While waiting to see the midwife a couple of weeks ago, I read a magazine article which suggested that having four or more children is, in certain circles at least, regarded as a symbol of both wealth and status. The author of the article interviewed several women who were married to high-earning bankers or lawyers, and who commented on how lucky they were to have been able to afford to have a large family without having to continue to work themselves. The article went on to contrast their situation with that of 'most women', who choose only to have two or, at the most, three children, for primarily financial reasons.
Reading this article, I realised how alien the whole concept of 'family planning' now feels to me. When you are dealing with infertility, you hold tight to any possibility of having a child, no matter when or how that possibility comes along.
I was reminded of this article over the weekend. My old friend from university and her fiance came up to visit (let's call them Jane and Patrick). The four of us went out to dinner to celebrate Jane's 37th birthday, which was on Saturday. Over the meal, our conversation turned to the topic of children. Jane and Patrick are 'definitely' going to start trying for a baby in around eighteen months or so. First, however, they want to get married and then move to a bigger house. Jane has a very successful career as a lawyer, and also wants to try and make partner before she has to go off on maternity leave.
I have another friend, Victoria, who is around the same age as Jane and myself. Victoria is an academic, and about to publish her first book. She then wants to secure a promotion at work and apply for a period of research leave. She thinks that she'll probably start a family after that, once her second book is well underway.
It strikes me that both Victoria and Jane have fallen for one of the great urban infertility myths: that it's OK to wait, because even if things don't happen naturally, there's always IVF. Over dinner, Jane made a comment about wanting to 'get it all over in one go', by having twins or possibly even triplets.
But it seems to me that my friends are taking one hell of a risk with their fertility. I want to grab them by the shoulders and tell them that, at the age of thirty-seven, their fertility is already in decline. I want to tell them that IVF is by no means a guaranteed treatment, and that success levels fall rapidly once you are in your late 30s. I want to tell them about my own diagnosis of diminished ovarian reserve, and about how, after two poor responses to stimulation, I was forced to think long and hard about whether it was worth continuing with assisted conception.
But is that perhaps the equivalent of someone with no apparent fertility problems suggesting to me that I should simply relax?
Tuesday, 10 February 2009
Tuesday, 3 February 2009
The Scarlet Letter 'I'
When I was caught up in the day-to-day struggle of infertility, I tended to avoid the company of those who were either pregnant or raising small children. Sometimes, it was simply too painful to be confronted with such a tangible reminder of what I myself could not have. At other times, I found myself bored by lengthy conversations about the intricacies of weaning or potty training - let's face it, other people's children's toileting habits just aren't that interesting. But what used to infuriate me the most was the ever so slightly smug, self-satisfied and patronising attitude that certain (though by no means all) women with children tend to adopt towards those without children. I can well remember having a (rather one-sided) conversation with a fellow PhD candidate who had recently given birth herself about the joys of motherhood. 'Of course,' she said to me confidentially, 'you'll only really understand what I'm talking about once you have children of your own.' I resent the underlying implication behind such statements: that those who remain childless - whether by choice or as a consequence of infertility - are somehow to be considered 'less womanly' than those who are mothers.
But I also found that my resistance to spending time with these women was often matched with a certain discomfort on their part. As we grow increasingly vociferous about our condition - whether as individuals or as a community - we force others to confront an uncomfortable truth: that infertility can happen to just anyone. We serve as visible reminders of the fact that it could just have easily have been them with their feet in the stirrups. To certain members of the 'mummy brigade', the realisation that pregnancy and motherhood are by no means a 'natural' or inevitable stage in every woman's life strikes deep at the very core of their identities.
