We live in a country where there is always some kind of pressure. First, it is about your education, and then it shifts to your job. For some people, these may not feel like major concerns, but what almost everyone seems to care about is when you are going to get married. Almost everyone I knew seemed to enjoy asking me that question. By Indian standards, I got married a little late, at 28. It felt like half the world breathed a sigh of relief. I am now happily married, but that didn’t end people’s concerns. Instead, a new one appeared-that my biological clock was ticking. I never really heard it, but everyone around me made sure I believed it was.
Still two and half years of being married, all questions about the so called good news were avoided with various answers. April 2014, we decided that we should have a baby as were ready to be parents. So, what happened if we decided? Silly us who had watched various movies where women got pregnant so easily, we thought it was very simple. They made us believe one night of sex was all that was needed. Okay, we were not fools to believe that, but we never thought it could take very long. After all pre-marital sex was a no no because you could get pregnant.
Now we both had started a journey which was not easy and I hope no one needs to go through it. This was a journey of feeling broken, ashamed, jealous, sad, helpless and which made life meaningless suddenly. I belonged to a nation which had one of the fastest growing populations, where children are produced at the rate bacteria multiplies. And there I was this woman, who could not get pregnant. The Internet made life worse as I would keep reading about signs of pregnancy and then feel every month, this is it. And then the red dots would shatter me and have me sitting and howling in the loo as if the world had ended and there was no hope.
I read innumerable resources on how to get pregnant. Most of them gave me the same information and each month when the pregnancy test failed just brought with it more frustration. After trying started the trips to hospitals and life became so mechanic. Sex was a routine and not enjoyable. You did not have sex because you felt like but because you were the most fertile on those days of the month.
People around me would keep asking me insane questions and tell me I would be a great mother. I wanted to ask them can you please do this for me. I am incapable it seems. The other place that added fuel to the fire was Facebook. I felt the world around me was having babies. Everyone had their profile pictures with their baby bumps and cute babies. I used to ask God, where is my angel? People would post pics of pregnancy, baby at the hospital, baby at home reaching milestones. These were the people my age or younger than me too. This made me feel jealous and flooded me with feelings I was surprised I could ever have.
I ate everything possible, prayed to every god I could think of, tried various treatments, basically did everything I thought I could do. Seeing a depressed husband just made me feel guilty. He told me every time that it is Us who are not able to conceive but I believed it was my fault to not give him the baby he wants.
The period was the toughest of my life but what followed was the most beautiful one. Today I play with my one-year old daughter and I just feel she was the one who gave me the strength to go through it saying, mummy just one more time. I hope no one goes through the stress we went through, but if you do, I will say just relax.
“It’s going to be okay in the end, if it’s not okay, it not the end.”
