INTRODUCTION
My introduction will, I hope, provide context to my story. There are many different elements to male infertility, and I speak only from my own experience. My husband’s (at the time) infertility not only had a devastating effect on our ability to have a family and ultimately on our marriage, the effects rippled out until it touched every aspect of our lives. Shame, secrecy and humiliation dominated our lives for many years, robbing it of any pleasure or joy until we were merely going through the motions of living as a married couple. Being part of a friendship circle in which partners supported one another and had the shared dream of becoming parents, succeeding time and again, ripped my heart in two. Blame followed, not blame towards my husband, for nobody is to blame for a medical condition, but blame directed at myself. What was wrong with me that prevented my partner from confiding in me? This question haunted me for many years, and only with the love and support of Gateway Women have I found the answer to that and other questions, as well as the strength to start putting my life back together. It is important for me to share my story here at World Childless Week in order to prove that it is neither shameful nor secretive, it is my reality, but a reality which I am learning to live with.
I met my husband at age 19, and we married at 21, which is almost unheard of nowadays. My husband was the same age. About a year after we married, my husband had to have emergency surgery to remove a testicle, which was traumatic. However, we were told at the time that this did not necessarily mean that we would not be able to have a family, as other men in his position went on to have children successfully.
I was teaching and we enjoyed a good lifestyle. I assumed, naively, that when we were ready and the time was right, we would have children. That sounds so straightforward and simple; I cannot believe how naïve and ignorant I was about fertility, even though we were already at a disadvantage.
We began trying for a baby when I was 30 and after 3 years, I realised that this was not going to happen. I asked, pleaded, then begged my husband to come to the doctor with me and when he refused, it was the start of years of hell.
He fought me every step of the way. He never came to one appointment with me, but grudgingly said that if I wanted children then it was up to me to do whatever I wanted. In many ways, and with the benefit of hindsight, this was the beginning of the end of our marriage.
When I look back, I cannot believe that I went along with his demands, and never stood up for myself. After the most basic of male fertility tests, we (or should I say) I was told that he was infertile. I believed that if only I could become pregnant, everything would somehow fall into place and we would be happy.
I took fertility drugs, then did AI using donor sperm 3 times. I did IVF 3 times, also using donor sperm, all unsuccessfully. I attended every hospital appointment on my own. My cousin came with me once or twice as I remember, but that was all. Whenever I tried to discuss our situation, he would roll his eyes as if he were merely tolerating me and my attempts to have a family. He made me feel unnatural, like a freak for wanting children. I even began to think that maybe there was something wrong with me. I used to look at couples at the hospital and think that at least they had each other for support.
During this time, friends were having babies one after another, until I was the only one in our circle of friends who was childless. I became used to the comments of “you’re so lucky, you’ve got all this freedom, you don’t need to worry about babysitters, you can go on fabulous holidays” and so on. I could not make people understand that all the holidays, meals out, lifestyle, meant nothing when all I wanted was a family of my own. I would have given it all up in a heartbeat to have my own child.
At the same time, my husband was drinking more and more heavily, socialising on his own, to the extent that he was going out every single night. At the time I was studying, for which I am thankful, as it gave me focus and kept me sane. When I spoke to one or two close friends about our situation, they would say everything will be fine when (not if) you have your own baby. He will change and life will be great. How stupid could I have been to believe that?
Looking back, I believed what I wanted to believe, because the alternative was too painful to contemplate. By this time, I was 39, and we were leading separate lives, although still in the same home. Whenever he was at home, which was not often as most of the time he was away on so called business trips, life was lonely and miserable.
A few months before my 40th birthday we separated, as he had met someone else, and we divorced a year later. Our marriage was over and with it, my hopes and dreams of having a family. We divorced when I was almost 40.
Life goes on, but the pain of childlessness remains forever in my heart.
Anon.