On Being an UnMom

So now that I am miraculously, unbelievably, but quite apparently happily married, (I'm happily married! How did that happen?), one would think my life would be, well, good? Yes?

No.

I'm in my mid-forties. And we don't have kids. And it sucks.

Pretty much 98% of all my married and divorced friends have kids. I live in a world of parenthood. One of my volunteer gigs is at the local day school. My synagogue is crawling with children and pregnant women. I have siblings and siblings-in-law who want and expect me to have a great deal of involvement with my nieces and nephews. I have children and children-related stuff coming out of my ears. But none of these children are mine. I am an UnMom.

So I finally sucked up my courage and made an appointment with the best reproductive endocrinologist in the state. Literally. Apparently this man has gotten half my shul pregnant. So to speak. I have to wait about a month for the appointment, but he is supposedly The Man.

I've been married for more than six months now. I put off the whole fertility treatment thing because for some reason, I thought that since I was actually in a good, honest, wholesome marriage now, maybe God would just toss me a pregnancy or two. But it's not happening. I've never been pregnant. Ever.

It's gotten to the point where, in consoling a friend of mine for her third miscarriage, the following incredibly stupid sentence came out of my mouth: "well at least you know what it's like to be pregnant." Yeah. I said that. She is a good enough friend to understand the place of extreme narcissistic pain from which that comment emerged. She actually sort of laughed and said that was the first honest thing anyone has said to her since she lost the baby.

The funny thing is, there is nothing medically wrong with me or my husband. We got tested in the first version of our marriage. Nothing wrong but our ages, that is. But all my chemistry was supposedly in good working order, even considering my age. It just didn't happen. I figured if you added the stress of a horrible marriage into the equation, that probably kept me from conceiving. Or maybe it was the lack of magical pixie dust. Who the hell knows?

That's the thing about this whole fertility thing. Lots of it comes around to plain old mystery. And helplessness. And pain. Long, deep, pain. It's a whole other kind of abyss from the pain of divorce or singleness. It's sharper and nastier and makes jagged, messy cuts. You wake up every morning, and the pain says to you: you think you're in control of your body? Hah! Guess again, loser. No baby today. No baby for you. Loser! UnMom!

And the pity. Good Lord, the pity from my friends is the worst. The look-exchanging. The offers of being called "Auntie WebGirl." Seriously, if you know a childless woman, don't offer her auntdom of your kids. It's so demeaning. Think.

In-vitro fertilization treatment cost between $20-25,000. And in some states (like mine), none of that is covered by health insurance. Yeah. It's like they are saying, not only are you a loser because you can't have a kid on your own, but now we're going to gut your savings account. Ha ha.

Ha ha.

And what does The Husband have to say about all this? Well, he's confident that if we do IVF, we'll have a kid. He's completely, ridiculously confident. Even when I quote the horrible, bleak statistics, he just ignores it all. He won't say anything negative. He won't think anything negative. He just tells me we should go in there, throw money at the doctors, inject me full of hormones twice a day for two months, etc. and the baby will happen. It just will. Of course it will. Why would God get us to this point and then not give us a kid? Why indeed.

My favorite part of being my friends' token Childless Woman is hearing the stories of miracle babies. Yes, I'm being incredibly sarcastic. "WebGirl, my sister-in-law's best friends brother's wife just had twins at 47. 47!! Isn't that amazing?" Yes sirree Bob, I've heard all the stories. You would think that women over 40 are just exploding with babies, based on all the stories I hear! Why, we are just dropping babies like bunnies, aren't we!

The reason these stories are dumb is because all of them, every single one of them, are exceptional. For every woman over 40 who has had a healthy live birth, there are dozens of others who are having multiple miscarriages, or can't conceive at all, or have had babies with birth defects or genetic disorders, etc. The urban legends are the rare successes. So please. Again. You know that friend of yours who is over 40 and is childless? Don't tell her any damn stories. The stories don't give us hope. They just make us jealous. And they even reinforce our hopelessness. Frankly, everything reinforces my hopelessness. Yeah. I'm not an upbeat kind of gal.

So I have an appointment in a month. My friend who did IVF at 35 warned me that the first thing this doctor will do is recommend that I use donor eggs. I'm not doing that. Forget it. I almost don't see the point. I want my own children. My own genetic children. Doesn't everyone?

