I was taking part in a discussion on another board about the adoption recruiter ad and the ethics involved..and a poster wrote the following kind of message:

People know how to get pregnant or not to get pregnant..and you can’t say that they can’t help but get pregnant when they don’t want to. It is easy not to get pregnant unless you are raped. There is basic biological facts, birth control and just general consequenses of sex..one of which is preganancy or just say NO

So It’s the Birthmothers Fault for Getting Pregnant

Yeah, accidents happen, but it is not because of super fertility. There is just no such thing.

Or along those lines pretty much.

Now, I happen to be one of those uber fertile kinds of women. Rye and I joke now that he can’t even come within three feet of me. Our family is done, I will not be having anymore children and at this point a pregnancy would not be a positive thing. If I was a good Catholic and lived 100 years ago, I probably would have been one of those women who had 15 children.

Infertility in the Family Genes

And I don’t know why. My mom had me and then secondary infertility for years. I remember her trying to get pregnant as a child. The basal thermometer in her nightstand drawer, her chart neatly printed out next to it, my father saying to me one early morning,

“You want a sister or brother? You don’t want to be an only child? Leave us alone in the morning..go watch TV”

It took her twelve years to make my brother.

My aunt has one child. Tried for years, a few miscarries, a few bad genetics that had to be terminated. Maybe it skips a generation or two, but I was blessed with well working female parts that wanted to make up for the times.

Anyway, I replied to the doubting poster my basic pregnancy history which is as follows:

• I first became pregnant at 18 because I was stupid and too much involved in trying to “get the boyfriend to love me” to say hey wait, but chalk one up for experience and lesson learned.
• I became pregnant at 18 AGAIN on the Sponge. Why was the Sponge was taken off the market? It had a bad failure rate. It felt really, really bad getting PG again, and couldn’t abort, so my oldest son was adopted out.
• I became pregnant around 20. I was on the pill immediately after birth of adopted child, but was not aware that it is true that antibiotics cancel out the pill.
• I became pregnant at 22 with my second son. I am till scratching my head at this one..I was soooo careful for years..Condom failure must be made to blame as that’s what I swore by. Sometimes, I just tend to think that my son just really wanted to be born..and he was.
• Then I had a nice run of fertility control. I think there were a few “scares” in there, but nothing more than being three weeks late and then the body kicking in. Sometimes I almost think that they were not so much as real “lates” but early spontaneous miscarriages….no way to know for sure and either way it was fine.
• Then when my husband and I decided to conceive .it had been years without a “known” pregnancy. I had friends with secondary infertility and I was a bit nervous on whether it would be “as easy” as before. Decided at the end of April, by the end of May..you guessed it. Pregnant with my daughter.
• She was born in January. By November …yup. Again, but I miscarried.
• Then in December, my son took. So in 2001, I started Pg and ended PG. We had not been all that careful as we knew we did want another child..though again..I had expected it to be a bit longer in time..yeah, I should have known better.
• I have had one other positive test since the birth of my LAST child..and that one, even with being very careful, was a surprise. Thankfully, with some mental help, the soul departed, and I miscarried two weeks “late”

So that’s 8 known pregnancies ..plus the few “lates” ..four children, two terminations, at least two miscarriages  ONE of those was intentional and planned, one or two were just sloppy on my part..and all the others..failure of birth control.

Over Fertility is Real

What made me feel really frustrated was when someone told me that it could not be my fertility that made this all happen, but my actions.

Ok..my actions?? Which would be what? Having sex? Choosing bad birth control  Because I did use it. I haven spent the majority of my life trying NOT to get pregnant..and when we planned for my daughter..that felt so alien, so weird, to want it to happen. That freaked me out.

I just don’t understand why it is impossible to accept that one can be very, very fertile. I am ovulating now. I know it. I could get pregnant tonight..and if I have sloppy sex, I probably would. I am almost 38 years old. I have sex since I was 16 and my fertility is still going strong. And it is a real bitch to control.

