Scab picking

In talking with my best friend yesterday--whose SIL is in the early weeks of pg with #2--she divulged that the SIL's pg was an 'oops.' It seems that the SIL and her husband had merely been talking about whether or not they wanted a second child as they have it pretty easy with baby #1 (who is a year old) and have gotten things down to a good routine/schedule with her. They weren't sure they wanted a second child and then...bam. Apparently, if you're an uber-fertile SIL all you need to do is miscalculate your cycle days and bam...pg. So I guess their decision has been made for them. There will be a second child in their family.

This reopened my infertility wound and got me to thinking once again about the unfairness of IF and whether or not there will be a second child in our family. If we want to even try, we'd need to do it fairly soon 'cause, at 36 (and with a borderline FSH of 8 point something at last check), I ain't getting any younger (please know that I'm not crapping on being an infertile over a certain age--infertility, as we know firsthand, strikes without prejudice--young, old, black, white, male, female--you get the drift). But for me, my age is a consideration as is my FSH. And then of course there's the CAH (my regular endocrinologist--not an RE--recently took me off my low-dose steroid--meaning it's unlikely that I'll ovulate on my own going forward once my androgen level rises back to its abnormally high levels. He said if I'm not trying to get pg, I shouldn't be on the steroid).

So if A and I decided we wanted to try for a second child, we'd need to get back up on the horse and soon. This scares me as I don't think I can go through the trying and its transient hope and heartache all over again. But, on the other hand, if we were to try again and luckily succeed, I think I'd be overwhelmed with two small children fairly close in age. And then I think to myself that I wouldn't want to take more attention than necessary away from Juliana. We waited almost five years to have her. I want to enjoy her and celebrate every one of her many milestones to come for a good long while without any thing or anyone else (except for A) competing for my time and attention. Not only that, but I come from a long line of only children myself so I'm pretty content with one (A is one of three and long had hopes for us to have two children one day).

So the idea of having a second child...it's there, vaguely tickling the back of my mind. With so many friends still dealing with IF and building their families, I feel slightly gluttonous in even contemplating the idea of having a second child when so many are still hoping for their first. And it makes me kind of sad that most--if not all--of us have never been one of those women who can get so lucky and have the decision made for her by an 'oops' baby. There won't be any children conceived that way in my house. Heck, there may not be any more children conceived in my future at all...and sooner rather than later, A and I need to decide if that will indeed be the case.