So you're pregnant and your friend's not. Now what?

Life is like a mine field when you're infertile. You never know where a pregnancy announcement or ultrasound photo is going to take your breath away and knock your legs out from under you. You're infertile and your friend or relative is knocked up. Now what?  My good e-friend, Allie, just wrote a blog that describes this situation wonderfully. **Thank you to my sister, Kris, for being so understanding and caring when you announced your pregnancy to me. I'm so glad you "get it." I am truly lucky to have someone like you in my life.**

 Excerpts from Allie's blog entry. Read the entire thing here.

"Infertility is hard.  Faith questioning, life changing, marriage shattering, friendship ruining, isolating, horrifyingly, miserably hard.  With infertility you are poked and prodded from all angles... From your friends and family asking you when you're going to have babies, to your doctors spending more time looking at your genitalia than your spouse.  It's expensive to the point that sometimes, some people with infertility are forced to make decisions like, "Do we put a down payment on a house... or pursue IVF?"  Infertility changes your life."

"People who struggle with infertility really will and most do give anything and everything that they can to be pregnant and for a chance to be a parent.  Someone who has spent $100,000 on infertility treatments and drugs does not want to hear a pregnant women sound ungrateful in any way.  I don't know if this sounds bitter, but to me it's just logical... You don't go to an amputee who has lost both of  his legs and start complaining about how annoying it is to walk everywhere and how nice it would be to just have a motorized vehicle to push them around do you? Of course not, it's callous and ignorant.  That is the same as complaining to someone with infertility about your pregnancy."


"If we need space, don't assume that we are just selfish and jealous and bitter.  We are broken hearted and self preserving.  It doesn't feel good for other people to think these terrible things of you, on TOP of the infertility itself.  Don't think negatively of us, or your friends if they or we need space.  Try to think of your lowest moments, when you found out the worst news of your life and you sat down on the floor and cried inconsolably... Sometimes that's what pregnancy announcements feel like... and judging someone for their grief doesn't make sense.  A lot of people make the mistake of taking our grief personally, but our grief has nothing to do with you or your pregnancy."