Christmas should be full of festive cheer, good feelings, great food, a relaxing break from work and most of all, the people you count as important in your life. Should be, but often isn't. For people trying to conceive, Christmas can be full of awkward questions about if or when they will have a baby "like your ______ (sister, friend, cousin, sister-in-law, niece, or Mrs. Anyone's daughter."
There are also insensitive comments dropped like lead balloons by someone who either hasn't heard you are having difficulties, or has forgotten it in a haze of eggnog or sherry. "What's wrong today is that women want to spend their child-bearing years gallivanting around the world or having a career. They only have themselves to blame if they can't get pregnant."
I was lucky not to have to endure either of those situations, however, I have been cornered into a debate over whether it was right to ask the NHS or insurance companies to cover the cost of fertility treatment, as those dollars come out of "our pockets." I was also told by an unnamed member of my husband's family that I "could just bypass all of that palaver (ancient Brit word meaning fuss or bother) by adopting from Vietnam or Korea. Seems like everyone is doing it."
- Did you spend your nights leading up to Christmas coming up with a dozen different scenarios of what you would say if someone else said something to you?
- Did you and your partner set ground rules about how long you would stay at Christmas dinner?
- Did you work out a signal for "Save me!"?
- Did you wish you could become invisible?
- Was it worse than you imagined?
- Was it pleasantly better than you imagined?
- Was it just the light-heartedness that got under your skin?
- Was it being around the pregnant relatives and young children that got to you the most?
- What did you do?
If you can bear to revisit it, please share what happened at Christmas for you this past week. It might help clear the decks, emotionally speaking. It will also help me understand more about what my fertility coaching clients may be feeling at other family get-togethers this year and help prepare them for Christmas next year.
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