Thursday 17 April 2014

Finding Meaning Questions - Take 2 (next set)

See here for background explanation of the questions

Installment 1: Creating Awareness

Installment 2: Practicing Acceptance.

Installment 3: Be Curious

Step 2: Practicing Acceptance


1.  Do you believe that everything you have experienced in your life so far has influenced who you are today?

Yes. I have always looked for and found meaning in my life.

Definitely. And I'm at peace with it because I find everything I've experienced interesting. Some experiences I certainly did not enjoy, but I can't think of anything I found utterly pointless or meaningless.

2.   Have you experienced moments of hindsight that helped you find meaning to a situation from your past?
Absolutely.

Hindsight is the key term though.  What I've found is that answers rarely come when I want them - even when I desperately want them. So often I have to make decisions and pick a direction without all the answers. Sometimes, when I lucky, answers come weeks or months or years later. Usually when the situation is well in the past and there is no more urgency.  I think a big reason I've been able to live my life with relative calm in the past few years (yes, I'm an anxiety-tripper, but I am overall doing better now than in earlier life) is that I've accepted that it's OK to not have answers and to not always understand why things are the way they are. The key part is to keep on living despite not knowing or understanding - to live in the present and appreciate it for its own unique opportunities.

3.    To what extent can you make peace with your past?
I am at peace with my past.

At present the past seems pretty abstract to be honest. There's not a lot in it that feels relevant to me right now. I think in a time of flux and change it becomes harder to analyze the past, because I am changing, and my interpretation of the past  is also changing

4.    To what extent can you accept your fertility journey?

 So far, I can accept it most of the time. But I also haven't gone through that much, relatively speaking. I can accept that this is  my reality, that I won't have children without following a  certain path, which is not the path I would have chosen if I had my 'druthers.

I think the hardest thing to accept about my "fertility journey" (whatever the heck that means) is how random it is. We don't know what "worked" and what didn't "work." We tried a lot of things - charting/timed intercourse, Traditional Chinese medicine, DHEA and CoQ10 supplements, lymphatic massage (Mr. Turtle) and of course IVF. There's no proof that any of them had an impact on my getting pregnant (except for the fact that in January we obviously did have sex at the right time lol).  On the other hand, any one or more of them might have contributed.

When I started this blog in January 2013 I thought that "acceptance" meant accepting that we needed ART to conceive. I thought it meant accepting sub-fertility. Accepting what the experts told us. And it did, but then I had my "lightning strike." So acceptance is a both simpler and more complicated now - it means accepting that the unexpected happens sometimes, I suppose.  And accepting my new reality and embracing it - which as anyone can tell, has not come easily, BUT I think I am making progress.

I still think fearful thoughts, and sometimes write them. But in the past few weeks I've been hearing another voice answering the fearful thoughts, reminding me that there is another reality out there, a place and time of promise. It is getting easier to talk about next month, next summer, to schedule appointments and believe that when they roll around, things will be fine.

Installment 1: Creating Awareness

Installment 2: Practicing Acceptance.

Installment 3: Be Curious

5 comments:

  1. You just have to shake your head in wonder. I have no idea what worked, but I'm glad it did :)

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    1. Me too! I think my brain just needs to catch up with everything my body is doing. :-)

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  2. Thanks for sharing these questions (and your answers). They're extremely powerful - have been making me think!

    I'm really happy you've been getting glimpses of the place and time of promise.

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    1. You're welcome....I think? LOL I mean I hope the thoughts have been useful ones. Just kidding mostly except I know sometimes I think too much and maybe not about the right kind of things. But I'm really glad you have enjoyed the posts. xo

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  3. OK, I'll check it out! I like your screen name - it is much too funny to be that of a spammer LOL!

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