Our Family++
A story about lovers vs infertility
The story of us spans the globe and our imagination
Alright kids throw another log on the fire and settle in for a long story cause this one is about how your story began and how your mother and I struggled to start our little family you’ve come to know and love. Before diving into that, a little prologue. The story of us started in 2017 when early that year I had reached a point where after a series of failed relationships and my ever advancing age I came to the conclusion that perhaps having kids was not in my future. In an exchange with my mother on the topic she attempted to soften the blow gently by saying “Not everyone in life is meant to have kids.” I started losing faith that we’d ever meet face to face and started picturing a life alone with Shreddies, and to some degree I had made peace with it. Every once in a while a baby thought of you infiltrated my mind, but the weight of my inability to have you in my life by 45 mentally and spiritually sunk me, I hit a wall, I shifted from dynamic being to static regression. I felt myself fall and cancelled my own growth. Things weren’t looking too great for me, I gotta be honest… things weren’t looking so great for you either little ones.
Was this to be my destiny? Shreddies and I forever?
Then later that year everything changed and the years that followed were a whirlwind of change, a tsunami of emotions, and a lifetime of beauty and memories. I met a woman, your future mother, a truly wonderful and pure soul that brought a richness to my life like no other; I got a really cool once in a lifetime job for a year and a bit; I made new friends; I strengthened old friendships; I bought a dream house with your mom, thanks to her mostly; I lost the very best furry friend I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing, which split my heart into pieces once more; I traveled from island beaches, to cliff hanging temples, to the birthplace of so many things that I love, Japan with Sophie; We got engaged at an onsen , third time's a charm; I learned to be handy and to not be too hard on myself; I hurt people… but I also loved them.. and I think I even helped a few; I grew and I struggled; in essence I was back to living life and learning.
Fast forward to mid March 2020, a worldwide pandemic hit us, what ensued was a difficult year for so many. I know that year I hit a fairly low note, certainly within the realm of a mini depression. When the pandemic broke so much changed and we were forced to confine ourselves in a house that was under full renovation. Scaffolding replaced living room furniture, tools and dust were everywhere and very little of our beautiful home was habitable. For a few months Sophie and I worked in the dining room elbow to elbow. Time expanded, slowing to a crawl where work days felt like they last forever and our renovation prison was closing in around us. We shifted from working to live to living at work, our identities collided which left us trying to find ourselves after we felt we had been found.
Underneath the perceptible undercurrents of all of this, we were also struggling to create our own little family, a seed that had been planted on our very first date. We sat across from each other in an empty restaurant, me at my dating wits end and her in her early days of dipping her toes in the water with many fish and fresh bait. I had reached a point where I was uninterested in hiding anything. I had been through a series of failed relationships, many because a possible family of my own was just not feasible. So sitting across from this blue smoky eyed wonder I bared my soul, a lot for anyone to take in and quite frankly what many might consider running away from. Rather than retreat she herself became more open. We shared what was likely one of the most honest and open first dates we’d ever had and we walked away knowing that we both wanted a large family, up to four kids, this was very important to both of us. The thought of our very own little kids was planted right out of the gate for us, we always wanted you.
Our very first picture together as a couple, in a grocery store no less
Months after that first date we planned and went on our first 2 week trip to Belize, a good dating indicator of future viability. We came back home unscathed and in love. Fast forward six months we moved into my cramped tiny two bedroom full on man cave condo, trying to tetris two apartments worth of furniture together. We were of the mind that since we fast tracked our first date and our first trip why stop there? Let’s fast track our lives and see where we break. With each test came hurdles and each time we opened up and let a bit more of ourselves out and we fell deeper in love. Never have I been so open and honest with anyone in my entire life, it was liberating and scary as all hell. I’ll never forget the moment your mom sat me down and asked me to do couple’s therapy… I looked at her bewildered and answered “But we don’t have any problems?!” She answered without missing a beat “And that’s why it's important to do it now, before a serious problem settles.” You see your mother saw us going the distance together from the beginning and wanted to do preventative therapy, to give us a fighting chance when serious issues emerged. I accepted reluctantly because I loved her so much and this was important to her. As is often the case she was so right to make this happen for what transpired gave us the foundation we needed to communicate in constructive and honest ways. It paved the way for our exponential growth together as we learned to challenge each other on our shit as well as to appreciate each other just cause. So when she suggested we buy a home together, with a bit of convincing of course, I followed along.
