Sunday, December 31, 2006

I think I am an elephant...

Did you know that a female elephant invests 4 years of her life in a single sperm? It works out to be 4 years because she is pregnant for a whopping 22 months and then does not ovulate for another 2 years. Don't you sometimes feel like an elephant, investing years of your life in a process that seems to take for freaking ever.

Other than spending my time lately thinking about elephant reproductive habits, which I must add was sparked by a program on National Geographic Channel, I have been thinking a lot about what Dr. Bowtie referred to as "getting lucky" in my last post. Every infertile thinks about it and hopes that they will be the one who can not get pregnant on the most aggressive fertility treatment protocol, but all of a sudden finds themselves with a positive pee stick either between treatments or after they have given up all hope.

I must admit that I have been guilty of this false hope. Even now I hesitate to call it false hope because I may jinx myself out of possible good fortune. I have been referred to as a cynic a few times and even good old Dr. Bowtie told me at my last appointment that I need to be at least a little positive while reassuring me that he does have success more often than not. So, even with my always plan for the worst case scenario mentality, why do I still remain the slightest bit hopeful that this process may one day work for us?

So here I am, about 5 days before my period is about to start, looking for all the "signs". We only mated (too much National Geographic channel) once with ovulation this time so with all our considerations there is realistically no chance it could work. But, there is still some part of my being that will not let me release hope. I reassure myself by stating that if it does not work this month we have 3 more times before IVF to "get lucky". This positiveness frightens me since it is truly quite uncharacteristic of my reproductive personality......or is it? Don't we all have some fraction of hope that guides us through this process? Putting fear aside since it usually overshadows hope, if we did not have even the slightest amount of hope, why would we continue to put our self through this torturous process? Even after the most heart breaking failure, we eventually can pick ourselves up and try again with some wisdom from the past experience, but also a "renewed" look to our current cycle.

So, although I may be an elephant in a temporal comparison, I am a human emotionally. Usually I cannot find my fraction of hope since I bury it with statistics and factors that are not favorable. But hope is a persistent little bugger and it seems to get beaten down and then surface again when you least expect it.

7 comments:

Stephanie said...

Oh hope. It keeps us going and doesn't allow us to throw in the towel. When lost we are left with dispair. Here's hoping for you "getting lucky" and my IVF cycle working. Here's to the hope of getting knocked up!

Anonymous said...

I am glad you have hope. It makes this all easier.

Happy New Year!

I am with Stephanie, I hope you can figure out how to get knocked up by only mating once! It does only take once, you know. . .

Anonymous said...

I can see her peeking between the lines of your post -- hope I mean. Without her we definitely wouldn't continue treatments.

Wishing you all the best for the new year, Josie!

Bea said...

I love the elephant analogy. Wow. Four years. I guess the odds of catching that egg must be pretty darn good. What's the elephant twinning rate?

Hope - well, ultimately it's based in fact. There may only be a small chance of luck, but you're not going to take home 1% of a baby if it happens to you. It is easier not to have to go through the disappointment of hope crushed, though. Double-edged sword, etc etc.

Bea

Bea said...

I love the elephant analogy. Wow. Four years. I guess the odds of catching that egg must be pretty darn good. What's the elephant twinning rate?

Hope - well, ultimately it's based in fact. There may only be a small chance of luck, but you're not going to take home 1% of a baby if it happens to you. It is easier not to have to go through the disappointment of hope crushed, though. Double-edged sword, etc etc.

Bea

LCP said...

HI! I just happened upon your blog and find it so interesting, as I am going through something similar. Are you blogging somewhere else?

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