... and it's true. I let this "time off" get the best of me.
Ashley and I just got back from vacation where we did our share of relaxing, for once. The two of us don't see each other very often because our schedules are opposite and I work on Saturdays to boot. Trust me, she loves this... about as much as I love washing silverware by hand. Our vacation was great because we got to spend so much time together and after a few days we both came to realize that not getting pregnant in June was something of a gift. If we had been pregnant we wouldn't have been as comfortable and free to do whatever on vacation since we'd be trying to protect a bambino. I think that realization gave Ashley some closure on our first attempt.
Now we're back at work and ready to jump back into all things baby. At first it was difficult because we've been arguing a lot lately and the last thing I want to talk about when I'm frustrated is what we're going to do about buying sperm. But those little fights (about who knows what, anything from dishes to our schedules to sex) come and go. Ashley spent a while looking into our first choice donor and found he's now unavailable which through a tiny wrench into our plans. After she spent a few days of weeding out duds from our potential replacements, I suggested I come home after work one night, make mimosas, crawl into bed and we'd choose our donor. And that's exactly what we did.
Choosing our donor the first time around was a real time and emotional investment for Ashley, I think, whereas for me this file we review is just a means of choosing a healthy baby. Some physical things matter to me too, but mostly I have a moral issue with having so much control over who you chose. [We just sat down to drinks with our friends last week and talked about this and it's interesting that the divide was the same; one thinks buying pictures and etc is weird and the other thinks it's better to know what you're getting than be completely surprised.] I guess I like the idea of being detached from this donor. While he is significant to the life of our future child, I don't want to look into my baby's face and say, "Oh look, he's got donor2222's eyes." Not that it's super important.
Whatever, I've sidetracked myself.
The point is that Ashley was excited about our first choice. I think she's excited about our second choice as well, but it's clearly different this time.
I guess I'm just forever trying to maintain a sense of stability within our life together. I don't want Ashley to fall into this spiraling depression because we don't get pregnant when we only have a 30% chance! And getting pregnant isn't the only complicated thing we're dealing with here. We have our move to her parent's house (yes, we're doing that), another semester of school for her, I'm beginning graduate school, she's having to play superhero between two jobs, and we hardly see each other. Ashley is an amazing woman who really pushes herself to the end of the line and always holds strong, but when something pushes her off balance (like not getting pregnant in June), it's like a domino effect. She then has to continue all the commitments she has and try not to fall apart. That alone makes me worry. Then again, I always play it safe. I never take on more than I know for a fact that I can handle. Getting pregnant for me is a gamble that I hope we get lucky with sooner than later and I wish it could be similar for her.
That being said, I know it's not similar for her. Her body is involved, her hopes are high, she's working at being pregnant while I sit idly by waiting for a positive result. I don't work at it and won't have to until our baby is born. I guess this is just one of those things it's hard for me to connect with because her experience is so different from mine.
That's the emotional side but to move on, we bought our second round and it should be delivered in the next couple of days, I think. I'm excited to try but terrified of the two week wait. I think we really jumped the gun last time and I'd like to hold off for as long as possible this time around. We're going to be packing up this month, getting ready to move an hour south, which might help us keep our minds off pregnancy tests but... you know how tempting it is!
Until next time,
Kristen
No comments:
Post a Comment