I've Always Hated Rubberneckers

Many years ago I dated a guy my friends and I called The Painter, not because he could paint or was sensitive or had chopped his ear off to show his love or anything like that, but because he was a real insensitive thick-o (proving that A) what a crazy and zany cat I am for using irony and B) I used to really pick some winners, I tell ya.)  The Painter was very, very close to his family, in a weird way that smacked ickily of "the family that lays together stays together", although I'm pretty sure it had never gotten that far before.  Anyhow, while we were together my grandfather took very ill and then passed away.  I called The Painter to tell him that I was off to a funeral.  Before I knew it, I had him and his family in the living room.

"What happened?" his mother asked gently.

I explained about my grandfather had been ill and then died.

"Oh," she said, her eyes a limpid pool of Deliverance blue.  "What kind of illness?"

Taken aback, I replied.  "Cancer.  It spread from his lungs through his body."

She nodded and looked at her husband, also nodding.  "Yup, cancer'll do it."

And I realized what they were doing-they were doing what old people do.  They were collecting statistics.  The elderly seem to have an internal notebook in their head, marking down the ways to go and the number of ways people fall headfirst into the coffin.  This is not me being ageist- I did get this verified once by an elderly woman I knew, who confirmed that as you get into your "twilight years" (and whoever coined that term needs a good sucker punch in the gut), you do start getting pretty matter of fact about it and wanting to gather info on those who punch their final time card and how they did it.  You find out how, say, Sid went or how Mary popped her clogs and you cluck your tongue and say something along the lines of "Yeah, that's a bad one.  I know a woman who went that way, you wouldn't believe the medications involved!" and then you drink more tea.  You like to know how people go as it populates the internal Excel spreadsheet in the mind, proving that while you only need 4 hours of sleep at a time and have the memory of a banana, you can indeed place your bets on the Grim Reaper.

I think infertile women are much the same.  We check in on some regulars (as you do), but we also wander on to websites of women that are cycling, purely in a rubbernecker statistics kind of way.  Maybe a website (for example Cyclesistas) leads you there.  Maybe it's a link in a post-"Go visit Sheilaz_dogs1471 as she sits through her tormented 2ww!", and you think "Christ, I have to check that out.  She's on her 2ww!  How many transferred?  What grade?  How old is Sheilaz_dogs1471?  How many cycles has she had?" because this all adds up in our own internal Excel spreadsheets.  If Sheilaz_dogs1471 gets a negative, you shake your head and swear with her in deepest empathy.  If you're a veteran like me, you stop visiting Sheilaz Doghouse regularly when it goes positive, and when she gets that strong healthy heartbeat stage, you really stop visiting, since (generally speaking, and I know that sadly exceptions happen) she's in the "breathe a sigh of relief" stage. 

The worst is when Sheilaz_dogs1471 starts complaining during pregnancy-call me a bitch (and some do) but I'm going to be honest here- unless Sheilaz_dogs1471 is suffering the hyperemesis (as some have in the blogosphere and I truly feel really badly for them-when I read about them I want to tell God that ok, he's had his fun already, leave the poor women alone), Sheilaz_dogs1471 is going to get little sympathy for sickness during pregnancy.  When I was knocked up you bet I had morning sickness, but I was also Captain Thankful-"Brrrrrrruuuuut!"- that's the sound I make while vomiting, something like a cross between upchucking a hairball and a horse coughing-"God I am so sick!  But it's working!  So it's fine by me!  Where's the ginger ale?  Brrrrrruuuuuuut!"  I made the mistake of stopping by a chick who is knocked up the other day, and she had written about how annoying it was that her developing little nubbin was on the big scale of the measurements.  She bitched about it for a while. I wanted to drop kick her, honestly. 

(This might make you think I'm a bad person, but I personally think that ship sailed a long time ago.)

