My Reproductive Story

Chapter 2 of Unsung Lullabies talks about acknowledging, and therefore understanding your "reproductive story". A reproductive story is a series of narratives, silent videos and imagined snapshots of what life would be like. It is built from an early age from interactions with and observations of your parents and various cultural factors. If things go as planned, you probably would never even know you had one. It's unconscious. This is probably one reason that infertility feels like such a loss. It is a loss of what you thought your future would be - without even realizing it. The authors note that your reproductive story is part of the underpinning of your adult identity. When that gets shifted, it feels like the rug is being pulled out from under you - like you don't know who you are anymore.

This is my story...

I was a girly-girl, and a nerd. I loved dolls, stuffed animals and books when I was little. I loved learning. I didn't like sports or anything I wasn't good at. (I'm still not thrilled about things I'm not good at...although, I guess I'm a little more persistent now or I would have given up on becoming a parent a long time ago).

My parents split-up when I was around 5. I can't say if that changed who I was, or if I would have been this way anyway being the first-born. I was the helper. I always wanted to help my mom do things like vacuum the house. I wanted to be useful to people. I wanted to be liked. I still do, although that is becoming less important the older I get. My grandmother called me the people-pleaser. I was the harmonizer. I wanted everyone around me to be happy. That was what would make ME happy. This quote from the book really got me - "If the cultural expectation is that women should raise and nurture children, how does our society's prevailing ideology affect a woman when she discovers that she can't get pregnant? How will others perceive her?" That's pretty scary for a people-pleaser.

I remember playing school with Ashley. I was always the teacher, and she was always my eager and willing student. I taught the girl long-division when she was something like 5 or 6 years old. You might think that sounds torturous, but she loved it. We took care of each other. That is part of our close bond now. Now I can see that I was practicing being a mom.

I did think about what kind of parent I would be. I remember in high school keeping a list of injustices that I would never inflict on my child. I SO wish I still had that list. I'd love to share it with my mom now and get a good laugh. I'm sure it had things like "I will never be insensitive to the needs of my child to talk on the phone as long as she likes". I also had a life timeline in high school with my BFF, Minda. We were going to go to college together, be roommates, and have matching Volkswagen Bugs with paint handprints all over them. We were going to be married by 22, have kids by 24 and live next door to each other. That plan fell apart with college, but the point is that I did think about it - even if I wasn't exactly realistic.

My reproductive story continued as I got older. When I was single, I never bought a condo or anything because I was going to get married and have a family - so I was holding out for a house with space for little ones. When I met Michael, one of the things that drew me to him was what a great father he would make. When I switched careers from consulting to local government, I thought about it being more family-friendly.

So - thus begins the process of trying to rewrite a story that began when I was very little. The authors note that infertility, like other traumas, is marked by the feeling of being trapped. My life isn't going as planned and there is nothing I can do to change that. The only thing I can do is try to understand how that plan got written and what it means for the broader context of my life. The chapter ends (appropriately) with this:

"Try to remember that it is a work in progress." As am I.



Here's the link to the next blogger's discussion of this Chapter.