What did you call me?

The first time someone labels you as "infertile", it is a life altering experience. I remember that first distinctly. I was on the phone speaking to one of the nurses at my Doctors office, receiving the information I needed for my referral to Seattle Reproductive Medicine. I asked her a question (I don’t even remember what the question was now, but I’m pretty sure it was fairly general) and her response was “You know what dear? I don’t know. I don’t usually work with our infertility patients, give me a second though and I’ll go ask.” By the time she came back, I was huddled under my desk (I happened to be at work at the time) in a heap, trying desperately to muffle the sound of my own sobs.

It wasn’t like I didn’t know that that’s what I was. There were in-depth conversations with my Dr., and I obviously understood why I was being referred to Seattle Reproductive Medicine. I had no illusions that I was anything other than infertile. It was just… that was the first time someone had referred to me as that term, directly. And she did it in such a nonchalant and conversational manner, like it was the most normal thing in the world to say. My guard was down and I was struck with the instantaneous realization that that was exactly what I was: infertile. That word now defined me, and would define the rest of my life. I could choose what that meant to me, and I could choose how to react to it, but... No matter how stoic I remained, or how much information I sought out and retained, there was no changing this fact now. I was infertile. The truth of my infertility (and the endo that caused it) had come upon me so quickly (the timeline had been so swift) that this hardly seemed possible or real. The shear weight of that label was crippling...

How had this happened? And when? At what point had this become my life?