Yet now I find that my pregnancy appears to have afforded me automatic entry into a club that had hitherto eluded me: other pregnant women catch my eye in the supermarket and smile conspiratorially; harassed mothers struggling to deal with tantrumming toddlers ruefully tell me that I 'have all this to look forward to.' For the past few weeks, I have been attending a weekly 'yoga for pregnancy' class. I'm finding it helpful not only to stre-e-e-e-e-tch, but also to pick up practical tips on how best to prepare for and cope with labour. But on another level, I find it difficult to accept that I really belong in this room full of pregnant women. I cannot escape the feeling that I still have a scarlet letter 'I' for Infertile emblazoned across my chest for all to see, and that, sooner or later, I will be found out and asked to leave.
But I also found that my resistance to spending time with these women was often matched with a certain discomfort on their part. As we grow increasingly vociferous about our condition - whether as individuals or as a community - we force others to confront an uncomfortable truth: that infertility can happen to just anyone. We serve as visible reminders of the fact that it could just have easily have been them with their feet in the stirrups. To certain members of the 'mummy brigade', the realisation that pregnancy and motherhood are by no means a 'natural' or inevitable stage in every woman's life strikes deep at the very core of their identities.
Yet now I find that my pregnancy appears to have afforded me automatic entry into a club that had hitherto eluded me: other pregnant women catch my eye in the supermarket and smile conspiratorially; harassed mothers struggling to deal with tantrumming toddlers ruefully tell me that I 'have all this to look forward to.' For the past few weeks, I have been attending a weekly 'yoga for pregnancy' class. I'm finding it helpful not only to stre-e-e-e-e-tch, but also to pick up practical tips on how best to prepare for and cope with labour. But on another level, I find it difficult to accept that I really belong in this room full of pregnant women. I cannot escape the feeling that I still have a scarlet letter 'I' for Infertile emblazoned across my chest for all to see, and that, sooner or later, I will be found out and asked to leave.
Wednesday, 7 January 2009
Great Expectations
Infertility has made me feel a failure - as a woman, as a wife, but also as a daughter.
My father and, perhaps more particularly, my stepmother have for some years had a palpable longing for a grandchild. While many of their friends have gone on to become grandparents, they have been forced to sit back and watch helplessly. My two stepbrothers show absolutely no signs of settling down in stable relationships, let alone reproducing, and so all their hopes have been pinned on my rapidly ageing ovaries. Although they have been very supportive of our decision to undergo IVF, in all the time I was struggling with my own complex feelings of guilt and failure in relation to my inability to conceive and carry to term a child, I was also acutely aware of just how disappointed they too were.
Eventually, they befriended a French couple of around the same age as myself and Mr H whom they met on holiday. I met this couple for the first time over the summer - they are lovely people, who have clearly been to hell and back as far as infertility is concerned: after several failed cycles of IVF, they eventually adopted two little boys from Estonia, a process which took them over four years (the question as to why we too couldn't 'just adopt' has often seemed to hover, unspoken yet reproachfully, in the air). My father and stepmother absolutely dote on these two children: they go to visit them as often as possible, and have even talked about moving to France permanently in order to be close to them. Their house is filled with photographs of the French family, and every time I go to visit them I feel even more guilty for not being able to provide them with the one thing that they seem to want above all else.
Since we told them that we were expecting a baby, they have been absolutely beside themselves with excitement. While we have yet to buy a single piece of baby-related paraphernalia, their plans for the new arrival seem to be well under way: my stepmother has already knitted a small stash of hats and bootees, while my father has been leafing through back issues of 'Practical Woodworking' in search of something he can make for his first grandchild (we had tactfully to reject a rather wonky looking crib on health and safety grounds).
Yet somehow the sheer weight of their expectations continues to press heavily upon me. Even at 25 weeks, I find it difficult to believe unconditionally that there will be a baby at the end of this process. While everyone around me makes plans, I am still very much living from moment to moment of this pregnancy.
