WARNING: May offend, aggravate, incite, etc...just so you know...

Just know you were warned.

However, I'll appologize in advance, as I feel it will probably be needed. And, for the record, this is directed to NO ONE IN PARTICULAR. FOR REAL.

Please let me start by saying that anyone and everyone who has ever said a kind or uplifting thing to me has been truly appreciated and valued, and I am thankful for the blessings of friends, family, and even *strangers* I come to know who think of me and pray for me. The thought behind the encouragement is genuine and priceless. I really, truly, totally and undeniably cannot say enough thank-yous or give enough merit to what your words deserve.

That said...I really think that the next time someone tells me that I need to just keep a stiff upper lip, I will go postal. Seriously.

I understand things like that are said to raise my spirits, and to try and help me be hopeful by saying encouraging things.

Here's the thing...How many years have to go by before SOMEBODY finally acknowledges that the record is BROKEN and maybe, just maybe, it might be okay to say so? Seriously--I need to work on my attitude or the IVF will not work? W*H*A*T?????

Explain why the two + years of stupid Basal charts, clomid, yucky ultrasounds, hopes UP, upper lips stiffed EVERY FLIPPING MONTH and smiles on my face DID NOT WORK?

Explain what it was about the next several years of MORE drugs, hospitalizations, charts, invasive procedures, inseminations, AND AN EXTREMELY HOPEFUL (and expensive, might I add) attitude that failed me?

How about this? How about all the smiles, excitement, dreams, nervous anticipation and things bought in preparation for the Walter Reed IVF program we qualified for? Why wasn't my faith and my attitude good enough for that possibility to be a reality?

Or, now my all-time favorite? What about the ROOM full of things I have upstairs? Friends, I am talking ROOM FULL of things--baby things I have spent the last nine+ years buying, compiling, dreaming about and WAITING to use? The bassinet? The mounds upon mounds of clothes for a baby girl from birth to 3 years? The HUNDREDS of books? The toys? The flipping bedding and nursery theme, for Pete's sake? How, I ask, HOW DOES THAT NOT SCREAM THAT I AM HOPEFUL? THAT I BELIEVE? THAT I STILL, after all these blippety-blipped years, I STILL think that it could happen? HOW can that not be the epitome of HOPE? Maybe not draped in flowery words and cliches, but still, HOPE--stored in a room I can't even walk into without crying...

And as for my attitude about this whole adoption? Yes, recently, it's been not so optimistic. But let's face it, folks, can we agree that optimistic and realistic are not always best friends? Actions have been speaking SO MUCH louder than words, and have I been disappointed? You betcha. That doesn't mean that even though I really believe the odds of it happening are slim to none, I would not hop on a plane yesterday if things got moving and we got a referral. Do I still hope that there is such a person as Emma Jane? Of course. But, I also hoped I would grow taller (never even broke 5 feet--4' 11)...and it never happened. I don't think accepting that possibility means that I'm a glass half-empty gal.

I go to a job (that to be truthful, is NOT what I saw myself doing in life) where daily, I have sweet, wonderful children hug me and love me and even *accidentally* call me "Mommy" and I stay upbeat for them and positive for them, and LOVE them as much as I can, while inside I cry and cry because I'd give my eye-teeth (and John's too) to just take ONE home with me!!! Talk about rubbing salt into a wound. Yet, ask anyone that works with me to describe me, and I guarantee the following would be named: always smiling, always so happy, polite, mannered, so upbeat, positive, yada yada. Heck, some people even call me Mary Sunshine (and I love that, by the way!) for Pete's sake. How's that for a positive attitude? And, folks, that's where I spend the majority of my time, so I think they'd know.

So, now with the IVF--the doctor, though nice enough, told me, "We attract to us what we think." Sorry, folks, I am pulling the BS card on that one. I have wholeheartedly, faithfully and DESPERATELY spent so many YEARS of my life thinking, "This is it!! I know it!! THIS IS IT!" that if I had a nickel for every pregnancy test I took I'd be on the coast of Italy right now. If you believe that, and it works for you, fabulous. I just know that I have believed, believed and BELIEVED and nothing. I have prayed. I have done it ALL...upside down for an hour after (you know what I am talking about), supplements, diet change, buried the saint in the ground (don't ask), exercise, read the books, gone into major debt, planned the big vacations (and then ended up taking them, because OF COURSE, I was NOT pregnant), you NAME it, I bet I've heard about it, had it suggested to me, thought about it and/or tried it. Most of the time, with a good, hopeful and expectant (pun intended) attitude. NADA, friends, NADA.

So, forgive me if I think I will literally just scream the next time someone tells me that my attitude may be the reason nothing has been successful. Pardon me as I pop them. Excuse me if I bite your head off if you, lovingly, of course, tell me that I'll never (insert and take your pick--get pregnant, adopt internationally, adopt domestically) unless I (again, insert and take your pick--pray more, have more faith, eat better, sleep better, exercise more, have more hope, think positively, keep my chin up, rub the moose...you get the message). And, God help the poor, unknowing, well-meaning person that tells me ONE MORE TIME that I will end up adopting and immediately get pregnant. I fear for his or her life...I really do. Because the reality is that for every ONE of those stories you hear about, there are NUMEROUS women that NEVER HAVE THAT (sadly) HAPPEN!!! It's sort of like air travel--it's statistically safer than driving, but all you ever hear about are the plane crashes or incidents, so everyone automatically associates plane travel as unsafe. I'm sure someone will disagree, and that's fine, but the bottom line is those lucky people who spend years trying and then finally give up and adopt and then get pregnant are statistically the exception--the happy exception that everyone wants to talk about and swap stories with you over, but still.. the exception.

Again, let me reiterate that I know these words--all of them--are meant to help give me hope, and trust me, just knowing someone cares enough about me to worry and feel the need to encourage me means the world to me. It really does.


But, please, stick a fork in me. I'm done.