Struggling to conceive, Sara Sweet makes her third attempt at intrauterine insemination just before her family's Christmas gathering.
Sara Sweet is a writer and storyteller from Boston. She is a Moth Grand Slam champion and has been a featured teller with Fugitive Stories, Now Hear This, Listen Up Storytelling, Life Is Good and the Moth MainStage.Sara and her husband are aunt and uncle to 8 nieces and nephews.
This story originally aired on August 30, 2019 in an episode titled “Labor Day.”
Story Transcript
I am sitting in the waiting room of the fertility doctor’s office and all the magazines in here are about babies or mothers or breastfeeding and I’m just looking for something to take my mind off pregnancy because I am not pregnant, like just an US Magazine or even a Golf Digest. There is a poster on the wall of a family and their doctor and it says, “Making families together.” This is kind of creepy but also a pretty accurate depiction of what is going on here.
After a year of no luck trying the natural way, my husband and I have turned to IUI, intrauterine insemination. You know, the turkey baster. Where they basically take the sperm and put it right into your uterus, kind of cutting out the whole trip so it can just get to the egg fast. It’s like the sperm is taking an Uber or a Lyft instead of walking those last few blocks.
And I am excited about this. It’s the easy part. It’s all the stuff beforehand that’s hard, like the injections. I have to give myself shots of a drug that’s supposed to stimulate my ovulation. I am afraid of needles. Not really afraid. It’s more like a full-blown phobia. The mere thought of a needle renders me absolutely terrified and so my husband has to give me these injections. He can barely get the needle to puncture the skin of my tummy pooch because I am screaming so loud and he is laughing so hard.
But he's really got the short end of the stick because not only does he have to give me the injections, he has to make the sample. His first attempt at doing this at the doctor’s office is hampered by some fussy venetian blinds and what he calls less-than-inspirational materials. So we are sent home so he can do this where he's more comfortable.
He does, but then we have to rush back to the doctor’s office and, of course, we have to go on Storrow Drive, and this is a test to both our marriage and my skills as a Boston driver. We do make it there on time but, unfortunately, our first attempt at IUI is a failure.
So we try a second time and we do everything right, no mistakes, and it doesn’t work.
Our doctor tells us, “You know, IUI does help increase the chance that you'll get pregnant but there are no guarantees.”
I’m frustrated because I’m all in. I am getting books out from the library, I’m reading WebMD all day long, and I’m getting braver at needles. But nothing we’re doing seems to have an effect.
Plus, the pressure is on because both of my sisters and my sister-in-law are all pregnant, and everyone is like, “It’s going to be so awesome that we’ll all be pregnant together.” This is really playing upon my deepest fear, which is to be left out.
It’s definitely starting to seem like I am going to be left out of this very cool girl gang, this tribe of all my female relations going through what most people call a miracle without me.
By the time we get to our third IUI, the last the insurance will pay for, it’s nearly Christmastime. I know the holidays are going to be rough anyway because we are going to my in-laws where we will be meeting our new nephew for the first time, also while waiting to see if this last IUI worked.
Not to jinx it but my period is three days late by the time we sit down for dinner on Christmas Eve and so I get a little excited. After dinner, I allow myself to think a few cute thoughts as I put on my pajamas, like the nickname ‘Peanut’ or naming a baby after my dad whether it’s a boy or a girl.
But then, as if on cue from Judy Blume, I get a huge and horrible period, like the worst of all times. I am definitely not pregnant.
Downstairs, there is a ruckus. It’s the grandparents. They're oohing and aahing, fawning. At long last, my brother-in-law and his wife have arrived with their brand new baby boy just twelve days old.
I take one of those big, Are-you-there-God?-It’s-me-Margaret maxi pads, put it in my underpants, take the deepest breath in the history of breathing and go downstairs to meet him.
Everyone is practically turning inside out with all the firstness and the cuteness and the Christmasness. I am actually turning inside out because this period is more like a light hemorrhage. I have a headache the size of double boiler and can only stare blankly at this baby who looks like a photocopy of my husband from when he was born. I am not happy. I am jealous and this makes me feel sad.
Standing downstairs staring at this baby, I’m trying to not feel jealous. I’m trying to feel Christmassy, but I can’t.
“No, thanks,” I say, when the baby is thrust in my direction to hold.
And this family is big on family. It’s a bitter pill to swallow that it seems like we’re not able to contribute to the fold. My husband and I survive the remainder of this visit by crying in secret and drinking a lot.
But we decide we’re going to try a fourth time out of pocket. We meet with a fertility doctor just after New Year’s. I’m sitting with her in the office. She's waiting for me to toss out a couple of dates that might be good to schedule the procedure. When she tells me she's got my latest blood work and that my FSH level, follicle stimulating hormone is at 29, 29 is not good. 29 is high, like really high. I mean, I’m not an expert but I have learned during this process that the ideal FSH level for someone trying to get pregnant is between three and fifteen.
I’m crestfallen, but also a little bit angry. Like I have been trying so hard. Can’t any of my good, hard work count for something? The answer is no, because that’s not how biology works. Biology doesn’t give a shit how bad you want a baby or how many books you've read or how many death-defying trips you've made on Storrow Drive. It is what it is. And an FSH level of 29 is a no-go.
But I ask her anyway, “Say, isn’t this a little bit high? I mean would it be crazy to try this again? I mean, would it be irresponsible? Isn’t 29 in the no-go range?”
“Yes,” she says, “but there's always hope.”
And I’m like, “I've used up all of my hope. Hope is no friend of science, and hope is certainly not enough.” I tell her, “I think we’re going to pass on this next attempt.”
She gives me a pamphlet on adoption as I leave her office.
Spring comes around and I have yet to hold the baby. I just can’t. I feel like a jerk but I’m just too sad. Me and my husband are both so depressed, me especially because, now, my failure has a name, premature menopause.
Right after we find this wonderful news out, my brother-in-law gives us a call to check in and see if there's anything that we need. And we tell him, “You know, we just need time,” like we can’t have a baby, I’m having menopause at forty, and everyone in our family has children, like we are up to our seventh niece and nephew now. “We just need a minute.”
And he's like, “Absolutely.”
But then four weeks later, we’re all gathered together again and my brother-in-law tells me and my husband that he is disappointed that we haven't held his baby. That he is annoyed and sad because he thought we were going to be the cool aunt and uncle.
Now, I know having a baby makes you crazy, or so I have heard, but my brother-in-law proves this tenfold when he looks at me and says, “You know, you should really just hold the baby. It will make you feel better. Babies make everything better.”
I look at him like Dirty Harry. Is he kidding?
“Are you kidding,” I say, “Because I know if I hold that baby, my heart will break into a million shitty pieces. I know if I do anything as dangerous as cradle him or smell his little head, I'll be done for, brokenhearted for eternity.”
I leave the room. We don’t talk about holding the baby again.
Time goes on and this baby morphs into a toddler and my husband and I start going to less and less family events. I mean, we still do the top tier stuff, like Christmas and retirement parties, but as my nephew grows, so does the wall that my husband and I are building around ourselves. Loving him just feels too impossible.
The toddler is now a little guy. He's like seven. And I have held him, briefly, on my lap since that conversation, but mainly we just high-five and hug goodbye. Even this, this most basic smidgeon of connection has taken time, a lot of time.
As mysterious and fickle as the reproductive system is so, too, is the heart. But my heart, unlike my eggs, I think might be a better listener and there's a chance that I can become the cool aunt. I mean, there are no guarantees, but there's always hope. Thank you.