Why I Refuse To Try Again

The Cute One is inching closer and closer to his second birthday, and the rumblings are starting to get louder and louder:

It's about time for another one.

The Cute One needs a little sister!

He's how old? Well, when is the next one?

These people mean well, but they don't know the struggles we went through just to get The Cute One in the world.

And, to be honest, I don't know that I'm willing to go through that again.

The Brain and I prayed earnestly about when we were supposed to start a family, and we really felt God saying to start trying in November of 2006. At that point, we had been married a little over two years, so we would have a baby just after our third anniversary. That all sounded hunky dorey to me. And we didn't decide this a month before; this was a decision we made about a year beforehand, so there was no rashness involved. Periodically we would pray again and make sure this was still what God wanted, and all the signs we got were that this was what He wanted.

You know how it goes, though, with trying to conceive. We may have said November, but really from about August/September of 2006 we didn't take any preventative measures, so technically, we could have gotten pregnant as early as August or September. We weren't "trying" yet, but we definitely weren't "not trying" either!

We didn't conceive until the end of March 2008, and during that time we found out I had PCOS, Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. It's basically an autoimmune condition where my body wasn't processing insulin effectively. My body would then produce more insulin than it needed, and all that excess insulin would turn into testosterone. So I could have become the bearded lady. Awesome. Because I was producing more testosterone than I needed, it was causing me to not produce progesterone, the hormone that allows you to carry a baby to term. If you don't have progesterone, you aren't going to sustain a pregnancy. PCOS can also cause you to gain weight, have more acne, and have really long menstrual cycles. Thankfully I didn't grow a beard or a mustache, but I did gain 30 pounds, and my cycles went from about 32 days long to about 39 days long.

During our time of trying to conceive, I got to meet Mrs. Vaginal-Ultrasound-Probe. Several times. We discovered I had "spots" on my right ovary. They wouldn't call them cysts at first because they weren't big enough, but I had four cyst-like things on my ovary. At my appointment two months later, where Mrs. Vaginal-Ultrasound-Probe and I got to spend more time together, I only had three cysts, but they were bigger. I'm guessing they ate the smallest cyst.

We also took my basal body temperature every morning, and I checked my cervical fluids all day long. Shoot, I am so used to it, I still do it! I can't help it. Wipe, then look at the toilet paper. I still take my temperatures because I like knowing when my period is going to come next.

I guess I say all that to say that I'm just not willing to do all that stuff again. I know God told us to start trying when we did, and I don't understand why we didn't get pregnant right away, and that's okay. I haven't had a major crisis of faith because of it, and I don't intend to start now. But, when people ask about us having another baby, it's hard to answer that. For now, we just joke that we are having another kid--The Drama Princess--but I know that's not what they mean. And as The Cute One nears his second birthday, I know the rumblings will only get louder and louder.

I just can't put myself through trying again. It's hard physically, mentally, and especially emotionally. Especially emotionally. I don't want to turn sex into just something we do at a certain time of the month again. I don't want to spend two weeks every cycle stressing over if I'm pregnant or not. I don't want to be "so in tune with my body" that I read every PMS sign as a potential sign of pregnancy. I'm tired of checking my cervical fluids--once you start, how do you stop!?

People that get pregnant easily don't understand any of this. They say things like, "Well it was worth it wasn't it?" I want to slap these people clear off the face of the Earth. Of course it was worth it, you morons! But there are a lot of people who do all those things, and they still don't get pregnant. You wouldn't ask them if it was worth it, would you? Geez people, grow a brain.

It's just hard. It would be nice to have a sibling close in age to The Cute One, so he can enjoy making memories with them, but I don't have the emotional fortitude to try for another year and a half like I did with The Cute One. I have prayed and prayed that if God wants it to happen that it just will. Even that is hard because I know the signs of ovulation, and it's hard not to fall into that pattern of "let's have sex right now so we can get pregnant!"

It's not something I would wish on anybody.

And I wish infertility were something I could drop from my life, too.