My father and, perhaps more particularly, my stepmother have for some years had a palpable longing for a grandchild. While many of their friends have gone on to become grandparents, they have been forced to sit back and watch helplessly. My two stepbrothers show absolutely no signs of settling down in stable relationships, let alone reproducing, and so all their hopes have been pinned on my rapidly ageing ovaries. Although they have been very supportive of our decision to undergo IVF, in all the time I was struggling with my own complex feelings of guilt and failure in relation to my inability to conceive and carry to term a child, I was also acutely aware of just how disappointed they too were.
Eventually, they befriended a French couple of around the same age as myself and Mr H whom they met on holiday. I met this couple for the first time over the summer - they are lovely people, who have clearly been to hell and back as far as infertility is concerned: after several failed cycles of IVF, they eventually adopted two little boys from Estonia, a process which took them over four years (the question as to why we too couldn't 'just adopt' has often seemed to hover, unspoken yet reproachfully, in the air). My father and stepmother absolutely dote on these two children: they go to visit them as often as possible, and have even talked about moving to France permanently in order to be close to them. Their house is filled with photographs of the French family, and every time I go to visit them I feel even more guilty for not being able to provide them with the one thing that they seem to want above all else.
Since we told them that we were expecting a baby, they have been absolutely beside themselves with excitement. While we have yet to buy a single piece of baby-related paraphernalia, their plans for the new arrival seem to be well under way: my stepmother has already knitted a small stash of hats and bootees, while my father has been leafing through back issues of 'Practical Woodworking' in search of something he can make for his first grandchild (we had tactfully to reject a rather wonky looking crib on health and safety grounds).
Yet somehow the sheer weight of their expectations continues to press heavily upon me. Even at 25 weeks, I find it difficult to believe unconditionally that there will be a baby at the end of this process. While everyone around me makes plans, I am still very much living from moment to moment of this pregnancy.
Friday, 2 January 2009
In which Mr H puts his foot in it
When you yourself are battling infertility, it can be very difficult to feel much sympathy for those who moan on endlessly about their pregnancy symptoms. I have in particular very little patience with those who complain of feeling fat and unattractive during pregnancy. About eighteen months ago, we had an extraordinarily difficult weekend visit from Mr H's best friend and his pregnant girlfriend, who spent the whole time going on about how big she thought her arse was. It took every ounce of self-control that I had not to tell her to shut the f**k up. 'Why can't you see just how lucky you are?' I felt like shouting at her. 'Have you any idea of what I would give to be in your shoes right now?'
During my own pregnancy, I have been determined not to fall prey to such culturally induced self-loathing. I have tried very hard to embrace my changing body shape, and to focus on feeling voluptuous and womanly. Yes, I have suffered some minor discomforts, but they seem a small price to pay for the privilege of becoming a mother.
My fragile self-confidence has, however, recently taken a knock. The other day we went round the January sales. Hr H pointed out a cardigan that he thought I might like. 'You'd probably still fit into that,' he commented.
The cardigan in question was in the window of a shop specialising in plus-size clothing. I am a UK size 8 (around a US size 6); this particular store starts at UK size 18 (US size 16). Once this was pointed out to my darling husband, he immediately started back pedalling. He wasn't for one moment suggesting that I should try on the cardigan; he was simply pointing it out as a particularly fine example of its kind.
My position on the moral high ground of the relationship is now assured for the next few days at least. From my vantage point, I am rather enjoying watching him squirm!
During my own pregnancy, I have been determined not to fall prey to such culturally induced self-loathing. I have tried very hard to embrace my changing body shape, and to focus on feeling voluptuous and womanly. Yes, I have suffered some minor discomforts, but they seem a small price to pay for the privilege of becoming a mother.
My fragile self-confidence has, however, recently taken a knock. The other day we went round the January sales. Hr H pointed out a cardigan that he thought I might like. 'You'd probably still fit into that,' he commented.
The cardigan in question was in the window of a shop specialising in plus-size clothing. I am a UK size 8 (around a US size 6); this particular store starts at UK size 18 (US size 16). Once this was pointed out to my darling husband, he immediately started back pedalling. He wasn't for one moment suggesting that I should try on the cardigan; he was simply pointing it out as a particularly fine example of its kind.
