Sjögren's and Infertility

One of the reasons I started this blog was to write about my life with Sjögren's Syndrome - the ups and downs and successes and failures and so on.  I hoped to draw in others with Sjögren's, and make a community of people (women) who are in the same boat, and maybe make coping with this a little easier.  

Like with everything else in my life, I don't know where to begin.  So I will start with where I am now:  41, almost 10 years since my diagnosis, single, childless, plus-sized, post-menopausal, and starting to get a little bitter.  ok, a lot bitter.

I struggle with balancing the "buy you look good" back-handed compliments with being a whiny, self-absorbed "i am my illness" emotional parasite.  I really struggle with the well-meaning friends/strangers who chirp "you can always adopt!" when the subject of babies comes up.   i get annoyed with the media and the self-absorbed people around me who look down there noses at me for having a belly, and a butt, crazy hair, no makeup, second-hand clothes, a homemade lunch and a 13 year old car.  i'm frustrated with the hoards of people who can't believe that a male friend and i are truly JUST FRIENDS and haven't shacked up and become one two-headed couple-creature (a la Brangelina) and started spawning.  

*breathe in*

*breathe out*

ahem.

ok.  so, maybe I have issues, or the whole freaking newsstand.  let's pick a path and travel that.  since I've already titled this posts "Sjögren's and Infertility" i guess that's as good a place as any.  

fact:  i can't have babies.  a hysterectomy 2.5 years ago took care of that once and for all.

semi-fact:  Sjögren's and pregnancy don't mix well.  

when i first was diagnosed, i was still young enough to think i'd be having kids.  i'd bargained with my gyn-oncologist (another story for another day) to let me keep my baby-making parts until at least 35.  surely in four years i could find a man, claim him as mine, and get knocked up at least once, right?  Wrong.

my early reading on Sjögren's was not very positive.  i don't remember the name of the book, but the gist was "pregnancy will kill  you, the baby, or both.  and you better start applying for permanent disability now, because no one gets approved the first time and by the time you do get approved, you'll be basically incapacitated.  sucks to be you!"  it was a very dark time for me.  after a few years, a few doctors, and a few different combos of drugs (both disease-specific and general pain/mood meds), things are a lot better.  

but i still can't have babies.  

fact: i worked as a nanny when i was 21-22.  

being a nanny was the hardest job i've ever had. I was young, and i was caring for three children, once of whom had special needs.  they were 4, 7 and 9, and they kept be busy.  just a couple months after the job started, the parents went to a town that happens to be in Canada (ANOTHER COUNTRY!) for a long (five-day) weekend.  i was the sole responsible adult for those five days.  i couldn't leave the house without dragging all three of them with me.  and on day 2, i got sick.  it sucked, we made do, but from that point on, my view of parenting had a MUCH more realistic edge to it.  any thought i'd ever given to just getting pregnant and figuring the rest out on my own was quickly tossed out the window.  my parents had been putting the grandbaby pressure on me pretty heavily, too.  at one point i (sarcastically) offered to just go out and get knocked up, and my dad, confused by my dry wit, told me "that's not what we meant".  well, then, butt out.  not much later, my (younger) brother and his (much younger) girlfriend announced they were expecting, and suddenly the pressure was off me.  Careful what you wish for, eh?  

so throughout my 20s, although i had opportunities to get pregnant (and even a chance to get married), i thought better of it, knowing that my bare-bones income would be a hindrance to any thoughts of child-rearing (daycare costs HOW much??), and i didn't need that stress.  and slowly, it dawned on me:  i wanted to get pregnant and have a baby, but i did NOT want to raise children.  

Then my mother got ovarian cancer and died.  then i had my first ovarian tumor removed (under threat of hysterectomy).  then i was diagnosed/bought my house/lost my job/got a new job.  then Harry & Terry, the Tumor Twins, popped up, and that brings me to now: 

41, almost 10 years since my diagnosis, single, childless, plus-sized, post-menopausal, and starting to get a little bitter.