The end of the Dark Ages

For the rest of my life I’ll refer to these last few years as the “Dark Ages.”  I was laid off from the biotech company in July of 2010 and subsequently drew unemployment while looking for jobs from Chicago.  2011 brought the move to Milwaukee and then there was the 4.5 months or so at the BloodCenter that turned out to be the single worst work experience of my entire life.   I’ve spent the last 8 (very humbling) months as a freelance writer and part-time Bed Bath and Beyond associate.  Its been tough.  So many life decisions were put on hold and we really had to scale our lives down to subsistence levels for an extended period of time.  

I recently was offered a long-term contract position with Harley-Davidson, though, and I’m really excited about it.  The job sounds neat and seems like something I’d be particularly good at.  And it pays well.  And its Harley-Frickin’-Davidson!!  How cool is that???  Its not a permanent position, so its not totally ideal, but I have faith in my abilities to win them over enough that – at the least – they extend the contract indefinitely.

This is where I bring this back to IVF.  We spent the first few months of 2011 looking into different IVF docs.  By ‘we’ I mean Jill because she did most of the work.  After identifying a doctor in late spring, we were about ready to start the process in July, but when my job became untenable and I left BloodCenter we were forced to put the process on hold.  Making the timing of this even more awful was the fact that nearly every woman in Jill’s office (of child-bearing age) was either pregnant or had just had kids.  It was like Mommy-palooza there and she was left as only a hopeful observer.  That period was probably the most stressful time in our marriage, but we agreed holding off would be the best option.

A few months passed and after a few more conversations, we decided that waiting for the sake of waiting wasn’t really getting us anywhere.  We had saved for it so we had the money and as we approached our 35^th birthdays, we knew we couldn’t wait forever.  So we took a risk.  A risk that I would have a better job by the time they were born.  One of the things the last few years have taught me is that – as long as you have your priorities straight – you can find a way to make difficult situations workable.  Not necessarily fun or enjoyable, but workable.  And I/we were determined to make this particular situation work.

As the IVF process unfolded we consistently got good results.  Honestly – at every step along the way things have very much gone in our favor.  Still, though, seeing those two little heartbeats brought on a definite sense of anxiety.  I was so afraid that I wouldn’t be able to provide for them.  There were nights I would wake up anxious at 2am.  You carry that anxiety with you as well – I’m sure anybody that knows me well could probably pick up on that.  There is a tension of both mind and spirit that inhibits you from ever achieving any real sense of comfort and peace.

That is what this job has given me – comfort and peace.  Money is money.  It doesn’t mean anything.  The ability to provide for my family, though, means everything.  We’re able to talk about cribs and car seats and high chairs and day care.  Today we bought a stroller – something we couldn’t have afforded without this job (thankfully I was still able to use my BBB discount ---20% gets pretty awesome when you’re dropping $500!!!).

Mostly I’m able to enjoy these next few months.  I’ll be able to provide for our little guys.  And Jill – Jill won’t have to carry us nearly single-handedly anymore.  After five years of marriage and seven years of being together I have definitely learned that life will give a couple plenty of opportunities to share the load.  And Jill has been carrying more than her fair share for entirely too long.  This job provides both of us with a level of comfort I think we’re entirely due.

I have no idea how the rest of the pregnancy will unfold and I’m 100% ignorant when it comes to parenthood.  We’ve made it through the Dark Ages, though, so I’m entirely confident we’ll make it through whatever is next as well.

Hello World

So.  Hi.  Thanks for stopping.  A bit of introduction is probably necessary.  I'm Joe -- my wife is Jill.  I tend to think of this as "our" blog and hopefully you'll see posts from both of us at various points.  Anyways -- We're in our mid-30s and we own a home.  When I was younger I had what I called the trifecta -- it was the measuring stick by which I judged how "grown-up" a person was.  It, logically, consisted of three parts -- marriage, owning a home, and having kids.  So we have the first two taken care of, but the third -- that one wasn't quite so easy...

I don't want to ruin all the good stories right off the bat, so I'll save the specifics of why we're going through IVF for a later time.  Clearly, though, we can't have kids the 'old-fashioned way.'  We tried -- and it was fun -- but after about six months or so it become clear that it just wasn't going to happen, so before we relocated from Chicago to Milwaukee we were both scoped, poked, and prodded to find out what was up.  Not too long after moving to Milwaukee we started the process by visiting with a few different IVF docs.  Now -- about a year after moving here -- we're actually getting the process started.  And its a lot.  Which is why we decided to start a blog.


The way I see it, there are roughly three main goals we would to accomplish with the blog:


1) Educate.  Probably for the most part this will be friends and family, but it would be neat to help people we don't find out more about the process.


2) Update.  See, the thing about IVF is that -- we think about it all the time.  It's all-consuming.  So when we're not talking about it, or - amazingly - not thinking about it -- we don't really want to talk or think about it.  But we also fully recognize that people are interested -- as they should be.  This is our way of saying -- hey -- this is whats going on, without having to answer the question "How is IVF going?"  Because the honest answer really goes one of two ways -- its either 'it kinda sucks and it costs a lot of money' OR 'I'll tell you in 9 months.'  Both are pretty accurate.


3) Record.  Maybe this is narcissism - I don't know.  I just think it'll be interesting to come back and look at this in the future -- regardless of how things work out.


Lastly, just a heads-up as to subjects coming at some point in the future -- I'll break down that $25,000 number in the blog's title, give more about the biology and what is happening, and we'll definitely spend a lot of time talking about what the experience is like.  Because it's crazy, it's weird, and hopefully -- it'll be successful.