My position on the moral high ground of the relationship is now assured for the next few days at least. From my vantage point, I am rather enjoying watching him squirm!
Wednesday, 17 December 2008
End of term
I have made it to the end of term with my sanity still reasonably intact. The flood of anxious emails has slowed to a trickle, and I at last have time to breathe, to think and to write.
On the pregnancy front, I am now a little over 22 weeks (although the bloody maternity jeans still won't stay up!). Everything looked as it should at the twenty week scan, and Mr H got to see the baby for the first time (he wasn't able to come with me for the nuchal translucency scan as he was away on work). We decided in advance that we didn't want to find out the sex: although I felt that I'd quite like to know, as parenting a boy or a girl each seem to me to pose their own unique challenges, Mr H was adamant that he didn't want to know - it would, he felt, be rather like knowing in advance what you're getting for Christmas.
At just over half way through the pregnancy, it feels a good time to try and reflect back over some of my feelings so far. There is a great deal of popular literature devoted to pregnancy, much of it emphasising what a special time this is in a woman's life. These guides are full of handy tips on how to nurture the unique bond between mother and baby.
In comparison with these somewhat idealised descriptions, my own experience of pregnancy has felt far more replete with anxiety.
In my weekly therapy sessions, I continue to worry that I do not feel the way the books tell me I should feel. I agonise over the fact that I was not able to experience such an immediate and instinctive bond with my unborn child. Did this perhaps mean that, even after all I have been through to get to this point, on some deeply unconscious level I do not really want this baby? In the session before we went for the 20 week scan, I voiced my deepest, darkest fears: what if the scan revealed that there was something terribly wrong with the baby? Would I be able to go ahead with a termination? If we decided not to terminate, how would I cope with raising a child with significant mental or physical disabilities? My therapist gently suggested to me that such anxieties were an inevitable part of the pregnancy process. While many women found them simply too terrifying to contemplate, others were more clearly able to acknowledge them.
I have found her remarks extraordinarily helpful in beginning to manage my conflicting feelings about this pregnancy. My previous experiences of infertility and miscarriage mean that pregnancy cannot be a time of unconditional joy; I remain too acutely aware of all that can go wrong. Somehow it still seems too much to hope that, in April of next year, I will give birth to a live and healthy baby. If I were to deny these anxieties, they would no doubt re-emerge symptomatically (perhaps in the form of postnatal depression, or else in my interaction with my child during the first few months of his or her life). But by exploring them, I can allow them to enrich and transform my experience of pregnancy and motherhood.
With my first pregnancy, I immediately expected to be transported into the state of blissful union that I had read about in the books. I felt an instant connection to that tiny little embryo burrowing its way into the deepest recesses of my body. That bond was abruptly shattered when I started bleeding. This time round, I could not allow myself to feel those emotions. For the first three months, I held my breath and I waited. And I felt guilty. I worried that I had in some way failed to 'bond' with my baby.
Now, however, I realise that pregnancy is a far more gradual process than the books would have us believe. Sometimes it takes a little time before we can allow ourselves to enter into such a fragile space of co-becoming. And it is only over the past few weeks, as I have begun to feel the first flutterings of the baby's movement, that I have been able truly to open myself up to the possibility of being transformed by the new life growing inside me.
On the pregnancy front, I am now a little over 22 weeks (although the bloody maternity jeans still won't stay up!). Everything looked as it should at the twenty week scan, and Mr H got to see the baby for the first time (he wasn't able to come with me for the nuchal translucency scan as he was away on work). We decided in advance that we didn't want to find out the sex: although I felt that I'd quite like to know, as parenting a boy or a girl each seem to me to pose their own unique challenges, Mr H was adamant that he didn't want to know - it would, he felt, be rather like knowing in advance what you're getting for Christmas.