Soon Sheilaz_dogs1471 will be posting pics of the little nugget, and you know then that you're really in for it.  Wish Sheilaz_dogs1471 luck at the heartbeat stage and hang amongst your own.  You know the ones-you all seem to be cycling together again and again.  It doesn't mean you're not ridiculously happy for those that succeed because you are.  It means that you have to keep a bit of space to protect yourself.  This comes and goes, and with it, your visits to their sites come and go.  If someone gets a negative, you can hear a collective cluck of the infertile blogworld tongue, we drink our tea and commiserate in silence with you.  You become part of our statistics. 

The spreadsheet exsist.  I'll go on and be honest here, too-if you're like me and you've done IVF as many times as you've had a Pap smear, we tend to not be so charitable at those who blow out a puff of air, have IVF once and get pregnant on the first try.  This does not apply across the board, as I love some of the women it did work for and am honestly happy for them.  But in general, if you're one of the lucky ones that it worked first time for, then I'm likely not reading you.  It's not personal.  It's self-preservation-I've done this far too often, honestly.  It's also protecting my karma, because god knows I need all of that I can get.

As my cycle goes on more and more (a week from now I should be on stims), I'm sure people will be popping in here for their own spreadsheet in their heads.  It happens as cycles peak-more folks show, then regardless of the result (a self-preservation positive or a tick in the Excel spreadsheet negative as we nod in sympathy), people will disappear.  I know I would.  I know I do.  I've got a team of women that I check in on regularly and love and root for, and hopefully they know who they are or I've been remiss.

PS-anyone watching Panorama tonight?  We will be.  Scares me.

Comments

[Kath]

Dear Vanessa, what a great post -- and what a great take on the spreadsheet impulse. How true, how true.

I can just see one of us saying, "No heartbeat? Yep, that'll do it."

[carey]

Ahhh... great post. I've noticed that the further I get in this fucked up journey, the less likely I am to visit a blog of a 'fertile'. "Oh what - she's doing her first IUI??" Yeah... no thanks. Lemme know when she's suffered a bit more, THEN maybe, just maybe I'll read her blog.

[DD]

EXACTLY why I don't look in on the CyclaSistas or whatever they're called.

I already feel extremly jealous of real-life family and friends getting pregnant, I don't need to add to my caldron women from the internet.

I feel like a newbie still with 4 IUIs, 3 m/c, 2 IVFS and 1 attempted FET.

And please, if you get pregnant, do not call your embryo nugget, bean, peanut, etc.

[statia]

So what you're saying is that I should quit my bitching?

BITCH BITCH BITCH BITCH.

(i'm so sending you the placenta when I'm done with it).

[Lassie]

Ohhhh, what a great post! So true, so true. Although I'm one that never got pregnant, it always stings to hear the complaining. I tell my pg friends that I'd give anything to have morning sickness, they usually quiet down after that.

[Lut C.]

You mean I can kick people back off my blog roll? Really!

I never add someone to my blog roll without at least skimming through the entire archives. I can't remember the last time I threw someone off my list, though I must say I read some more attentively than others.

A few times, I've burned myself on adding new bloggers too easily. Yes I'm glad for whoever gets PG after IUI nr. 2 or 3 one month after I added them to my list, but it stings.

The spreadsheet, that's a good image to use. I always focused on egg numbers and embryo numbers (boy, did I lose in that department).

Rubberneckers, perhaps, but I was very glad to receive all that support when our cycle failed miserably.

[Tinker]

How very true.

Even when I was doing IUIs I would only read blogs of IVFers -- the IUIers were too starry-eyed for my liking. And I've stopped following links off of blogs that don't categorize them, as it's inevitable that I select the pregnant ones. Ouch!

[Lut C.]

So what did you make of the Panorama episode?

[Carol]

You are so, so right. on all of it - the mental stat collecting, and the shying away from the preggo blogs, and really getting annoyed when pg people complain.

[Sarah]

Guilty as charged, your honour. For terrible rubbernecking and for keeping a mental spreadsheet. And shying away once the pg ones start whining. Hell, how they annoy me!

But I'll be rubbernecking some more as your cycle progresses. I like to hope that I'll be posting some cheery congrats one of these days to someone I actually want to see beat the odds.

[Meri-ann]

I wish I'd written this post...