I'm scared of the appointment. I'm scared that I'll get tested and the doctor will tell me that my chances of getting pregnant are next to zero. That my eggs are not viable. That my body is broken. That I will never be a mother, (but good news, I can always be an auntie!). I'm so scared.

I took one of those (probably useless) home fertility tests, because I have strong masochistic leanings. It came out fertile. But what does it know? I'm old. I'm so freakin old.

My friend from high school is marrying off her daughter next month. Another friend who is a year older than me is a grandmother, three times over. You cannot imagine how much cognitive dissonance this creates in me. And how much it hurts.

One of my friends is begging me to go see this mekubal guy in New York, who apparently will give me ruby dust to drink and get me pregnant. See, this sort of wacky segulah stuff tests the limits of my faith. Will God, who holds the key to conception, give me a child because I drink ruby dust? I'm thinking, no. My faith doesn't include magical potions.

So what do I do, dear readers, ask you to pray for Webgirl bas Webgirl's Mom? I have so many friends praying for me, baking challah for me, saying Tehillim for me. Will it break through? Will it help? What will change God's mind? Will He remember me? Can God really forget someone? Is God waiting for me to drink ruby dust? Pixie dust? I don't think so. I don't know what to think. I sort of go a little cognitively and spiritually gray when I think about my infertility. It dulls the pain a little.

And will my life have any value if God decides not to give me a child? Hmm. I guess that's the big giant question, huh. Who will I teach things to? What about when I die? Who will be my heir? Who will inherit my stuff? Who will say kaddish for me? Who will remember me? Who will care?

Infertility cuts like a knife. A nasty, serrated, rusty knife. So, enough wound opening for today. Time to go gray again.

Good news! They like us! They really like us!

This article is by far the stupidest thing I have read all week.

We are popular with the world again.

Are we in 7th grade? Is being popular in the world a national, American goal? Is this something our Founding Fathers dreamed of?

I cannot believe that there are people who are stupid enough to think this is important. David Ignatius, hats off to you. You have said the dumbest thing I have heard in a long time.

Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize

I give up. Uncle.

The Secret Lives of Housewives

I graduated college at a pretty young age, nineteen, and have basically been working ever since then. Except for brief periods of unemployment lasting a few weeks here and there, I've been very fortunate about getting work. I've never really had long stretches of time where my life was completely my own. I've always been in some sort of structured, scheduled environment. Even when I was working for myself, I was rigorous about my schedule and very disciplined about my work routines.

I recently moved to an Out-of-Town (read: not in New York) community where the job market in my field is horrific. Absolutely sucky. I've been here about three months and outside of a few meager freelance projects, I've had no work. Realistically, my prospects of getting a position in the next few months are rather bleak. Yup. My husband is supporting me.

I'm going to say those words again.

My husband is supporting me. My husband is supporting me. My husband is supporting me.

For some reason, it's hard to get those words out. I feel weird and conflicted and guilty about not working. We don't have kids (yet). I'm very good at my profession and have high-income earning potential. We really need the money. There's not a whole lot to do around the house. Well, there's always something, but it's mostly mind-numbing drudgery. When I say mind-numbing drudgery, I'm not speaking in hyperbole. I could fill up my day with mind-numbing drudgery, like reducing the endless piles of laundry that scream at me from the kitchen (Sort me! Sort me!), or space-bagging the overflow of the linen closets, or organizing and re-organizing the "Costco shelf" in the garage. There are the trips to pick up The Husband's dry-cleaning, or buying things we need at Walmart or at Bed, Bath & Beyond. I could spend hours trolling Bed, Bath & Beyond, clutching my 20% off coupons that never expire (never!), feeling my brain cells jumping ship as I think to myself "lemon zester....do we need a lemon zester? Have I been wanting to zest lemons recently?"

There is a lot of that sort of stuff in my life right now. But there's also more meaningful things to do. I'm back in the Jewish community here and I've firmly re-entrenched myself in volunteer work. I'm on the board of an organization that I care about, I teach the occasional class here and there, and I'm doing a few hours a week at the kosher food bank. I'm raising money for one of the schools here. I'm making meals for people who have just come back from the hospital.

