Hi, I'm Meg, and I'm a Pregnant Infertile.

I will start with the disclaimer that I am and always will be eternally grateful that I am pregnant. Grateful that I get to realize my dream of having biological children. I know that not every woman who experiences IF gets to have a happy ending. I know that it is a blessing and I treasure it through and through. It may have taken over $25,000, many attempts at IUIs, two fresh IVFs and one FET,  an ectopic and a chemical, almost three years of my nearly four-year-old marriage and a lot of therapy, panic attacks and antidepressants - but I made it to the other side, well - almost to the other side and it's worth everything I went through to get there. I qualify it with 'almost' because until I'm physically holding my babies I still have that feeling that they could be snatched away from me at any second. I worry that I'm a kid that got their hands on a toy that doesn't belong to them and I'm just waiting for an adult to notice and take it away.

Even though I'm pregnant I'm still infertile. While the vast majority of women out there got to just have some fun in bed with their partner to get their baby, I went through that list of challenges I wrote out above. While they can plan for their next child, I know this is my one shot. While they worry about needing to take birth control or getting their tubes tied after if they don't want any more kids, I know I don't have that choice. It's been made for me by the universe already.

I (obviously) spend time online, and have been spending time on a pregnancy board. I don't know how much longer that will last though. While I enjoy some of my time there, it's hard being surrounded by pregnant fertiles. They talk about their other kids and their other pregnancies and compare them to this pregnancy. This is my pregnancy. This one. This is it. I'm just incredibly lucky that we got the BOGO and I get to realize my dream of having more than one child. They talk about being even more excited to be pregnant now because they found out the baby is the gender they had hoped it would be.  Ore better yet, are upset and crying because the baby they're having isn't the gender that they wanted. I can't even respond to that one, I just can't. I'm disgusted by that. They talk about birth plans, and dream nurseries and all of that, and yes, I get to be a part of that, but my dream has some tarnish on it that won't rub off, and our savings are depleted from IVF so we're working within a very tight budget. I find myself feeling infuriated at fertiles once again. Wanting to yell at them to just be grateful that they get to have more than one pregnancy, that they haven't had any losses, or that all they had to do to get pregnant was have sex! Ugh! I want to smack them in the face. I'm sorry, but I do. I just want them to be grateful for the gift that they've been given handed on a silver platter. I want to say something to them...but I can't, so I stay silent and write a blog post instead. I know you will understand. I'm not sure they will.

It's just hard. That's all. Not 'going through IVF' hard, but I find myself once again feeling left out and isolated. Again trying to find a place where I belong. Realizing that even though I'm supposedly a 'normal' pregnant woman now, I'm not. I'm a pregnant woman who is infertile. I will always be infertile, even now that I'm pregnant, and even once I have children. It will always be with me, always a part of me. Even though I feel incredibly blessed to be able to have the children I'm going to have, I will always feel a little less blessed than the fertile women of the world. However, because their mother is infertile, my children will be the luckiest and most loved children. They will never want for love, never question that they were wanted, never feel like I wanted anything other than them. While infertility may have hurt me and taken things away from me, it will give my children two of the best parents a child ever had and more love than they'll ever know what to do with. They will have nothing but love and acceptance that is above and beyond unconditional.