From The Other Side
My wife and I are fortunate to have a beautiful, energetic, strong 3-year-old girl. We conceived her with barely a thought about “trying” early in 2016. I would venture to say it happened on the first try. We were lucky. We knew that. We never really, or at least I thought, took that for granted.
As our daughter got older and we got comfortable with parenting and all its ups and downs, we discussed having a second child. We battled around the idea of our daughter being an only child versus the importance of having siblings. While we knew that there was no guarantee that they would be best friends, we decided we wanted our daughter to have someone else in her life besides her parents. However, as we were in the process of making that decision, our world was turned upside down.
In December of 2018, just before our daughter turned 2, I was diagnosed with cancer. I was diagnosed on a Thursday. Met my doctor on a Friday and started a 6-month journey of inpatient chemotherapy on that coming Wednesday. To say it was a whirlwind would be an understatement. Of course, my wife-being my wife, was able to think ahead and realized the implications treatment might have on my fertility. We froze my sperm the day before I went in for my first chemo treatment.
Good news, I was able to beat the cancer and got the all clear in June of 2019. Once the treatment ended, we took some time to get back on our feet, try to find the new normal and begin to look to the future. That future, we believed had another child in it. So, we began to try again.
And because of the euphoria of feeling normal after all the crazy of the year before, we were not even thinking about possible infertility. It was almost as if we blocked out the entire year and a half earlier. (I actually even forgot that we had frozen sperm.) In our heads, I was healthy and we were ready, so why wouldn’t it work?
But it didn’t.
So, instead of trying for a few more months, we decided to check in with our doctors and make sure everything was ok.
But it wasn’t.
My wife was fine. I was told that I was infertile. I think I had one sperm in my sample. And it wasn’t mobile. To actually hear this news was a bit more jarring than I imagined.
I put on a brave face and tried to joke about it. However, deep inside, I felt weird. I felt weak. I felt like less than a man. It was because of my body that she had to go through all of the pokes and prods and hormones that go along with IVF, in order for us to grow our family.
During my treatments, I had to give myself so many shots to keep healthy, so I had some understanding of the routine, but this was different. I felt both at fault and helpless. It was my body that was coming up short and causing her to put herself in pain and discomfort. Every male insecurity that I had tucked away about not being good enough, surfaced each night, as she would begin the process of arranging the needles. I would watch, but not too closely as to make her feel like I was watching. I wanted to help. With each prick of a needle and grimace on her face, I felt worse. I felt responsible for putting her through this journey. The what-if’s seeped into mind. What if I had pushed to try earlier? What if I hadn’t been on the fence about a second child. What if I had been less wishy-washy? We could have tried sooner, before my cancer diagnosis and we wouldn’t be in this situation. The self-defeating thoughts spiraled. Those few weeks of shots leading up to the actual retrieval were mentally exhausting. I wanted to be there for her. I tried to be there for her. But the constant regret I felt for it being my body that put us here, prevented me from fully showing up.
Once we started the retrieval, we were lucky to have a ton of viable eggs and were lucky to get to the blastocyst stage with 5 of them. We had no reason not to be optimistic that all 5 would be viable. Then we received the gut punch phone call. It’s a nearly indescribable feeling when you know there is bad news on the other end of the phone: a combination of anxiety mixed with fear, as you wait to hear the news.
All 5 of the blastocyst came back with severe abnormalities and couldn’t be used. We were back to square one. We were gutted.
I sat there, looking at my wife, as the news hit her. All that effort was for naught. The pieces of her facade fell as I watched her spirit begin to crumble and I felt my internal temperature rise with guilt for again being the reason that we were here to begin with. I understand it’s absurd to take blame for the failings of our bodies, particularly in our situation, but it is easier said than done.
And what makes matters worse is, I don’t really know with whom to talk to about these feelings of guilt? I talk to her and she reassures me that it is not my fault. While I believe her, there is a part of me that feels (probably my own shit) that she looks at me as “less than”. And the reason for all of this.
Truth be told, I think I look at me as “less than”. Right or wrong, it is my candid feeling and one with which I don’t feel I have the tools with which to deal.
With nothing to show for our journey thus far, we are now faced with prospects of only a limited amount of sperm left to maybe try again. I want us to realize our dream of another child to complete our family. And I am truly scared that it won’t work.
~MF