At just over half way through the pregnancy, it feels a good time to try and reflect back over some of my feelings so far. There is a great deal of popular literature devoted to pregnancy, much of it emphasising what a special time this is in a woman's life. These guides are full of handy tips on how to nurture the unique bond between mother and baby.
In comparison with these somewhat idealised descriptions, my own experience of pregnancy has felt far more replete with anxiety.
In my weekly therapy sessions, I continue to worry that I do not feel the way the books tell me I should feel. I agonise over the fact that I was not able to experience such an immediate and instinctive bond with my unborn child. Did this perhaps mean that, even after all I have been through to get to this point, on some deeply unconscious level I do not really want this baby? In the session before we went for the 20 week scan, I voiced my deepest, darkest fears: what if the scan revealed that there was something terribly wrong with the baby? Would I be able to go ahead with a termination? If we decided not to terminate, how would I cope with raising a child with significant mental or physical disabilities? My therapist gently suggested to me that such anxieties were an inevitable part of the pregnancy process. While many women found them simply too terrifying to contemplate, others were more clearly able to acknowledge them.
I have found her remarks extraordinarily helpful in beginning to manage my conflicting feelings about this pregnancy. My previous experiences of infertility and miscarriage mean that pregnancy cannot be a time of unconditional joy; I remain too acutely aware of all that can go wrong. Somehow it still seems too much to hope that, in April of next year, I will give birth to a live and healthy baby. If I were to deny these anxieties, they would no doubt re-emerge symptomatically (perhaps in the form of postnatal depression, or else in my interaction with my child during the first few months of his or her life). But by exploring them, I can allow them to enrich and transform my experience of pregnancy and motherhood.
With my first pregnancy, I immediately expected to be transported into the state of blissful union that I had read about in the books. I felt an instant connection to that tiny little embryo burrowing its way into the deepest recesses of my body. That bond was abruptly shattered when I started bleeding. This time round, I could not allow myself to feel those emotions. For the first three months, I held my breath and I waited. And I felt guilty. I worried that I had in some way failed to 'bond' with my baby.
Now, however, I realise that pregnancy is a far more gradual process than the books would have us believe. Sometimes it takes a little time before we can allow ourselves to enter into such a fragile space of co-becoming. And it is only over the past few weeks, as I have begun to feel the first flutterings of the baby's movement, that I have been able truly to open myself up to the possibility of being transformed by the new life growing inside me.
Tuesday, 18 November 2008
Spreading myself too thin
I am at that stage in my academic career where, if someone asks me to do something, I am scared to turn it down, just in case I am never asked again. The result is that this semester I have taken on Too Much Teaching.
The module I teach in the Shit Hot Critical Theory Department was so over-subscribed that this year they asked me to teach it twice over, to two separate groups of students. It is also running as an MA option, which means that I have had to organise further classes solely for graduate students: every week, I tie myself up in knots trying to explain complicated bits of psychoanalytic theory to them. I am also doing some further teaching at another institution altogether, supervising undergraduate dissertations.
I seem to be pursued from all angles by anxious students wanting to ask me questions: every time I check my email, I find my inbox full of communications all marked 'urgent query re: essay'; at the end of every class, there is inevitably a small delegation of people waiting to talk to me. This morning one of them even followed me into the toilet: 'Are you in there, Ms Heathen?' came a voice from outside the cubicle. 'Can I ask you a quick question about my essay?'
Mr H is still working away from home during the week. Because I do not wish what little time we have together at the weekends to be entirely taken up by domestic chores, I try to cram both housework and teaching preparation into the week, while my marriage is inevitably condensed into the weekends. There seems very little time left over for myself.
Somewhere along the lines, something has had to give. And that something appears to have been my own writing - both here on my blog, but also within my PhD.