We were so into each other we made our very own hoodies
We visited many houses, all your mother’s planning and doing. Those who know me well know that I am a great procrastinator and generally pretty lazy, don’t take after me kids. Sophie is the complete opposite. In the 3 years we’ve been together she’s gotten a number of promotions, worked two jobs, managed a number of income properties, got her MBA as well as her real estate licence, learned to ski, all while building a life. I’ve come to learn that she is my sun and I am an orbital body rotating around her gravitational pull. She brings so much beauty and love into my life, her sheer will and determination are like nothing I have ever seen. My life blossoms through sheer proximity to her.
Sophie didn’t waste any time selling her first property either.
I’ve always been a drifter in life. There are very few things I have pursued and pushed for. I was where I was because of invisible currents or simply because of geography and time. My mother kicked me out in my early twenties because I was afraid of living life, afraid of the world because I knew nothing about it and it knew very little of me. I moved into a house on the market with a close friend because he did all the work and I needed a place to stay, I got a job at the college I went to, I bought my mom’s house cause she wanted to give me a hand… I drifted and things happened around me. Very rarely did I make things happen through sheer will and determination.
One of the few examples of something I’ve willed into reality… through a purchase of course.
And so in me your mom had found a movable immovable soul. A young old man stuck in his ways pulled out of his world of known knowns and into a mysterious world of unknown unknowns. Those who know Sophie will understand this very rare gift she has, a superpower even, capable of pushing people to be better without feeling like you are being pushed. I wasn’t ready or interested in moving but here we were visiting houses together and me hating most if not all of them, but in these moments something else happened. I started to see a new reality emerge in my mind, another life possible besides the one that dictated my existence. Slowly but surely Sophie moved me from purely existing into active being. I started to dream again but in a new way, a shared dream emerged where in life we tackled everything together; she did most of the heavy lifting of course. Right away I dropped my lazy lens onto the entire activity, if we did this I didn’t want to jump from house to house as our family grew. I hated moving, it felt like a shitty job that no one really wants. No if we got a house it would have to be our forever home, until we dropped everything and moved onto a sailboat and sailed around the world… a story for another time. I also didn’t want to travel too far for work, I abhor traffic and needed to avoid it like my life depended on it… because it did.
Traffic and I are not a good combo, like cereal and soya sauce.
These new requirements introduced a few things in our search, first of all it increased our budget but it also increased our appetite. With each new visit the houses grew to accommodate our family of 6 and each time we got closer to what we wanted. Second, it surfaced a neighborhood I had fallen upon in my walks with Shreddies. A place where no two houses are alike, yards were enormous and surrounded with rich and dense, mature trees, and above all else close to downtown Ottawa. We must have visited 3 or 4 houses in this neighborhood before getting to the one that we fell in love with. I will always remember your mother whispering to me as we crossed each other in the stairs as we took it all in “I really want this house!” When Sophie sets her sights on something there is very little in this world that will stop her and I wasn’t about to be one of those things. I shared her love for this home and I wanted this as much as she did.
The home we wanted in all of its snowy glory.
The house was on the market for less than a week when the owner accepted our offer, another of Sophie’s gifts, her attention to detail and planning put us in that house early and allowed us to beat others to the negotiation table. So after almost a full year after our first date, on October 12, 2018 we slept in our new house that would one day be your home. We don’t fuck around… well we do.. but not when it comes to fast tracking. So in true fast tracking fashion in January 2019 we welcomed the happy possibility of falling into pregnancy should that come to pass. Yet months went by, life moved on, achievements were shared and celebrated but you were nowhere to be found little ones.
Oh what a happy day, our forever home was ours.
Early on we shrugged it off and just went about our lives expecting the happy news to come but it never did. For a drifter such as myself navigating these ebbs and flows that life throws our way is much easier but for your mom, a detailed planner and over achiever this turn of events weighed heavy on her, it felt like a failure for her to bear. She meticulously followed all of the science, the baby making recipes however unlike all of her other efforts that led to success these efforts led to a void that was left empty and devoid of life. A crushing blow to anyone who deeply desired many children. To make matters worse a deeply moving human experience that connects us all became a taboo topic amongst loved ones. Not because we didn’t want to talk about it but because loved ones did not want to add any pressure or negativity to an already stressful and heavy experience.
Our loved ones were always there to help entertain us and raise our spirits.
In true Sophie fashion she started searching and consuming content on infertility and troublesome conception. She literally wears her heart on her sleeve, she shares openly and is deeply reflective, traits I absolutely adore about her. She can’t help but share what she is feeling or thinking with her loved ones because this is how she’s grown to be into the woman we all love and adore and this was not going to change her ways… in the background of all this you would see me hovering, floating, orbiting her darkening rays. She took the necessary steps to start getting tested, to seek outside help. She pushed me to do the same and only once her tests came back normal did I start to move on my side. This inaction did trouble her, I do regret causing her unnecessary pain in this regard, I often drift on autopilot and that’s usually on neutral. This kind of behaviour is completely the opposite of my love, but seeing her pain… and an all green on her side, was enough to kick me into high gear.
