Befuddlement

Today I find myself in a strange place of befuddlement.  I'm finding myself confused by the shifting direction of my life and the many changes that have occurred not just in my lifestyle but in who I am and what I do in my life.  My interests have changed, my activities have changed.  They are all really good things.  But the suddenness of these changes is leaving me dizzy.

And then there is the complete turnaround of my desires.  Just last year, nothing mattered more to me than being a mother.  I was determined to achieve our goal, doing everything necessary to try and get there.  Nothing else mattered.  And just a few months ago, I was pregnant and looking forward to finally achieving our dreams. 

Now all of a sudden I find myself childless, I don't want to be pregnant ever again, I never want hormone injections again and thought of starting a new life with a baby is something I'm finding that I don't want.  I'm 44 and I just can't imagine dealing with a pregnancy, being up all night and having my life consumed by a baby, then a non-stop toddler when I'm in my late 40's, and then being a mother to a teenager when I'm 60 years old!  My life has been flipped over and around and I'm freaking out just a little bit.

If we had gotten pregnant not long after we started, things would be a completely different story.  I was ready for that life, I wanted that life, I longed for that life. 

Now, with all the experiences of the last four years, in particular the last four months, everything is different.

I don't know whether to be terribly upset or terribly relieved.  I'm both all at the same time and how dizzying is that????!!!!

I think about a large portion of my work and my work colleagues and I don't want to go back to that world.  It just isn't me anymore.  How confusing is that?  I've been doing it for 25 years.  Part of me feels like I should stay involved, stay part of the community, stay connected to that.  But most of me is glad.  I had been drifting away for a while and these last few months have just solidified it. There is only one area of that work that I have chosen to keep and in that area I have actually put feelers out to get more involved, but in a different capacity.  Go figure!

Even in just this last week, my thoughts and feelings are shifting quickly.  I think of a comment I left just a few days ago to another bloggers post, and already my thoughts have changed.  As I read more and more of others experiences and as I experience more things and feel more emotions myself, my understandings and viewpoints are evolving.  It's overwhelming and befuddling.

DH and I have come to one decision.  There will be no more IVF treatments.  The chances of us succeeding are only 5% and to go through all that, spend all that, and then have to go through the emotions again of probably not succeeding, is just too much.  Not to mention the fact that we are both feeling the issue of us just beginning to raise a child at our age.  It's all crazy.

Of course, then I think of all the grandparents out there raising their grandchildren.  It's hard but they do it.  But then they also have experience behind them.  We are going in blind and tired and defeated from all that has happened.

So today there are no words of wisdom or lists of positivity, no continued efforts to try and understand what is happening, there is just one whirling brain who wants to get off the ride.