I'm bored. I'm so bored I could cry. Actually, I have cried, quite a lot. Twice I cried really bad. The Husband wasn't quite sure what to do with me.

I'm not sure why I'm not enjoying this more. There is something about waking up and kissing your spouse goodbye as he toddles off to work and having the whole day yawn wide in front of you that is utterly depressing.

I have friends who are housewives who are bright, capable women, and they are exhausted all the time. Why are they exhausted? What are these secret lives that they lead that make them tired and fulfill them as my work used to do for me? And as I reluctantly embrace my unemployment, how do I access that feeling that I am doing something useful and good even though I'm not working?

Let me explain right off that I don't have a feminist bone in my body. I'm comfortable and secure with the gender role-oriented aspects of modern Orthodox Judaism and always have been. This is not me trying to prove something or trying to compete in some way. I just want to work.

I just want to work.

I know it would be different if we had kids to raise. But right now, we don't. And I don't know where to put myself. I can't do another Walmart run. I can't even look at the washing machine. I don't want to make any more stuffed cabbage and I don't want to vacuum. I don't want to make packages at the food bank. I want to work.

And while I'm ranting on about the joys of housewifery, let me say some particularly unpeecee things about househusbandry. We have these friends from shul, a young couple, who are very young and stupid. She works, he stays home with their baby. I have to say, (and I know I'm going to get flamed for this but whatever) I have never known a guy who was a "househusband" who wasn't a little strange. Granted, I've only known four couples where this is the case, but thinking about these men, they are all either 1) too lazy and unmotivated to pursue a career or 2) trying to prove some social feminist point that no one really gives a damn about anyway or 3) equipped with a history of mental illness. Seriously. I know there are statistics and studies etc. that bear out that househusbandry is perfectly normal and productive and okay, but I've yet to encounter this sort of setup where the players are not, well, weird. And frankly, some of their kids turn out even weirder.

Ok, back to me. I woke up at 7am today and made my husband breakfast and then spent 8am-9am in bed with a good library book. At 9am I got dressed (no sweats, I will not wear sweats, no I will not) and headed down to Walgreen's to pick up bandaids and shampoo. At 9:25am, I sobbed silently in my car, just for a few minutes. At 9:45am, I sat down at my computer to blog about it. And so it goes. Tomorrow I will do it all over again, different episode, same show.

I'm not cut out for the housewife gig, I think. I'm just not.

Checking in

So here's something new.

I'm happy.

Yup. I'm actually happy. I'm not thrilled, ecstatic, on Cloud 9, over the moon. But, I'm happy.

I know a happy blogger doesn't exactly make for the most interesting posts. Hope I don't sound like a blithering idiot. Maybe that's why I haven't written in my blog so much these past few months. I started my blog as an outlet, a place to put all the mental energy and dust that got kicked up during my divorce, the divorce that shook my world to pieces. I just don't have that much to kvetch about.

Scratch that. I actually have a lot to kvetch about. I need a job. I have a very small biological window left to have a baby and I'm worried sick about it. We're short on money. My move here was a nightmare. My mom and siblings are driving me crazy, crazy, crazy. My house is still not unpacked and in need of some major fixing up. My community needs money. I need to have some minor (very minor) surgery next week. One of our contractors stole money from us. My car is badly in need of some body work and we can't afford it. I'm middle aged. Etc. Etc.

But these problems are all just part of being awake every morning. I don't expect life to be free of problems. That doesn't happen till you're, well, dead.

Truth is, I greet every day astounded at my lack of unhappiness. I think I've been unhappy for so long, I didn't really recognize the feeling of being happy. My miserable marriage, followed by my sad divorce....nearly a decade spent steeped in unhappiness. No wonder. I'm flexing new muscles. I'm getting laugh lines.

Well, thank you, God. Seriously. Thanks for turning my dear husband around and showing him that if we each devote ourselves to making the other person happy, we will have a good life together, and we will build something. Thanks for helping me change. Thanks for giving me something to work with. Most of all, thanks for a second chance. I owe you one.

Shana tovah.