Perhaps our infertility issues was my doing, I needed to get my ass in gear and get checked.
After all was said and done we were told that my motility was low and that next steps would either have to be insemination or in vitro. Living in the province of Quebec we benefited from up to 9 possible inseminations attempts all covered by health care while in vitro was not. So we got transferred to a fertility clinic in Gatineau and began a new journey in our baby making chapter. Another series of tests revealed that I actually was just fine and we fell into a category of unknown infertility issues. I won’t bore you with all the details, because quite frankly I don’t know all of them, but like many other things in life the woman’s experience is much more complicated and demanding than the man’s side. Similar to making a baby the woman does most of the work while the man contributes very little, the same is true with insemination. My love tracks her cycle religiously, visits the fertility clinic on multiple occasions for each attempt, she ingests pills, and injects hormones. What do I do? I show up once and fill up a cup… actually even that is an overstatement.. I capture a small sample in an oversized cup. Think of all the moments and time buried in those activities where she’s reminded why she is doing all this in the first place.
Underneath that beautiful smile was a struggle imperceptible to most.
Once the planets and stars line up it is time for insemination. Due to the pandemic I wasn’t allowed to be in the room with Sophie so I waited in the car. This is a very scientific process where so many variables are accounted for making the experience extremely robotic and formulaic. As we headed back home after the first attempt the air hung heavy in the car, seconds later tears started streaming down her face, my heart cracked in two. I knew where her mind was and I felt her pain. All of this was the antithesis of what we felt creating life would have been for us. Gone was the love, the emotion, and romance of it all. In its stead was a disinfected, cold, and structured process that didn’t even put us in a room together during what could be a life changing moment. I couldn’t offer much to console her other than my chest, support and empathy. Everything she was feeling I was thinking and feeling as well, she was just brave enough to share it.
We had reached our highest high and our lowest low in less than a year.
Even after the procedure is carried out nothing is guaranteed and the woman’s work is far from over. More medication must be injected or ingested each and every day, a constant reminder of what you still don’t have and what you might not get… there’s never any guarantee. Two weeks later she gets to pee on a stick to see if it was all worth it. We pee all of our lives without as much as a fleeting thought yet in these moments on that fateful day what has been an afterthought for most of your life becomes such a defining and important moment. All your hopes and dreams tied to a stream of yellow liquid hitting an inanimate stick and allowing it to seep in for 5 minutes in the hopes of seeing two lines. What did her pee and that stick have in store for us? She no doubt had so much hope and emotion wrapped into such a small condensed moment of time. Seconds become months as she waits for those two lines to appear so that she may begin her new life with her ever growing family… yet that day was not to be as a single line prolonged her anguish. Another crushing blow each and every time which sends her mind reeling, trying to understand what she did wrong. Ever present in the background I am there, the drifter, with very little to offer to ease this burden. Echoing in my mind are my mother’s words: “Not everyone is meant to have kids.” Was this our fate?
Was this to be our only creation together?
One night as Sophie stood in our dining room she started to share a thought as her voice trembled with sadness, tears quickly followed as she exhaled a shattering thought, “Children choose their parents… why do they not want us?” This was the moment I saw my love come apart at the seams, foundational pieces of her were coming undone. She was always an optimist at heart with never ending determination, she finally reached the end of the road and waiting for her there were malevolent thoughts ready to wreak havoc from the inside. I softly answered “If our kids are anything like us they’ll be super picky about when they want to show up.” A silly and warm thought that eased the pain for a moment but there is not much one can do to battle the loss of something you never had but always wanted. The only tool I knew that worked was one that many dread to use… time.
We had come a long way from these blissful, happy times.
Over two years had passed since this journey started with no success, we started entertaining an alternate reality than the one we had crafted together in our minds. New conversations unfolded, new forced possibilities started to materialize and together we explored a life together just the two of us. No kids, no sleepless nights; no game changing, life altering children to speak of… no little yous. Just the two of us and the happiness we create and bring into each other’s lives. Surprisingly we found and met each other there, we both came to the stark realization that a life together with no kids was better than a life with kids without each other.
Our life without kids involved a whole lot more travelling, something we are quite adept at.
