I guess in my journey, this is less of a question and more of a statement; I am less of a woman.
When I see a woman walking around with her beautiful bump, or carrying her newborn baby, or pushing a precious little one in their pram, or holding the hands of someone who so desperately needs the guidance of their mum, I feel like so much less of a woman than she.
I believe that I was put on this Earth to have children. I was messaging a lady recently who adopted due to the infertility battle she and her husband had experienced and she described me as having ‘a mama’s heart’.
She said, “God wouldn’t have given you a mama heart if you were never meant to be a mama.”
And this I so desperately believe.
But at the moment, it isn’t happening.
And I feel like a failure of a woman.
I feel like my body is not allowing me what my heart longs and aches for. And oh how I wish I could explain how much agony this makes me feel.
Now, I get it. I know that biologically I am about as ‘woman’ as I can be. I have a vagina, I have a uterus, I get my monthly periods (yay, thanks mother Earth…) and I have breasts. I am fully a woman. No doubt about it. But all of those things are there for the very reason of having children. But right now I can’t have children. And so what is even the point of having all of those things if I can’t put them to the use they were created for?
Every month, my period arrives and I experience the loss of another baby that never even was. It reminds me of my female body that isn’t doing right now what it should be. I feel less of a woman.
To those who have never experienced this, I imagine this all sounds totally ridiculous. How can you feel the loss of a baby that was never there? But let me tell you, for those of us who have experienced this, and are still experiencing this, this is beyond anything I could explain and such a real feeling.
In a previous post, I explained that my husband’s sperm morphology was low which could be part of why we are struggling to conceive. But we don’t know for sure if that is why. In fact, our GP seemed pretty convinced that that isn’t the reason and when his results come back from his second test (which was sent off today), it will probably come back normal.
Whether or not my husband’s sperm isn’t the best quality, we as a couple are currently unable to conceive. I thought if the problem lay in the sperm, then I’d feel better. But I don’t. We are infertile, not I or he, but we. And as a result, of the sperm or whatever, I feel less of a woman that someone who is able to conceive, carry and birth a child.
It took me a while to realise I felt this way. For months and months whenever I saw I saw a mum with her child, a pregnant woman or another pregnancy announcement, I would put my head down and look to the floor. I felt so unworthy that I couldn’t even look at the woman with her child or the bump. I didn’t even consciously realise I was doing this for a while; I just couldn’t look at it. And it is because I feel like a failure of a woman.
I totally didn’t think that this was normal but it doesn’t take much research to find that a lot of women, and I imagine men suffering with infertility too, feel a loss of womanhood (or manhood) when they are unable to do what their bodies were created to do.
Here are some blogs and pages that I found useful in understanding how and why I was feeling like this. They also articulate it much better than I do! And they’re great at encouraging you to not feel like a lesser woman than those with kids. Super helpful if you’re feeling the way I do!
“You are all woman, no matter what your fallopian tubes are doing. You are desirable, you are loved, and your identity as a woman is not contingent on your ability to birth a child….. Infertile girl, we are more than the people we make. We are more than the sex we have and the checklists we keep. We are more than the waiting and shots and disappointment. We are more.” *Weeping*
https://www.unexpected.org/2014/09/does-infertility-make-you-less-of-a-woman/
“The very definition of female is “of or denoting the sex that can bear offspring”. And I can’t do that. What’s the point of having ovaries, a womb and breasts if I can’t use them as nature intended? Getting my period is a monthly reminder of my reproductive potential – and failure. My uterus is defective, ergo I am defective. ” Yep, I have had these thoughts too!
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/02/feminist-infertility-failure-child-mother
“Our bodies are designed to carry children. Of course, that is not all our bodies are capable of doing, and there are many women who choose not to have children—but for women who desperately want to bring a baby into the world, infertility has slammed that door, locked it, and thrown away the key. In my experience with barrenness, there were times that I looked in the mirror and wondered why my body betrayed me like it did. I carried around the notion that I was not as feminine, womanly, and attractive because I could never birth a child. After all, it is one thing—a big one—that distinguishes women from men.”
“Infertility is certainly not for the faint of heart. Women who are dealing with infertility are a lot of things, but we are not inadequate. We are brave. We are curious. We seek answers. We ask tough questions. We dive into the unknowns. We willingly undergo procedures, testing, and processes to aid in our path to motherhood. We embrace life as the gift that it is and have learned not to take anything for granted. Most of all, we understand just how precious motherhood is…
…Infertility may make you feel inadequate, but friend, you are not.” THIS!
https://adoption.com/when-infertility-makes-you-feel-inadequate-as-a-woman
Journeying to Family 