Fixing up our little nest

We've spent the last few months doing stuff to our house. Starting off a new marriage in an old house can drag you down...we wanted our external environment to be as fresh and different as possible. We've done quite a lot on a very, very limited budget. Since money is tight for most people these days, I thought I'd share some stuff I've learned along the way:

1) the cheapest and most effective facelift you can give your home is a paint job. What a difference a little fresh paint makes. We used a painter, but if your funds are seriously tight, do it yourself.

2) paint all your ceilings white, no matter what.

3) use Facebook to get recommendations from friends on contractors. Get a million estimates before you hire someone. Estimates are free. You will eventually find someone who fits your budget and does good work.

4) Home Depot takes Lowe's coupons, expired or not. Lowes takes unexpired Home Depot coupons. Sears will usually match Lowe's and Home Depot prices on appliances...don't be afraid to bargain. Lowe's 10% off coupons are available at the post office, in change-of-address kits. Grab five of them at a time. I buy nothing at HD or Low's without a coupon.

5) Another way to do cheap updates that make a difference is to change doorknobs, drawer pulls, handles, switchplates, socket covers, toilet seats, towels, lighting fixtures. You can get much of this stuff very cheaply online.

6) when decorating, use odd numbers when displaying things. Put out five plates, not four. Put out three vases, not two.

7) Use Craigslist, but very, very carefully, because there are a lot of weirdos out there. Hire lawn guys from Craigslist, but don't necessarily hire contractors that need to come into your house. Never give a contractor money in advance, no matter how trustworthy they seem. If they need to buy supplies or paint at a store, have a store call you from the register for a credit card number. They do it all time.

8) Go on Freecycle.org and look for posts on people giving away painter's tape, ceiling paint, clean dropcloths, etc. And when you are done with your paint job, freecycle your stuff as well.

9) A good handyman is priceless. Get one through recommendations. Wait until you have at least five things he can do and have him come and fix/install it all at once...you'll save the multiple traveling costs and it's so nice to get a bunch of stuff fixed.

10) If you're doing ongoing renovations, go into home improvement stores periodically to check out the floor sales. I stopped in one day and got a Moen faucet for our sink for $50, just because they were on overstock sale. I got a stainless steel refrigerator for $400, because it was the floor model.

11) if you're painting and driving yourself crazy with color choices, rather than just choose a color and hope it works, invest $3 and buy a color sample and throw it up on the wall. We made one bad mistake in a bedroom and had to pay the painter to repaint it (and buy new paint). We should have bought five or six color samples instead.

12) do things in stages. Don't try to do everything at once. Get your floors done. Pause. Get your repairs done. Pause. Get your painting done. Take a breather. Then get your window treatments. Put up some shelves. Go slowly or you will make bad choices.

13) Nothing gives a house a quickie external face lift and curb appeal like painting the front door. Make sure to use a semi-gloss finish and exterior paint...the elements are tough on paint.

14) Another cheapola face lift that brightens everything...have your windows professionally cleaned. Suddenly, the sun will come in.

Feel free to post your home reno tips here. Could use some ideas about low-cost window treatments.

Those who cling

I've been connecting to lots of old friends in Out-of-Town and it's been quite nice.

Last week, we were invited to a couple's house for Friday night dinner, and imagine my surprise when I saw Jessie there. Who's Jessie? Jessie is a great woman. She's fun. She's funny. She's nice. She's offbeat, interesting, and always great to talk to. I was quite friendly with her a few years ago when I first lived in Out-of-Town, but I had to let our friendship fade and disappear. See, the problem with Jessie is that she never lets go. Never. Lets. Go.

When we invited her for Shabbos meals, she would always stay for at least an hour to two hours after everyone had gone home. At first, I was sort of pleased and flattered that such a nice, funny woman would choose to hang out with me (The Husband always went to take a Shabbos nap) when she could have gone home any time. But it got tedious and old really quickly. I too wanted a nap, or at least to have some facetime with The Husband. But every single time we invited Jessie over, she hung out long after it was time to go home. She was The Guest Who Never Left. Sometimes, if we had her for lunch, she would end up staying for Shalosh-seudos, and then eventually for Havdallah, and then one time even went to the movies with me and The Husband on Saturday night ("I'm such a third wheel! You don't mind, do you?"). Sometimes she would ask me to go out during the week, and occasionally, because she was a fun, likable person, I'd willingly agree. But then she'd come back to the house with me and hang out for hours. Of course, eventually, I would start gently hinting, and she almost always took the bait. Almost always.

