Earlier this year I
was considering going for
counselling after my operation in January. This was due
to the surgeon finding endometriosis, which very likely could have contributed
to my infertility but was something the IVF clinic we went to never looked into,
let alone mentioned. I was feeling very angry and let down and the grief about
not having children reared up violently.
I haven’t gone to
counselling.
This time I found,
after a bit of time, I didn’t feel that I needed it. I found that I have moved
through the grief and pain (although it did rise again after my last operation
in June) and have come to a point where the anger is not overwhelming and I no
longer feel guilty that I let our children down.
It was only since
losing Ari that I realised that the need for counselling had gone. This wasn’t
because I thought that I needed counselling after losing Ari, but rather that I
realised that I know things about myself that I didn’t even know I knew – how’s
that for a mouthful!
I used to be a
positivity nut – and when things weren’t going my way or I thought they were
unfair I would try to control everything to make the situation good again, or I
would look for a very good reason as to why things weren’t going my way. I didn’t
recognise back then that what I wanted was for things to go my way – I just
thought that because I was thinking positively about certain aspects of life
that they would happen the way I envisaged.
Even after we couldn’t
have children I had this idea of how life was going to be for Kirby and me and
that was the way it was going to be. If we couldn’t have children then surely
this new vision of life would become a reality? It would be completely unfair
if it didn’t!
It didn’t. Well, not
completely – things have happened that we hoped for, and things have happened
that we wish hadn’t.
My mother-in-law said
to me the other day that there is something different about me this year – that
I seem more settled in myself. And that is how I feel.
Life has its ups and its
downs – I have very little control over it really. I do what I can do and then
the rest happens due to events, people – a combination of things really.
I have learnt to
accept that – most of the time! The night before Ari died, when he was in the
emergency vet overnight and we knew he was very sick, I said to Kirby that it was
quite possible that Ari might not come home. Kirby was surprised, I think, as
normally I wouldn’t even want to entertain that idea. But, it was a real
possibility, even though I hoped that what was wrong with him would be
something like a blockage in his digestive system that an operation could fix.
I don’t believe that
my “negativity” contributed to the outcome. How could it? Ari already had lung
cancer and was going to die. I didn’t create it overnight and change what was
wrong with him from something that could have been fixed to cancer. If I had
the kind of power to change situations there is so much I would change in the
world and I would be a god! And, Ari would still be here because I would
definitely have made it so.
So, I’m not sitting
here with my thoughts and emotions constantly wondering why it all happened and
how unfair it all is and that life is over. Of course, I am grieving – which involves
feeling sad, angry, guilty, asking why, etc. but it is a healthy grieving, not
an unhealthy grieving. I hope that makes sense.
Stoicism is something
I have been reading about lately – once again thanks to
Oliver Burkeman! Being
stoic – as it is defined today – was not what it originally was. Stoicism is a
philosophy and one I am keen to learn more about. One of my favourite quotes
from Marcus Aurelius (2
nd century AD) is:
“The cucumber is
bitter? Put it down. There are brambles in the path? Step to one side. That is
enough without also asking: “How did these things come into the world at all?””
I’ve still got a long
way to go in understanding Stoicism, but it seems to be a philosophy that quite
possibly will appeal to me the more I delve into it. Or maybe it won’t be. I
don’t know and that’s quite okay.
So, with the
endometriosis and with Ari and with not having children – I can grieve in a
healthy way, and wonder why as part of that grieving, but that is it. I don’t
have to keep on asking why and constantly dwell on it and be angry all the time.
The interesting thing about
Stoicism is that the recognition of a situation doesn’t mean that you don’t do
anything about it – if someone is bullying you, you wouldn’t sit there and say “well
this is how it is” and leave it at that. You would say “this is how it is – now
I recognise this and I will do something about it.” Perhaps it is in that
recognition of the situation that the clarity of whether there is anything that
needs to be done occurs, and if so, what that might be? What do you think?
Therefore, I will
still be writing to the IVF clinic to ask for an explanation about why they
didn’t look into endometriosis – because I believe this will be a healthy thing
for me to do and may prevent them from failing someone else in the future as they
did us. After that, whether I get a satisfactory answer or not is out of my
control, and I will leave it be.
