The women we don't speak of.

I've been thinking about this for awhile. This is probably one of the most personal entries I could ever write. The internet and social media is saturated with mommy bloggers. Women posting about their pregnancies, and what they're learning as they set off on the journey of new mom. It's a club you don't belong to until you become a mother yourself. Babies. Toddlers. Everywhere. Women sharing jokes, and advice, and parenting tips among themselves, all able to relate to each other. This isn't hard to find. You're probably a click away from finding one now.

Then there are stories of women who tried to get pregnant, but weren't able to. There are blogs and articles dedicated to infertility. There aren't as many dedicated to this side, but they're out there.

Lately, I've found myself asking the question, "what about the in-between?" There is a group of us who lie in the haze of the middle. The group of women currently trying. We are floating in the grey area, without belonging to one category or the other. It's a strange, anxious, and superstitious place to be. Half of the month you may be sure you aren't. This is either a hopeful or hopeless phase, depending, I've found. More on that in a bit. The next half of the month you are with, and without. You proceed accordingly, but what does that mean? You may treat yourself as though you are, but if you find you're not, it's back to square one. 

This is the hardest place. It's hard not to be frustrated. To scare yourself by wondering if something is wrong. To put pressure on yourself. The emotional roller coaster is constant.

I find it spills over into many aspects of my life. It obviously affects what I eat and drink, but also my mood, and what activity I may choose to do on a weekend. It affects conversations, and how social I may feel. You must dance around your conversations and plans because you don't yet know yourself. You can't plan something months ahead since you have this priority, yet you don't know for sure, and you don't know when. You can't really talk about what you're going through, so you try to adapt as best as you can to this new existence where it all revolves around trying. A couple of weeks of extreme hope, and a couple of weeks of extreme disappointment. How I'm going to behave that month purely depends where you catch me. I'd say sorry, but I'm not. My husband, my well being, and this future family trumps everything. That's why this is hard. 

When you tell someone you're trying, in hopes of some support, you wish you hadn't more often than not. Even other women, and women who are mothers, seem to forget that before they had their babies they too went through this fragile, sacred time. A time that will be short for some, long for others. 

They ask you when. When hurts. It's impossible to know. If only we had control of what month we could get pregnant. What month we'd like a baby to be born. If only. Some know you're trying, but ask when anyway. Some make jokes. Some tease you that you are, or going to be soon, when they don't know what you've embarked on, and what you've already been experiencing. I've already written about the insensitivity of this for YoU Mag (Are you pregnant yet? Page 13) . You don't know your ultimate outcome, and what if (god forbid) you end up falling in the can't category?

Why aren't there blogs or articles dedicated to us? Who live in half hope, half disappointment each month? Who don't yet belong to a can or can't category? Who buy expensive test after test, heart pounding as we wait for the result. Who are dying for this to be the time we get to tell our husband, "I'm pregnant!" Who can sometimes power through, with faith that it's just not our time. But who sometimes spend the day crumbling, fighting back heartbreak, sure it's never going to happen. Those days, and very well the days that follow, I retreat from the world. I feel I have failed. Again.

I know I'm not alone, and I'd sure like to hear the words of others who get it. We're our own club. There is more to it here in the club of trying than I'd expected. It's definitely different than life before. I'm no longer a woman existing as I did before we decided to join.

I am reluctant to write this. This means letting even more people in on my most personal plans. But I'm in the category of women that we don't speak of, so I'm speaking about us. I'd like to meet my others. This is it's own club and I'd like to know where my women are that exist this way each month, emotionally exhausted, and wondering when it's finally going to end. 

~DM