Part I

Somehow I landed on an infertility blog and it�s been amazing reading the struggles this couple has been through to have a child. What I didn�t expect was the feelings it would raise in me. I don�t really talk much or ever about my infertility experience fifteen years ago. Last night I dreamed about it, trying to get pregnant, the pregnancy tests, thinking I was pregnant, etc. And all morning I�ve been lost in that world again. So, I decided it was time to write about it.

The Beginning:

I was 21 years old and sharing an apartment with a friend. I had just been through the nightmare of my blood clots hospitalization and surgery. I was still on crutches as my legs learned to work again like normal legs. After many hospitalizations in the past six months for blood clot related issues and one major surgery, I was still dealing with much pain.

During the surgery the doctor has plicated my superior vena cava, so that any clots that dared form could not get to my heart and lungs. Because I not only had deep vein thrombosis in my femoral veins, but also an abdomen full of clots it had been necessary to do an ovarian vein ligation�.they had to cut many veins that fed blood supply to my ovaries. A visit to my gynecologist for abdominal pain led to him telling me I�d not be able to have children because of all the damage that was done to me internally; as well as because of the years of anorexia that caused me to not ovulate for over a decade.

I was devastated because even in my fucked up world, I always believed that eventually I would have a child. I�d always loved babies and children and never for an instant saw a future for me without children. Being a Mother was the career I wanted. A house full of kids was where I saw my life heading, even while in the throes of anorexia. Perhaps that is what always kept me verging on sane.

So, when the doctor told me I�d never have children, I began a period of my life of truly not caring what happened to me. Being a mother was the only thing I thought I�d be good at. And with that option removed, I figured it didn�t matter what happened to me. I began a period of drug use, sleeping around, hitting the bars every night and sleeping with whoever would have me. Because at the time I didn�t believe my future mattered.

So basically I became a slut. Since there was no future for me, it didn�t matter what I did to my body, or who I let use my body. One day I was at the mall with a friend of mine. I was still on crutches learning to use these legs that been so destroyed by blood clots. Somehow I ended up losing those little rubber handle things that protect your hands. I was attempting to backtrack my evening at the mall and still couldn�t find them. We ended up back at the store where a friend worked. I was leaning on the counter resting when a guy (a kid really) brought a card up to the counter.

And I went into flirt stage, because you see I had to ensure that every man I met wanted me. He told he was a senior at Jacksonville (city and college name edited to protect some degree of anonymity). I thought he meant Jacksonville College so I stepped the flirting up a notch! A college boy�ooh. He ended up coming with me to help me try to find the parts to my crutches, which we did find. He was cute in a skinny, gangly sort of way with dark hair, olive complexion and a large roman nose, which I told him I found sexy.

Believe it or not, I didn�t get him into my bed that night. Rather we set up a date for the following night. We agreed to meet at the mall where we would go have a dinner and then perhaps a movie. Only I knew that the evening would end in bed. This guy was actually a gentleman and during my several months of partying was something/someone that I had not seen often.

The next evening we meet up at the mall and he immediately calls me by the wrong name �hey Zon� he says. Umm, it�s Zen actually I say. He blushes and apologizes and I laugh and say it�s no big deal. We talk about what we want to do and decide to go to a small pizza restaurant located at the far end of the mall. I grab my crutches from the bench where they were leaning and we start off to have dinner.

After dinner I invite him back to my apartment telling him that Julia was out for the evening. We go back to my place which could have been an awesome three bedroom loft style apartment but due to the fact that Julia and I have no money, is more like a tenement! Our living room consists of a mattress and box springs on the floor covered in blankets and tons of pillows in an attempt to make it look like a daybed/couch. We turn on the little black and white tv which only gets one station as we�re too poor to get cable.

We sit on the �couch� and immediately begin kissing. We�ve not even talked much about our lives or who we are, but at this point in my life all I cared about was ensuring that the guy wanted me. My goal was only to get him in bed. After a time of kissing and playing I score a goal and at the time have absolutely no idea what immediately begins to happen in my supposedly dead uterus. Afterwards, he is feeling a bit off and wants to go to the store for antacids. Damn, I think, I�ve never unnerved a guy to where he has to soothe an upset stomach after an evening in bed with me!

We walk down the street to a convenience store where we get alka seltzer for him and at the counter he buys me a rose from the bucket next to the cash register. How sweet and unusual I think. We go back to the apartment where he informs me that I have just deflowered my first virgin. I�m also shocked to find out that he is not a senior in college which I had originally believed but a senior in high school. Uh oh, I think, I guess we should have talked more!

I�m feeling a bit overwhelmed thinking I�ve not only robbed the cradle but molested it as well! He reassures me that he is indeed 18 and that he just had the best night of his life. He then tells me that he has to go home as his father needs the car. I�m feeling slightly uncomfortable but agree to have him call me the next day. After he�s gone, I lie back on the couch and immediately overcome with nervous laughter. My first de-flowering! My roommate comes home and over a shared joint I tell her the whole story. I then fall into a dreamless sleep, completely unaware of what is already beginning with my now awakening fallopian tubes and uterus.

to be continued...