I was supposed to submit my dissertation by the end of this month. I am not going to be in a position to meet this deadline, and so am going to have to apply for (yet another) extension. I have gone through this whole process several times already - firstly after my miscarriage and latterly when I was undergoing IVF. These extensions have to be formally approved by a special committee of senior academics: somewhere in the remote recesses of the University, there sits a body of men (and somehow I always imagine them as elderly men) who are by now intimately acquainted with the vicissitudes of my reproductive system. This time, however, I have a more immovable deadline than the one imposed by the University: somehow or other, the dissertation has to be finished before my due date of 18 April next year.
With every passing day, my list of unread items in Google Reader grows ever longer. My blogging friends have been such an incredible source of support to me over the past twelve months or so, and I feel simply horrible about the fact that I am finding it increasingly difficult to find the time to repay that support - to sit and wait with those who are undergoing treatments of whatever kind, to try to empathise with those who are trying to find a path through the labyrinth of adoption, or even simply to nod in agreement with those who voice the frustration and pain inherent in living with infertility.
Night after night, I lie awake, my mind racing with all that I have to do the following day. Often, I compose blog posts in my head, posts which then never make it beyond the draft stage. I started this blog because I wanted to try to make some kind of sense of my struggle with infertility and pregnancy loss. As I continued to write, I realised that what was also important was to feel part of a broader community of women. Those twin aims have not diminished. Of course, it would be perfectly easy for me to publish a series of posts in which I confess that, at the weekend, I gave into a craving for Brie and have been racked with guilt ever since, or in which I tell you about how I finally cracked and bought a pair of maternity jeans, which constantly threaten to fall down whenever I wear them. But I don't want this blog to turn into a laundry list of common pregnancy symptoms. The blogs which I most admire - and the one which I myself aspire to write - are those which offer a degree of reflection on ART, infertility, loss and life post-treatment: whether that life includes children or not. Thoughts on these issues continue to swirl round and round in my mind... it's just that I have too much going on in other areas of my life to begin to process them in any meaningful manner.
Bear with me until term finishes in three weeks' time....
The module I teach in the Shit Hot Critical Theory Department was so over-subscribed that this year they asked me to teach it twice over, to two separate groups of students. It is also running as an MA option, which means that I have had to organise further classes solely for graduate students: every week, I tie myself up in knots trying to explain complicated bits of psychoanalytic theory to them. I am also doing some further teaching at another institution altogether, supervising undergraduate dissertations.
I seem to be pursued from all angles by anxious students wanting to ask me questions: every time I check my email, I find my inbox full of communications all marked 'urgent query re: essay'; at the end of every class, there is inevitably a small delegation of people waiting to talk to me. This morning one of them even followed me into the toilet: 'Are you in there, Ms Heathen?' came a voice from outside the cubicle. 'Can I ask you a quick question about my essay?'
Mr H is still working away from home during the week. Because I do not wish what little time we have together at the weekends to be entirely taken up by domestic chores, I try to cram both housework and teaching preparation into the week, while my marriage is inevitably condensed into the weekends. There seems very little time left over for myself.
Somewhere along the lines, something has had to give. And that something appears to have been my own writing - both here on my blog, but also within my PhD.
I was supposed to submit my dissertation by the end of this month. I am not going to be in a position to meet this deadline, and so am going to have to apply for (yet another) extension. I have gone through this whole process several times already - firstly after my miscarriage and latterly when I was undergoing IVF. These extensions have to be formally approved by a special committee of senior academics: somewhere in the remote recesses of the University, there sits a body of men (and somehow I always imagine them as elderly men) who are by now intimately acquainted with the vicissitudes of my reproductive system. This time, however, I have a more immovable deadline than the one imposed by the University: somehow or other, the dissertation has to be finished before my due date of 18 April next year.
With every passing day, my list of unread items in Google Reader grows ever longer. My blogging friends have been such an incredible source of support to me over the past twelve months or so, and I feel simply horrible about the fact that I am finding it increasingly difficult to find the time to repay that support - to sit and wait with those who are undergoing treatments of whatever kind, to try to empathise with those who are trying to find a path through the labyrinth of adoption, or even simply to nod in agreement with those who voice the frustration and pain inherent in living with infertility.
