melt-down moments

I've been trying to post positive things lately...I want as much positivity as possible surrounding me as I start my first IVF cycle (which is still really weird for me to say).  Over Christmas, though, I had a few "melt-down moments."  I debated over whether to blog about them--they are over, and rehashing them does nothing.  But because blogging often helps me process and close the door on things that are bothering me, I decided to put these out there.  Feel free to stop reading now.

1. Christmas Eve Mass: We purposefully went to 6:00 mass rather than 4:00 mass, since 4:00 is usually children's mass.  There I was, kneeling quietly waiting to receive communion, when out of nowhere the contemporary band stopped playing and a children's choir began to sing.  For some reason this hit me like a ton of bricks...I started literally weeping in my seat.  Not my finest hour.

2. The Night Before Christmas: A's family has a tradition that they read this book every Christmas Eve.  Since the youngest is now 15 and there are no grandchildren, it seems a bit out of place to me and I did my best to avoid it, even going to bed first on Christmas Eve. As we sat at Christmas breakfast, however, out popped the book, and my father-in-law proceeded to read the entire thing.  The appearance of a children's book felt very insensitive.

3. Presents: Let me preface this by saying that this is going to sound petty and entitled.  I realize that our families are not obligated to chip in for our treatment in any way.  Because we really only need help with treatment costs, though, we asked that instead of presents our parents give us money to put towards IVF.  This was our way of letting them know that any help would be immensely appreciated.  On Christmas morning, we got $200.  This was very nice, and we are grateful.  But A's little sister got a new iMac...the 27" screen iMac...the $1800 iMac.  It pained me to see this excessive piece of technology sitting there knowing that my in-laws, who have the means to do more, had not even given us enough to cover 1/3 of our follistim.

4. Traditions: A's family is a bit obsessed with traditions.  One tradition is to draw numbers to decide the order of opening presents.  During the number drawing this year, his little sister said something to the effect of this is how we do it and this is how we will always do it no matter how many people are in the family.  This was a special sting...I know that they value their traditions, but they were able to create their own.  I worry that his family will try to impose their traditions on us, rather than giving us the space and freedom to forge our own way.

5. Don't Ask, Don't Tell: Finally, in one of the few conversations where it was acknowledged that we are dealing with fertility issues (I brought it up everytime), we were talking around how everyone has an opinion about IVF.  A's mom said "Just don't tell anybody you are doing it," to which I responded, "I should be able to tell everyone, and I should receive nothing but support."  She didn't really respond, which of course made me feel that she doesn't agree.  I hate feeling like his family wants us to hide this, like it's some dirty secret.  We don't ask cancer patients to wear a wig and hide their chemo.  Why am I supposed to hide this very serious medical condition?

Sorry that these sound so whiny, but thanks for listening bloggie friends.  Sometimes you just need to vent.