Amazon Book Review
Emotional support for the infertile woman
1/14/2010
The following review was placed on Amazon by "Kentucky."
If you have been diagnosed with infertility, or if someone you care about is experiencing infertility, this book is an absolute MUST READ.
I myself have been unsuccessful in conceiving a child, struggling for several years to overcome the many physical and emotional brick walls that infertility can create in one's life. It is such an isolating experience - to have this immense anguish going on in your life and feeling so sad and alone.
I have a very supportive family and wonderful friends, but not one of them has personally gone through what I'm going through. Consequently, they can sympathize, but they don't fully "get" what it is like to live every day of your life with the anguish of infertility. The depression, the desperation, the never-ending pattern of hope followed each time by a fresh heartbreak.
When I found this book and read it cover to cover, I immediately felt like someone out there truly cared about me and the struggles I have gone through and still continue to experience. Someone in your life can tell you that they are sorry about your situation and the pain you're going through, but these authors have been where I am, have experienced to the last detail what I go through in my daily life, and have given me such a feeling of unity that has made a difference in my life.
There are so many passages in the book where I just stopped and stared at the book, feeling amazed to see in writing that someone out there has been where I have been. Going shopping at Target and intentionally avoiding the baby aisles? Check. Needing to buy new clothes, but putting it off month after month thinking I will be pregnant soon? Check. Hearing co-workers talk about their pregnancies, or complaining about daily life with their toddlers, while I just sit there showing no emotion, but wanting to die inside. Definitely check.
Infertility is exhausting. It dominates every day of your life and how you look at your future in general. I have been blessed with a loving, supportive husband, but he often doesn't know what to say to me or what NOT to say to me. I connected with this book because of the validation and support it gave me, but I know another purpose of the book is to offer the loved ones of an infertile woman support and guidance, too.
I told my mother and sister about this book, and they both want to read it. It's not sympathy I want, just a more complete awareness from those that love me and want to help but don't know how. Reading a book won't cure my infertility, but the lessons and guidance inside THIS book have given me the validation and acknowledgment that I desperately needed, which feeds my courage to hang in there and keep trying.
"There are so many passages in the book where I just stopped and stared at the book, feeling amazed to see in writing that someone out there has been where I have been."