If we’re looking for silver linings — which let’s be honest, we are, because otherwise it’s all one great big shitty grey cloud — phoning the clinic and telling them I was bleeding made them suggest I came in for an earlier blood test. So rather than spending the weekend knowing in my heart of hearts I wasn’t pregnant but having to wait for a blood test on the Monday to confirm it, I had the blood test on the Friday, got confirmation I wasn’t pregnant, and spent the weekend having the odd drink and eating rare burgers because frankly why the fuck not? Silver linings remember.
And if I’m honest the other silver lining of this whole thing has been seeing the true colours of the man I’m dating. In all the best ways. Like I said before, I feel that this isn’t just my story to tell any more. So it would feel like something of a betrayal of him to write about the conversations we’ve had, the plans we’ve made, and the things he said to me. But as I told my friend C, “If I’d been asked to script what I wanted him to say, I don’t think I’d have come up with anything half as good as what he actually said.”
I didn’t think men like him existed. Aside from the fact that he’s cute, funny and can solve crossword clues that I can’t (I mean, seriously, that’s a winning combo right there), there is something quite extraordinary about a man who, five weeks into a relationship, doesn’t walk out the door when a woman tells him she’s trying to get pregnant using IVF with an anonymous donor. There’s something even more extraordinary about a man who is actively supportive of that decision and, when it doesn’t work out, knows exactly what to say in a way that doesn’t sound patronising, platitudinous, or insincere.
There was a time when I wouldn’t have written those last two paragraphs. I’d have worried that it felt like tempting fate. That it would have looked like I was revelling in my good fortune and something was going to swoop in and take it away from me. (OBVIOUSLY I really hope that’s not going to happen.) But I thought it was important to mark the positives. (God knows this blog has had enough negatives to last a while… ) And he is very definitely a positive.
And, I’ve been thinking about him, and us, and IVF — and I am FULLY aware of how trite this next bit sounds — and the fact that I don’t think we’d be together if it weren’t for the IVF. I told him as much the night I told him about the IVF. I told him that for all that I wished things were more straightforward for us, I couldn’t regret the egg freezing, or the IVF, or the gazillions I’ve spent on it, because it’s made me the person I am, who I think is probably a nicer human being than I was before I started all this. (Don’t worry I’m not going to use the word “journey”, I’ve not become that much of a twat.)
I know, I KNOW I am SO not the sort of person who glibly parrots that “everything happens for a reason” and I also know damn well that everyone reconfigures their own personal history in a way that means they can live with themselves and not feel constantly full of longing, regret and remorse — and maybe that’s what I’m doing. But I think there’s something inevitable about what you live through changing your perspective. And if my perspective hadn’t changed in the way it has, I think I could very easily have overlooked, or dismissed a relationship that, whatever happens in the future, is making me very happy right now. But more than that, it’s a relationship that’s forcing me to recalibrate just how much fuckwittery I’ve put up with in the past — and make a vow to never subject myself to that sort of shit in the future.
I’m not riding off into the sunset or anything like that just yet, but I think I am going to take a break for a few months — from the blog, from all things fertility, from doing and not doing things because I worry about how they’ll affect my chances of getting pregnant. CLEARLY, I’m not going to start getting shitfaced every night, and I’m not going to stop taking my Pregnacare Max supplements. I’m not that person, I still want to have a child, I can’t be THAT reckless. But I do want a bit of space from all of this. Time to breathe, to have fun, to — in the words of Bebe Rexha and Florida Georgia Line — see where this thing goes…
After all, if it’s meant to be it’ll be… (well that’s what the song says anyway, and frankly right now I’m as up for putting my faith in country music as anything else.)
So — for now anyway — EggedOn out.
(That was my Obama-style mic drop.)
(I can’t believe I had to explain that.)
Egged On 
Go do it, relax, take that break. A wise man once said “Life is what happens to you whilst you’re busy making other plans”.. I hope that this relationship goes in all the directions you want it to. You deserve this happiness.
Drop by and let us know how things are going from time to time.
x
Hello, hello, thank you for your lovely words! I will be back, I promise x
I love this post. Choose happiness- you so deserve a break from this gruelling ‘regime’. Have fun, start spending your hard earned money on champagne and holidays and enjoy this beautiful new relationship 💖💖💖💖
Great idea to have the break, in all of this one thing you have to do is look after your mental health as best you can, because it is a head fuck. So pleased you have met such a lovely man, and I think you are right everything that got you to this point includes the IVF, and now fate has its way of putting this wonderful person right in your path and who knows what is next now? All the best for now xx
You’re so right – I think IVF focuses so much on the physical things your body is expected to do that we don’t prioritise our mental health half as much as we should (apart from getting stressed about the fact that we’re meant to be relaxing and we can’t!) Thanks for your good wishes x
Best of luck for the future!
Thank you – and thanks for reading! x
I’m so happy that at the end of reading this blog for which I have been doing for over a year now from the other side of the world in Sydney that you have met such a lovely person. Enjoy all the lovely fuzzy feelings that comes with a new great relationship and all the best for what the future holds for you. I think you really deserve it Xxxx
Oh thank you so much for following from all the way over there – and thanks for your very kind wishes. Doesn’t feel like this is the end, though, more a pause…..so hopefully there will be more for you to catch up on in the future x
I just want to say thank you so much, not just for all the factual stuff you have shared, but really telling us how it feels.
There are many of us on the sidelines who read, and support you, and I just wanted to say thank you.
Hope you have a great break and a few drinks, wishing you all the best things x
Thank you! For reading, and for appreciating what this blog is all about. No thanks necessary – I’m so grateful to have people who read the blog, and take the time to email and comment – I do so appreciate the support, thanks again, x
As a 36 year old London gal just starting the egg freezing process (it sounds like at the same clinic!), reading your blog for the first time this eve (start to finish) has made me feel so much less ‘solo’. You’ve talked about so many things that I’ve been wondering, worrying or putting off thinking about. Thank you for being graphic, honest and open, it’s made a huge difference to My feelings about where I’m at xxxx
Oh hello! You’re so welcome. Thanks so much for reading (start to finish in one night! That is one mammoth reading session!) and taking the time to comment. Glad it’s been helpful and I’m always here for questions, chats, reassurance, rants, whatever, whether in comments or via the Contact Me page. Wishing you the very best of luck with it all xxxx
I’ve written to you before, and you responded in such a compassionate way. I’m the one who had the baby with the married man and was talking about the low points of single parenthood in the truest sense possible. (i.e. not just separated/divorced from the child’s dad).
Anyway; I’m so delighted you have met such a wonderful man. He sounds very special. A lovely (single!) guy has been in my life for 3 and a half months now (similar length of time I think) and I have to pinch myself every day. He is my perfect man and is making me so happy.
Look at us with our beaus! And wishing you all the luck in the world with having your longed-for baby too at some point. Have a restorative, relaxing break and look forward to reading your next blog hopefully at some time in the future.
“There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind” – C.S. Lewis.
Oh I cannot tell you how happy this news makes me. I do remember you and I’m so, so pleased that you have found someone wonderful who is making you happy. Long may it continue! (Love that CS Lewis quote too.) Thanks so much for the update, it’s really put a smile on my face! Xxx
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