A Coward at Heart
So there I am reading Thalia's latest post (yes, I know how to insert a link but no, I generally don't do it. I figure if you've made your way to my dark little corner of blogland, you are most likely well versed in anyone I'm likely to mention). After reading the post, I ran through the comments, largely to laugh at DD - ah, sorry DD, that should read, largely to laugh WITH DD (she'll forgive me as we have a lot of repoire).
I was expecting some people to agree with Thalia's comments - that as members of the IF blogging community, pregnant (previous IF people) somehow owe it to the rest of us (those I call the leftovers) to continue blogging. However, I was also expecting some disagreement and there didn't seem to really be very much of that. I guess it's just another way that I don't fit the "norm".
Just speaking for myself (as I am wont to do), I blog because it is where I can express some of the crap that I don't feel I can outside of blogland. I am part of a community (away from the computer) and I find it difficult and sometimes near impossible to inflict my crap on those people who care about me. None of my family or close friends have known about four of my five pregnancies that resulted in miscarriage until after the fact (and most of them still don't know I am a recurrent miscarrier). NONE of my family or friends even know about the last miscarriage. I obsessively told acquaintances and near strangers I was going through a miscarriage but not any of those near and dear. You see, it hurts them too much.
And I don't want anyone I care about to feel they have to temper their joy around me. A baby is one of the very most joyful things in the world and I never want to dilute that euphoria for anyone. If I have a problem dealing with pregnancy and baby news, it's exactly that - it's MY problem.
I don't want people I care about to tiptoe around me in any way. I don't want people I care about to think twice about bringing their babies over or offering to let me hold them.
So the sadness I feel sometimes? What do I do with it? I deal with it and sometimes blog. And (for me) blogging is not done to be part of a community that I am somehow beholden to. And I in no way feel that other bloggers I read owe me a dime (not even a wooden nickel).
What I want for the IF bloggers I read is for them to have their child(ren) (however they pursue it) and to leave the whole IF shit long behind them. If you actually obtain your child(ren) and still hold on to all the pain of IF, that is the only thing that could genuinely piss me off. Damn, I'm going to have to link here (read it, READ IT).
For some of us, a successful pregnancy would take away a lot of the need to blog. For some of us, it's the sadness that is the motivator.
And so, if I have ever commented or read your blog - you owe me nothing (your blog is about you, not me.) However, if you do decide to pack it in, I would appreciate the smallest of posts indicating your decision (just so I know the whole Mac truck scenario hasn't been played out).
I understand the "community" argument, I just don't see myself that way. Can I at least characterize myself as a rebel and not an outcast?
DinoD
So there I am reading Thalia's latest post (yes, I know how to insert a link but no, I generally don't do it. I figure if you've made your way to my dark little corner of blogland, you are most likely well versed in anyone I'm likely to mention). After reading the post, I ran through the comments, largely to laugh at DD - ah, sorry DD, that should read, largely to laugh WITH DD (she'll forgive me as we have a lot of repoire).
I was expecting some people to agree with Thalia's comments - that as members of the IF blogging community, pregnant (previous IF people) somehow owe it to the rest of us (those I call the leftovers) to continue blogging. However, I was also expecting some disagreement and there didn't seem to really be very much of that. I guess it's just another way that I don't fit the "norm".
Just speaking for myself (as I am wont to do), I blog because it is where I can express some of the crap that I don't feel I can outside of blogland. I am part of a community (away from the computer) and I find it difficult and sometimes near impossible to inflict my crap on those people who care about me. None of my family or close friends have known about four of my five pregnancies that resulted in miscarriage until after the fact (and most of them still don't know I am a recurrent miscarrier). NONE of my family or friends even know about the last miscarriage. I obsessively told acquaintances and near strangers I was going through a miscarriage but not any of those near and dear. You see, it hurts them too much.
And I don't want anyone I care about to feel they have to temper their joy around me. A baby is one of the very most joyful things in the world and I never want to dilute that euphoria for anyone. If I have a problem dealing with pregnancy and baby news, it's exactly that - it's MY problem.
I don't want people I care about to tiptoe around me in any way. I don't want people I care about to think twice about bringing their babies over or offering to let me hold them.
So the sadness I feel sometimes? What do I do with it? I deal with it and sometimes blog. And (for me) blogging is not done to be part of a community that I am somehow beholden to. And I in no way feel that other bloggers I read owe me a dime (not even a wooden nickel).
What I want for the IF bloggers I read is for them to have their child(ren) (however they pursue it) and to leave the whole IF shit long behind them. If you actually obtain your child(ren) and still hold on to all the pain of IF, that is the only thing that could genuinely piss me off. Damn, I'm going to have to link here (read it, READ IT).
For some of us, a successful pregnancy would take away a lot of the need to blog. For some of us, it's the sadness that is the motivator.
And so, if I have ever commented or read your blog - you owe me nothing (your blog is about you, not me.) However, if you do decide to pack it in, I would appreciate the smallest of posts indicating your decision (just so I know the whole Mac truck scenario hasn't been played out).
I understand the "community" argument, I just don't see myself that way. Can I at least characterize myself as a rebel and not an outcast?
