Infertiles are from Mars ..(with update)

on Monday, January 10, 2011
...while the rest of the world is from Venus.  Its like once you enter the room with the 'infertility' tag, and start talking about it,  the rest of the world ceases to understand what you are about.  Labels like 'obsessive' and 'melodramatic' start getting applied to you and nobody understands how you can spend so much time preoccupied with this process.

I just got into a massive fight with my brother, and it started with me telling him how these blogs get readership from all over the world. He called it 'creepy' and chided me for putting all this information out there where anybody can read it,and why was I being so careless? I saw red instantly.   I tore into him for  for talking thoughtlessly about something he has no clue about (ie, this blog, which he has spent 5 minutes on many months ago), for not willing to listen to the minutiae of this process (he changes the subject within 2 minutes, most people IRL do), and yet, criticizing me for finding support where I can.  He promptly took my comments to mean that I was saying he is not supportive (not so; he will do all that is practically necessary, even at great cost to himself, to help me in this process) and moved into injured party mode.  I tried to explain to him that I need somebody to listen to me talk about the details and nobody in real life is willing to do so.

Now, my brother is a really amazing, wonderful human being I'm really proud of BUT at times he can really resemble an OX in his stubbornness (he accuses me of the same, BTW).  At this point, he said I was obsessive and melodramatic and said all I ever do is talk about this and of course people would not want to hear more. The last bit is not true. I would love to talk about this about 20 % of the time but realize my audience is looking impatient and squirmy and trying to change the topic after 1 minute of conversation, so I back off.

I am so ANGRY right now. I spend most of my time trying not to talk about this, except with immediate family (where the pressure valves have released some steam).  I've managed to sound ok to friends and extended family the day AFTER my D & Cs, so they would not suspect anything is up.  I've managed to make jokes the day after I found out my babies had died so nobody would have a clue that my world just fell apart.  To be accused of all of this from my brother is really too much. As a consequence, we are going to have one of our more extended fights. No worries, we will go back to normal in a while, we have had this Tom and Jerry thing going since our childhood and its not done our relationship any harm. We fight...get hugely mad and either talk it out/ forget all about it within a few days.

But right now, I'm just furious. All I want is to be able to blog in peace, so I can pour my heart out to the only people who can possibly understand, and more importantly, are willing to listen...not too much to ask for!!!!!!!!!

I'm also just mad at the rest of the world. What is wrong with them?!?! When I can spend 30 minutes talking to friends about what is important to them (for example the process of home buying, something I have no interest in at present) why do they never reciprocate with what is important for me?  Its something I thought I had accepted as a fact a while ago, but right now I just want to punch a wall.

Update: My parents, as usual, played peacemakers. They've had plenty of practice at it along the way, being always older and wiser than the two of us hotheads.  Anyway, they apologized (and meant it).  My brother apologized (through gritted teeth) so it did not make me feel one bit better. I'm in the process of learning a valuable, but difficult lesson here; to pursue this journey silently. I should absolutely shut up about diagnosis, treatments, plans, news, worries- anything I want to yammer on about in the 2 minutes before other people's lack of participation makes me shut up.  Because those 2 minutes, apparently, cost me dearly.

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