The Well's Gone Dry

The tears aren't there like they used to be.

That was kind of a sad realization for me.  You might think not crying about it anymore would be a good thing.  But I think in this case it isn't.

***********************************************

I have a bump on my middle finger on my right hand.  It's from holding a pen a certain way for nearly all my life.  I have a tendency to grip a pen tightly and press firmly on paper while I'm writing, and over the years, I've formed a callus on my middle finger.  When I was in school and had to do a lot of writing, not only would my hand cramp but that spot on my finger would hurt from all the pressure.  But now I've built up that callus, a "hardened or thickened part of the skin" (dictionary.com definition) and I don't feel that pain when I have been writing a lot.

The word callus comes from the same Latin beginning as callous, which means basically the same thing but in adjective form, to describe a person who has become hardened...insensitive...indifferent.

And I've realized I've grown a callus over my heart, my soul, with regards to my infertility.

O, the pain is still there.  At times, when it's built up and explodes out of me, I feel it.  I break down.  I crumble.  But in the general, everyday times, I'm just numb to it.

************************************************

I remember, early on in our infertility journey, before we had begun treatments and still held out hope that we could conceive a child the old fashioned way, I remember at least one day a month when that hope was dashed yet again, that I couldn't contain the pain and the tears.  I hated being that way, and I hated how upset it would make my husband - not because I wasn't pregnant, but because he couldn't to anything to take away the hurt.  And I hated being crippled by the pain.

I remember there were other triggers, other things that would set off the waterworks.  I hated the despair but it seemed I couldn't control it.  It was as if it surrounded me in everything I encountered, like it was taunting me.

Now, 10 years later, 120 months of disappointment, I've become indifferent to it.  I see the evidence of that monthly visitor, and I just sigh, take care of business, and move on.

*************************************************

I think part of it is acceptance, which I see as a good thing.  I've come to terms with who I am, what I am, and that isn't bad.  I am 1 in 8, and that's just that.  And I'm doing what I can - within my capability - to fix it.

But I think the other part is that I have hardened myself to it.  The pain and the despair, day after day, month after month, year after year, became too much.  The constant barrage to my soul caused that hardened exterior layer to begin to build up until it got to where the hits didn't hurt as much.

Or I didn't notice them as much.

Like I said, the pain is still there.  The callus doesn't make you immune to it.  Just like with the pen and my finger, if I do a lot of writing, I notice the ache.

If I do a lot of thinking or have a lot of hits, I'll feel the heartache.

But that callus, like a calcium build-up, has slowed my well to a trickle.  And I can't decide if that's a good thing or not.





Photo cred: Photo by Alexander Zvir from Pexels