Another month came and went and yet again another failed insemination. Fall had departed as quickly as it arrived and we were now entering the holiday season with a secret wish for Santa. Three being such a magical number in so many fairy tales we wondered if it could be swayed to be our lucky number. So in early December we went through the motions of our new baby making dance and were informed that this month’s stick peeing festival was to occur on the 21st, four days before Christmas. Was there anything we wanted more than this for Christmas… a rhetorical question if ever there was one. We went about our lives planning for the holidays, gift shopping for loved ones and each other and in the recesses of our minds a whole lot of finger crossing. The doctor had informed Sophie that there were 3 eggs this time, this increases chances of having twins. Having struggled so much to make just one we openly asked for twins. The week prior to pee day Sophie went to see our massage therapist, a monthly activity, and as she shared the latest developments he softly interjected with such a warm and romantic thought. He explained that the 21st of December was the winter solstice, an event signaling new beginnings, and how perfect it would be that she receive confirmation of a little one in her tummy on this particular day. A day of new beginnings not only for seasons and the earth but for her and I and hopefully for that little dumpling in her stomach. Her face buried in the massage table she broke down into tears, the walls of an alternate life were frail when juxtaposed against the life we really wanted. She cried tears of pain but more importantly tears of hope. A true believer of signs she felt this had to be a sign from the cosmos and slowly inside a renewed faith emerged.
Sophie is a deeply spiritual person and so when the cosmos speaks she listens carefully.
The 21st was a work day, the night before we agreed that we’d get up early to see if our life was about to change. When morning came she wasted no time, straight to the washroom she went, I waited in bed, groggy and tired. In what had become a sort of defence mechanism Sophie abstained from letting hope take hold of her with reckless abandon in a kind of self preservation. After 5 minutes had elapsed she walked over to my side of the bed and sat down with the stick in hand and muttered “I guess this month wasn’t meant to be.” I turned my gaze towards her half expecting tears. I was surprised to see her maintain composure. It was like she had flipped the auto-pilot switch on in order to survive. She grabbed her phone, snapped a pic and sent it to her sister-in-law who was convinced this was the month it was going to happen. We hugged in silence for a brief moment and then the day unpaused. I remained lying in bed, deflated and somewhat defeated while Sophie started getting ready for the day. Minutes later she was back by my side in tears and complete despair as her sister-in-law messaged her back saying that she saw a second faint line. Sophie expressed concern at the thought of raising her expectations when she’s been doing everything she can to contain any of these kinds of feelings in order to avoid severe emotional destruction each and every month. She really didn’t want someone else helping her sow her own undoing. She reviewed the instructions often left hidden in the box to confirm what she was being told, sometimes when it is early it is possible for the second line to be incredibly faint… almost invisible really. Apparently a similar situation occurred for Sophie’s niece, and so a convinced sister-in-law insisted that she come over with a quality pregnancy test so that Sophie could have a redo.
The test in question compared to an unused test, a single line… but was there a second faint line?
It was clear in this confusion and uncertainty hope was manifesting once more in our hearts and minds. As we waited for the new kit to arrive I slipped out to go and grab an ice capp and a coffee. Sophie’s brother arrived at our door with his wife and two boxes of pregnancy tests. Sophie was sent back in to do yet another test so that her sister-in-law could be proved right. On my timmies run I pondered if this was the type of push we needed to bring some positivity back into what should be a joyous occasion. Perhaps all we needed was for one person to believe beyond a doubt that we were with child, and that was enough to make space for us to believe it as well. Once I got back home I pulled into the garage and quickly made my way up the stairs to the main floor, and as I emerged Sophie was coming down the stairs from the second floor in full blown tears, but these were different somehow… they were awash in pure joy and relief; and in a soft trembling voice she whispered “She was right baby, we are pregnant!” The words pierced my entire being, a moment I had long wished for and failed to materialize had finally arrived. We were going to be parents, I was going to be a father. I effortlessly burst into tears of extreme joy and disappeared into your mother’s welcoming arms.
In each other’s arms, a place we both absolutely adore and feel safe.
We had finally succeeded in giving you life little G. Our little Gyoza nestled in your mother’s tummy... on the very first day we came to know of your existence you completely made the world right again. Even before you came into existence you were an even mix of both us, a procrastinator at heart with your mother’s intricate and detailed planning. We will never forget that perfect little moment you created by picking the perfect day to choose us as your parents, I just knew you’d be as picky as us. And so on December 21st, 2020 a time for new beginnings had begun, we started a new chapter of our lives as parents and you started the very first chapter of your life. We look forward to savouring every page of our story together, but for now until you're ready to join us out here know that you’ve made us the happiest parents alive.
Our crazy little family competing to see who did it better.
Mom and Dad
xxxxoooo