DinoD
posted by DinosaurD at 9:05 AM
8 Comments:
Outcast was the last thing on my mind to characterize you. Don't laugh, but 'role model' came closer to it. Not so much in regard to blogging, but in regard how you shelter your friends and family (and in some ways yourself). I wish I could do that/could have done it.
I'm curious though, why would it piss you off, if someone still feels some pain about their IF even if they finally get a baby? I can't imagine anybody who didn't start "healing", but there may be still some emotional scars left-over.
Let's see if I can bring out the devil advocate in me:
If a baby post-IF should alleviate the pain associated WITH IF;then wouldn't it stand to reason that IF shouldn't be as traumatic for those with SIF?
That kind of flies in the face of the unwritten rules of Infertility, doesn't it?
(yeah, I heard you guffaw when you saw my comment on Thalia's post. I am actually very grateful we have that repoire)
Let the debate begin!
Oh my god - you mean there are rules to all of this?
I still say, that eventually (somehow)you need to relinquish some of the pain associated with IF (and if a baby can't help you with that, god help you because I don't know what else would).
I'm not saying it's easy, I'm not saying you'd get rid of all of it but really, wouldn't it be a bit like listening to someone with two good legs complaining about how they had broken one of them years before and how much it hurt at the time (in the distant past)?
Okay, have at me now.
And please, please no more of who has the most pain. I know if I had the choice of my current infertility situation but with no previous child (primary infertility) and where I am now, I'll stay where I am now thank-you. Likewise, I imagine that most people with primary infertility would gladly accept a deal where they could keep their current infertiltiy situation but have already had a child.
I'm just saying.
Sorry if I'm making you see red but it happens to me whenever I see the sentiment that recurrent miscarriers can "at least get pregnant" and I just thought I'd share.
DinoD
I agree on the pain thing. You know that. I once told someone that the person who is the owner of the pain feels the MOST pain because it's theirs. They cannot make a judgement on someone else's.
But what if instead of a broken leg, IF is more like an amputation of a limb and a pregnancy is an prosthetic. Sure, it fills the void of the missing limb, but does it ever make up for the fact that there was a missing limb in the first place?
I cannot begrudge someone who gets pregnant and stops blogging. But I read blogs for more than just stories of their uterus. Sometimes bloggers forget that. They inadvertantly give us glimpses of their lives, but that's what attracts me as a reader. I associate with those people better. But I really think we shouldn't lay an expectation on anyone to continue blogging. It's not my obligation to anyone but myself.
Just as I admittedly stop reading some blogs when the two-lines show up, I know that when I announced that we were done with IVF back in April and then I switched sites, some people did not go with me. I no longer filled whatever void or had that "communal bond". It actually stung just a little. But, I've found a different niche. It's still infertility, but I now feel more comfortable talking about X or actually writing about goofy, day-to-day things.
Blogging is forever in flux, even though there will always be that line, ever so fuzzy, drawn in the sand between the haves and the have-nots. Many of us can dance on that line, but some are absolute. Could it be that those who suffer with PIFertiles find absentee blogging more of a peeve than SIFertiles? Is that making a stretch to something that's not even there?
And, my dear, one of the few times I ever see red is when I look at that dreadful picture I sent to you of me.
I so want to comment but each time I end up writing a novel of epic proportions, so I'll come back to it when my brain can reduce the size of my rambling to fit neatly into a comment post.
why oh why can't i be succinct
You're not an outcast - unless of course you want to be then by all means outcast away.
I too find myself wanted the blogger that gets past to post... because well to be blunt I want the blogger to find their happy ending, their camelot, their own private miracle (I was going to say Idaho, but I think that's a movie) anyways... but if they don't I understand.
I've never gone long enough to actually feel uncomfortable because well heck I'm the queen of the low doubling beta. So I don't know what I'd do in the same situation. Hopefully I'll come up with a game plan when and if that finally happens.
As someone dealing with recurring IF, I believe that having P did temper the sadness from primary IF. So there was some release from the abject depression of IF when I got pregnant, he stuck around the whole (OK, almost the whole) 9 months, and was born healthy. I can't imagine having held onto it forever. And I think that I am less sad about the idea of it never happening again than I would have been if I hadn't had him in the first place. But it's still painful.
I do like it when IF'ers blog after getting pregnant. I like to hear about how they're getting to experience all the things they never thought that they would. I like to read about how excited they are to meet their child, how it felt to finally hold the person they've been waiting to hold. And I do get sad when they drop out of blogworld. If I don't feel up to reading about pregnancy that day, I don't read their blogs. But other days, it gives me hope that this can sometimes work out. I don't know that I feel they owe it to me, but I do wish they would at least post about why they're dropping out of the blogosphere.
Yup, I'd trade for SIF in a heartbeat.
SIF brings it's own pain, I believe that, but the reward!
I think a 'duty to blog' is putting it a bit extreme. Though I do think it is beneficial for the IF community when women PG after IF continue to blog. As a leftover (LOL!), I appreciate it. The happy endings are uplifting.
But ultimately, it has to be the decision of the blogger.
Likewise, it is good to leave comments (well, supportive or constructive ones), but ultimately it has to be the decision of the reader.
Post a Comment
<< Home