Night after night, I lie awake, my mind racing with all that I have to do the following day. Often, I compose blog posts in my head, posts which then never make it beyond the draft stage. I started this blog because I wanted to try to make some kind of sense of my struggle with infertility and pregnancy loss. As I continued to write, I realised that what was also important was to feel part of a broader community of women. Those twin aims have not diminished. Of course, it would be perfectly easy for me to publish a series of posts in which I confess that, at the weekend, I gave into a craving for Brie and have been racked with guilt ever since, or in which I tell you about how I finally cracked and bought a pair of maternity jeans, which constantly threaten to fall down whenever I wear them. But I don't want this blog to turn into a laundry list of common pregnancy symptoms. The blogs which I most admire - and the one which I myself aspire to write - are those which offer a degree of reflection on ART, infertility, loss and life post-treatment: whether that life includes children or not. Thoughts on these issues continue to swirl round and round in my mind... it's just that I have too much going on in other areas of my life to begin to process them in any meaningful manner.
Bear with me until term finishes in three weeks' time....
Thursday, 6 November 2008
Jetsetting
Don't worry - I haven't turned into one of those bloggers who finally gets that elusive BFP, promptly forgets that they were ever infertile and then skips off into the sunset to decorate the nursery...
Mr H is stuck out in Madrid on a three-week assignment at the moment. Because of flight times, he cannot make it home at the weekends. This week is reading week for my students, which meant that I did not have classes to teach, and so I decided to fly out to see him. Coincidentally, last weekend also marked our fourth wedding anniversary.
We had a wonderful few days together. Although infertility and pregnancy loss have taken us to some pretty dark places, and have at times stretched our relationship almost to breaking point, we weathered that storm. After eight years together, we are still going strong and, perhaps just as importantly, we still actually like each other - I know that it's a bit of a cliche, but he really is my best friend as well as my lover.
While in Madrid, I also threw caution to the wind and ate a wide variety of cured meats. I also consumed a large and very bloody steak, which I washed down with half a glass of red wine. I cannot help but feel that much of the dietary advice aimed at pregnant women may be culturally specific - I can't really imagine that French women are warned of the potentially dire consequences of consuming Brie, or of not cooking their steak all the way through. One of Mr H's Italian colleagues did, however, inform me that there is an old superstition in Italy that, if you eat too many raspberries while pregnant, you will give birth to a bright pink baby! Given my fanatical belief in the anti-ageing properties of blueberries, Mr H is now worried that our baby may emerge looking a bit like Violet Beauregarde!
Mr H is stuck out in Madrid on a three-week assignment at the moment. Because of flight times, he cannot make it home at the weekends. This week is reading week for my students, which meant that I did not have classes to teach, and so I decided to fly out to see him. Coincidentally, last weekend also marked our fourth wedding anniversary.
We had a wonderful few days together. Although infertility and pregnancy loss have taken us to some pretty dark places, and have at times stretched our relationship almost to breaking point, we weathered that storm. After eight years together, we are still going strong and, perhaps just as importantly, we still actually like each other - I know that it's a bit of a cliche, but he really is my best friend as well as my lover.
While in Madrid, I also threw caution to the wind and ate a wide variety of cured meats. I also consumed a large and very bloody steak, which I washed down with half a glass of red wine. I cannot help but feel that much of the dietary advice aimed at pregnant women may be culturally specific - I can't really imagine that French women are warned of the potentially dire consequences of consuming Brie, or of not cooking their steak all the way through. One of Mr H's Italian colleagues did, however, inform me that there is an old superstition in Italy that, if you eat too many raspberries while pregnant, you will give birth to a bright pink baby! Given my fanatical belief in the anti-ageing properties of blueberries, Mr H is now worried that our baby may emerge looking a bit like Violet Beauregarde!
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