Carol Leigh Frye

I was still a child of eight years old when my mother took me with her to her friend's baby shower. I remember a white cake and gift boxes wrapped in pastel colors, fruit punch, and lots of other women in dresses, some with baby bumps and others holding infants. I heard them talking, laughing, exchanging stories with each other. Even as young as I was, I felt a sensation of alienation, knowing I didn't belong. 

My puberty was a hellacious experience of epic proportions. My time of the month reduced me to a hormonal, sobbing mess, abdominal cramping so severe, I couldn't think or function. I was home schooled, so my Mom would give me a heating pad, fluids, and a few books, and excuse me from my usual chores. At age 19, I saw a gynecologist who ran a series of tests including blood work and correctly diagnosed me with severe PolyCystic Ovarian Syndrome, commonly known as PCOS. I was told my uterus would never carry a child because of how badly my hormones were messed up genetically.  I had inherited my diagnosis, my paternal aunt and grandmother had less severe versions of PCOS. There is no cure; the best any gynecologist could do is prescribe birth control to help manage my symptoms until I reach menopause. I am almost 41 now, and every previous pregnancy test has been negative. See, doctors must test me before I can get the birth control shot every 3 months.

In my life, infertility is more than a diagnosis, it is a definition of my identity. Females I once considered potential church friends rejected me during years I was an employed single woman, while they were happily married, barefoot, and pregnant with a different child every year. I couldn't relate to their lives, nor could they relate to mine. 

But what about my blood: the four sisters who have the same parents as myself? Surely if my church family disappointed me, my blood would be my safe place. Unfortunately, my sisters all married and became mothers, and alienated me from their society because they couldn't relate to me, either. This past June I cut 2 of my sisters out of my life and I feel happier. 

This year, I visited the church my sisters go to. It was full of young families, women my age with teens, faces I once knew as acquaintances, now merely strangers. I felt the curiosity in the expressions of those females observing me: where were my kids? I also felt the alienation. I don’t belong in that church, and I will not return. 

But infertility has done more than alienate me from church friends and family. Infertility has offered me a place among the permanently childless. Finally, I found  where I belong. This is my tribe, my family, my people. This community is well worth my previous rejection from church and family, they understood the journey like nobody else could.  My life improved because of World Childless Week and people who were and are part of it. 

I came to realize I want my life the way it is. I appreciate my infertility because it ensures I have the freedom to travel with my truck driving husband. I appreciate my infertility because I get to remain fascinated with what I admired as a child: Barbie, Hello Kitty, Popeye, Looney Tunes, Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Precious Moments, while also appreciating adult things such as Fenton lamps, crystal glassware, red coin glass, various painted China dishes. I know myself and what I like, love bubble baths and romance novels and old Westerns where the guy gets the girl. I also love humor and storylines where NOTHING goes as planned, but everything turns out okay. Rumor has it that being a mother means focusing so much  on child rearing a woman doesn't know herself anymore. But I know and love myself. 

I'm not like them others. 

I am not like the mothers. 

I'm not like the (m) others. 

I am unique.