Sometimes she'd bring a ridiculously extravagant hostess gift, like the $80 Sharper Image corkscrew I'd mentioned we wanted but would never buy for ourselves, and then I'd feel horribly guilty about hinting that she should leave. She was single (never married), lived far away at the very edge of the eruv, and her kashrut was definitely not up to our standards, so she really couldn't reciprocate and invite us back, and so was always trying to do nice things for us "to pay us back," which we insisted was not necessary, but there she was. She called too often and sometimes at odd hours, and was hard to get off the phone.

Finally, I introduced her to some other friends of mine who had large lively Shabbos tables, and they started inviting her too. As soon as I realized that she had other places to eat on Shabbos, I stopped inviting her, and, I'm a little ashamed to say, stopped returning her calls. I'm not very proud of the way I handed her off.

My friends reported to me that she did the same thing to them in terms of sinking in her tenterhooks and not letting go. It was pretty clear that no matter how great Jessie was, she had some major self-esteem issues. I was willing to bet that this was one of the reasons that she never married, as I find that most guys like clinginess as much as they like garlic breath, and tend to run quickly from both. One of my friends that apparently had taken a real liking to Jessie even decided to get brutally honest with her and talk to her about her slightly obsessive clinginess, and how it turned people off, but Jessie was less than receptive, and told her that people liked to be engaged by other people. Yes, but....

So, it was with mixed feelings that we ran into Jessie last week. As usual, she held up her end of the conversation with wit and humor, and was a pleasure to talk to. She asked me about going out for coffee this week, and (after The Husband delivered a gentle reminder kick under the table,) I politely declined, though she was so engaging and interesting, I was tempted. But coffee with Jessie was practically a long term committment, and I could not afford to fall into that abyss again. We bade her a goodnight and good Shabbos as we left, and she was just settling in on the couch with the newspaper, even though our host had already retired to bed and our hostess was about to get into a robe. Jessie clings like liquid soap.

I wonder about people like Jessie who have so much going for them, but don't know when to let go. It is so utterly against my nature to impose myself into other people's lives, I can't even get my head around why she does this. I can understand why someone with less going for them would do it, but Jessie seems to have it together. As I said, she's very likable, and she's attractive, with an interesting job to boot. She could have a great circle of friends if only she stopped the clinging. Sad. Self-awareness is everything.

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The Latest Assinine Comment on Healthcare from the Leader of the Free World

President Obama, at a Town Hall Meeting on August 11:

"All I'm saying is let's take the example of something like diabetes, one of --- a disease that's skyrocketing, partly because of obesity, partly because it's not treated as effectively as it could be. Right now if we paid a family -- if a family care physician works with his or her patient to help them lose weight, modify diet, monitors whether they're taking their medications in a timely fashion, they might get reimbursed a pittance. But if that same diabetic ends up getting their foot amputated, that's $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 -- immediately the surgeon is reimbursed. Well, why not make sure that we're also reimbursing the care that prevents the amputation, right? That will save us money."

Oh my Freakin Freakin Lord Amightee. Did the President of the United States of America just imply that American doctors would rather amputate their patient's leg than prevent the disease that called for the amputation for the money? Did he actually just say that?

Here're just a few of the many, many things that are wrong with this statement:

1. Are you freakin kidding me?
2. The doctor who counsels the patient (general practitioner, internist, or endocrinologist) is not the same doctor who cuts off the leg (surgeon).
3. According to the American College of Surgeons, "Medicare pays a surgeon between $740 and $1,140 for a leg amputation. This payment also includes the evaluation of the patient on the day of the operation plus patient follow-up care that is provided for 90 days after the operation. Private insurers pay some variation of the Medicare reimbursement for this service." So Mr. President, not $50,000, not $40,000, not even $30,000. Around a thousand. Yeah, that's big bucks.
   
4. How is this an argument for government-run health care?
5. Are you FREAKIN KIDDING ME?
   

Does President Obama consult with anyone before he spouts pure, offensive, wrong, crap like this?

And where, exactly, is the outrage?