I have lived with infertility for nearly 6 years and hope to give women with infertility a voice. I live in Minnesota with my husband and teen age step son. You can follow me on my blog.
I was originally going to do a series of photos that were going to inspiring and happy and all sorts of awesome, that post was scraped since I can't lie and pretend that after a year since my first article here on Still Standing things are so much better because they aren't. In some ways they are but others are worse. The last year I've gone … [Read more...]
Since Thanksgiving, my almost 16 year old stepson has been living with us full time. Parenting a teenager is hard, but parenting one that is not yours is even harder. As with all teens we've been having attitude and school issues and issues with chores. One of the issues was the teen thinking he was doing everyyyythiiiiing around the house(remember … [Read more...]
In the infertility world, there are things that every infertile cringes at hearing. "Just relax!!" "Go on vacation, you'll come back pregnant" "Just adopt, my hairdressers husbands cousins teacher adopted and 3 months later she found out she was pregnant!" We have all heard those in one form or another more times than we ever wanted to. Lately … [Read more...]
Apparently having a "Mother Heart" is real. Not because I'm a loss mom but because some one pure of heart and mind said so. A child. A child very dear to my heart told me matter of fact that I'm a Mom. Since I was young I've always had children in my life, started when I was 10 with my first niece and has continued. I have 2 special little … [Read more...]
We made it! (but not without tears) We made it through another Holiday season. (for some of us, just barely) We made it through the onslaught of holiday pregnancy announcements. (about 10 at my last count) We made it through all the holiday get togethers with the tiny tots opening presents. (will our children ever sit in that … [Read more...]
December 1st. 2 days ago. December 1st, 2007. 5 years ago. The reason I don’t care about Thanksgiving. The reason I’m having to learn to like the holidays again. I lost my second baby and lost my fertility. I should have a 4 year old. I was so excited, I shared the news to family on Thanksgiving Day. I bought my mom this silver … [Read more...]
Let’s talk about sex, yes, doing the deed, baby dancing, getting it on, doing the dirty. Imagine with me for a moment... You’re in the bathroom, you take out your “special cup”, you know the one that you pee in and use to dip all your tests in. You dip your ovulation test and sit there staring at it for the allotted 3 minutes and BAM … [Read more...]
My intent this month was to write something a little more light hearted and funny. We’ve all had those special and whacky moments in our journey where we have thought to ourselves, “Did this really just happen? Is this real life!!??” and I went to a special group of ladies and not only got some of the humor I was looking for but also those … [Read more...]
As of late, I have had more and more of my friends who started trying to conceive with me over 5 years ago starting to have their second and third pregnancies. These are some friends that infertility have cost me, not because of ill will towards them but because of the shift in priorities and life in general. Those of us with no children are on a … [Read more...]
Hey Gods, anyone there? I often imagine the gods up above us in their amazing world sitting in grand palaces, eating ambrosia. They look down and watch over us like a child with an ant farm. Yes, ant farm, you read that correctly. They watch us with boredom in their eyes and think to themselves, “Oh yeah them. Eh, they are ok and still moving … [Read more...]
She draws me rainbows and colourful swirls and announces to me “This what heaven looks like, Mummy. My big brother is there. He died. But he is in heaven now, so it is okay. He has special lights on his hands”. River, my daughter, sees things that I cannot. She tells me stories about [...]
It’s inside the spaces– the pauses– the infinite stillness– that I most palpably feel the emptiness you’ve left behind. It’s the silence of your missing voice that screams the loudest. It’s every holiday that’s impossible to truly celebrate. It’s the painfully absent goodnight routine. It’s the missing you in every picture of our forever-one-too-small family. [...]
