It gets better?

Pardon my absence. This week has been filled with gnarly dental work and me contracting the plague. I've mostly been asleep or trying to keep on top of basic things around here.

I might hop back on the blogging theme bandwagon, I might not. I'm going off the script to talk about something else that's been rattling around in my head about some of the stuff around the world of people who blog about infertility have said; especially the people who have managed to get pregnant after struggling with it.

Witnessing a conversation between some friends on twitter earlier today helped coalesce some of the thoughts I had.


The It Gets Better Project has gotten a lot of attention lately after a rash of gay teen suicides. I think it's a great message and I've teared up watching several of these videos, especially the one from Fort Worth Councilman Joel Burns. Even President Obama has gotten on board. Columnist and author Dan Savage started the project with this video with his partner Terry. I have seen some people criticize Dan Savage's video as being somewhat disingenuous because it's easy for the guy who is a famous, rich, white advocate to speak from his privilege to tell struggling kids that it gets better. For most, no, they won't ever get Dan Savage's life.

Still, I like the message these videos give. But I think the more powerful ones are not the ones of famous writers, though they have a profound place in having the recognition and power to start a project like this, but in the videos and stories like Joel Burns, from Fort Worth Texas, and is just basically another dude, who definitely lives in a less gay-friendly place than Seattle, tell their stories about how it gets better.

So here's the segue, awkward as it is. There are a lot of things in life that could potentially use their own little "It Gets Better" project, and often times people are putting this message out without a big organized project. My friends on twitter joked about how there needed to be an "It Gets Better" for Asian kids struggling with the aspirations their driven parents put on them, like being a scientist or a businessperson and telling them their self-worth is derived from that, and following their own paths which they find enjoyment in. (To wit, not saying ALL Asian parents are like this, but I think it's a stereotype that rings true in many situations, and that this sort of parental pressure doesn't just happen to Asian kids.)

This conversation made me think "Man, there needs to be an "It Gets Better" for people who are struggling to have kids too." And it hit me... that message exists, but I've only been bothered by it before.

The problem is all too often the message of "It Gets Better" comes from the voice of some happy belly-rubbing pregnant woman who can recount the tales of how terrible it was to struggle to conceive, but now that they've gotten what they want, they enjoy telling others how they should feel about their current, on-going infertility.

I find that disingenuous and insulting. The point of telling someone that it gets better isn't to tell them "Man it'll be so great when you're cured/the problem goes away." That goes without saying. Hell yes, it would get better for gay teens if the bullying suddenly disappeared. Infertility would suck a lot less if you weren't infertile! But that's not the point of the original project. The point is to spread the message that who you are is okay, and that this too shall pass, and to accept who you are, even if your immediate world doesn't, because there are others out there who DO.

The "It Gets Better" issued to the infertile is not about finding a way to be okay with yourself and your life, and infertile, it's "You'll get pregnant!" That neither fixes nor empowers. It's demeaning to those who can truly not get pregnant, and not helpful to those who have lost sight of hope while still in the struggle.


I feel like I only marginally qualify to toss myself in the ranks of those struggling with infertility. I do not have some nigh insurmountable diagnosed pathology, nor have I been actually rendered infertile. I've been trying for 9 months with no success. It is more difficult for me than the average healthy person because I ovulate in random, unpredictable, really late, and possibly poor, ways. The view from here stinks; we started trying to have a family just shy of three years ago. We've lost a child, had a miscarriage, and now had to go on fertility meds. It's depressing, it's frustrating, and it's difficult even if I do not have it the worst. I am certain that some could look at me and be annoyed while I speak from the privilege of someone who actually can ovulate on their own sometimes, of someone who has ever been pregnant, of someone who got to hold their own living baby, because all of that is more than what some others get. If someone doesn't want to listen to what I have to say because I "have it better" so be it, because I do the same thing to others. The only thing I can try to do is only talk about how I feel, and not tell how others how they should feel, or how they can be enlightened about it like me.


You know what would inspire me? Or make me think harder about how down on myself I feel? Not someone who has a living child(ren) while they complain about their attempts to have more. Sure, go right ahead, that sucks too. You have every right to complain about it as I have every right to not listen to it. It falls on my deaf ears because at the end of the day, someone is still going to call you mommy. You still are a parent. And you're trying to tell me how I should feel, or that I should just buck up, or that you still "get it".

What would help? What would I listen to? Not some blog post by some pregnant woman telling me how she doesn't define herself by her infertility anymore, and how dark and terrible it was when she did, and how you shouldn't either.

No shit, Sherlock, it's because you're PREGNANT.

That's the kind of message that makes me roll my eyes and close the browser tab. Some people look at that story and see hope. "It happened for her, and it can happen for me!" But for me, that message is meaningless when it comes only after the person got what they wanted. Again, I'm not saying that it's not okay to tell your story. Where it stops being okay is when someone leans down from their position of privilege to tell you how to feel, or what you're doing wrong. Because when you're struggling to conceive, being pregnant is definitely a position of privilege. When you have no living children, living children are a privilege, even if it's not as many as you wanted.



What would affect me is someone who isn't already a mommy, someone who isn't pregnant telling me that it'll be okay. That if I can never have a healthy, living child, I will still be a good, worthy person. That I have value. That I haven't let my husband down. That I am not devalued as a person, as a woman. That it won't be pointless to try to start a new direction in life at 30+.

I don't need some pregnant woman to pat her belly, and tell me that it'll all be okay. I need someone who can credibly say that it'll be okay no matter what.

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Because I have no desire to link to some of the bad examples I've seen and be all "Uppity pregnant lady said what?!" I will instead link to one really good example of someone who is doing it right, in my opinion:

Keiko of Hannah Wept, Sarah Laughed, is a wonderful advocate and creator of an inspiring video about infertility that wants to help other women accept where they are. There is no belly-patting. No air of "See, it'll get better when you're pregnant like me." Just pure, awesome owning where she is and wanting to help others to be able do the same.