And I do blame my body just as much as I would blame my body if I was infertile. I have easy periods, I have easy pregnancies, I have easy labor. My body likes to make babies. And it does it rather well. For many years I did not want it to do it, and I live in great fear of it happening again. I can’t wait til menopause so I can be done with it all, but I don’t think I can trust it even then..I would fear a change of life baby surprise.

Right now, I am a big proponent of being very “stern” with my ovaries  They know they are on a time out. I have told them that they are DONE. I don’t allow myself for one second to think “Awwww..little baby..that might be nice” for I fear that they will hear that little whisper of desire and start up the baby factory again. We have a nice understanding at the moment..They stay dormant and I keep them from temptation. But I am gonna have sex, damnnit.

It’s Unrealistic to Expect People to NOT have Sex

It just irks me that it is not taken as fact. I am not saying that I have nothing to do with it. I said openly when it was purely my fault. But also, when you have one “mistake” and then you try to do things the “right way” afterwards..and it still doesn’t work. Is it expected that maybe after the third time I was just going to become a non sexual person because birth control DOES fail and all I happen to need is one little swimmer to make his way in? Should I have been on the pill AND an IUD and using CONDOMS and maybe a diaphragm too? Or just keep my clothes on? Like WHAT actions makes this my fault? Being human? It’s not a fertility issue? And why does it have to be my fault? Because I choose to have sex? So I should tell Rye that he’s cut off? Yeah, that will work nice. Why must there be blame? Why can it not just BE?

Why Feel Sorry for the Infertile, but Blame the Very Fertile?

It’s like saying to someone that it’s not their infertility that prevents them for getting pregnant and having a child. It’s their actions. How insulting would that be? How just plain stupid. Obviously, if there is the one end of the spectrum with infertility and that is accepted as fact..they why cannot the other end be accepted also? If one can blame their body for the failings in being able to have a child, then one can also blame their body on the failings of that body wanting to have too many children?

Sometimes things are just not controllable  Birth control is not infallible. Some infertility is not fixable. Hyper fertility is not always fixable either. I do my best to control it, but all I need is one sperm. You know, they are really, really little. Kinda hard to find and catch sometimes. Slippery little buggers with only one thing on their mind. In over 20 years, I missed 8. I have a normal sex life…how many of those guys have I seen a week, a year, in the past twenty years? Eight out of 200 million kabillion is NOT a bad ratio.

I don’t necessarily like my uber fertility any more than anyone likes their infertility  It’s cause tons of heartache and trouble. It’s rather a bother at times. I constantly worry about it. I do a dance of joy every month when I bleed. I don’t trust my body. I have felt betrayed by it. Like so many women, it doesn’t do what I want it to do.
Don’t tell me it’s my ACTIONS. Heck, I was born this way. I am not asking for sympathy, but don’t blame me.
__________________________

I have to add: I don’t want to be resolved of any responsibility here. But I think the concept of very fertile should be accepted.
Granted, I feel more blessed than anything. I adore having my children. Even if I did just get yelled at by a whiny Scarlett for taking “too long” with demands for my return to the land of chaos and put in the Cinderella tape. So I made her get the tape first… to buy more time, so I can add this.
I love that I had had four children. I am amazed at it myself. I never would have thought four. I find it impressive. I do feel proud. Producing these things, these creatures, that spring forth and breath and become these little people…and you see yourself and their fathers in them. Quirks and stances. Sounds and habits. It’s fascinating  I find them all quite fabulous and I am amazed that they came out of my body, how they fed off me, how I was theirs for so long.
So there is great joy among the heartache and I wouldn’t have traded it for anything.
So I am sorry if you do suffer the other side of the fertility spectrum.
I don’t want to say anything that implies that one is measuring up pain, or that you are less because, or that you got a worse deal. But I do wish we had all had to suffer less, and sometimes I think my cross is lightly less to bear.
Ah, I should shut up now and put on Cinderella before I PC myself to death.