mad at her at all.

I think of this story often when a fellow fertility challenged friend announces their pregnancy. How they must feel how I felt with Stacey that day; guilty that I was happy and that I had found someone and that she hadn’t yet. I made every effort not to be over the top with giddiness about my engagement or my wedding. I went out of my way to keep up with single activities such as meeting her for drinks or gabbing on the phone with her any chance I got. In retrospect, I think I even didn’t fully allow myself to be as happy as I was for fear I was hurting Stacey or my other single friends. I knew better how it felt to be in their shoes than anyone and I didn’t want them to think of me the same way I thought of married people all those years.

The thing is every time someone I know who has struggled along with me to conceive ends up pregnant; it is a mixture of true joy and a bit of sadness. You do feel like you’ve lost a person who was in the trenches with you and you’re sad for yourself but you can’t help but feel happy for someone you know who has struggled desperately to achieve this moment. Ultimately, these stories of successes should offer you hope and incentive but in lower, more hormonal moments, it’s difficult not to feel either left behind or disappointed that it’s still not you.

All in all, it’s a mixed bag of emotions. I think the bottom line though is we all have different issues and we’re all different people. There is no logic to when it should or shouldn’t happen for one person or another. There isn’t an “Ok, whose turn is it now to be pregnant?” or “Who deserves it?” so why even bothering comparing yourself to someone else who got knocked up when you didn’t? Also, and as comical as this may sound, I do often remind myself that just because so-and-so had a baby, that doesn’t mean she directly took my baby away from me.

Now let me be clear here: I can say all this and I know it’s all true but obviously, if you’ve been reading my blog, you know there are times when I am blindly jealous or resentful of the fertile community at large. I’m human, I’m hormonal and at times, quite frankly, I’m downright pissed off at my situation. Still, in more reasonable moments, I remember the whole Stacey situation and I know that in this scenario, I’m Stacey.

One day, I hope I’ll be the one with happy pregnancy news. I also hope that when that happens, my fellow infertiles will forgive me for getting pregnant and celebrate along with me. Right now, at this moment, I have the opportunity to react to others pregnancy announcements like I hope others will react for me – with nothing but happiness, support and encouragement. Does it still hurt at times and am I still jealous? Fuck, yeah but I look at it as an investment for when it’s my turn. Well, that and because I know in my heart, putting aside all poopy, negative feelings, I actually am genuinely happy for them.