Okay, I can sit on my pity pot or I can soldier on.

I think that deep down, I am really scared. I have so much riding on this last IVF and I am petrified of the road that may lead me down.

The road of childlessness.

I have to suck it up and pull myself together.

I cannot let my fears paralyze me.

The rub of infertility is that you need to relax. The more you relax, the better the results. It is a proven, scientific fact.

I was the Queen of Calm for my first IVF. I never let a negative thought in my mind for one minute. Not one minute.

It was a life changing experience for me. How do you type a sentence like that so that it has some weight? It was a life changing experience for me or perhaps: It was a life changing experience for me ...........I guess you had to be there.

I have always been a "panties in the wad" type of girl. "up in a tizzy" at the slightest aggravation . "drama queen to the max" and "bitch on wheels" wouldn't be far off.

I had to chill out. I had to be unaffected by the world. Whatever happened to me during the day, I did not let it effect me. I imagined myself in a pool of calm and my husband was my concrete shielding me from the idiots of the world that happen upon a human on any given day.

I needed him to make it all happen. I, quite frankly, didn't know if he was up for the job. Could he really make my life calm and peaceful? Could he keep my water still? Could he take all of my stresses away?

I must describe M. a bit here perhaps. He is from Boston. A Yankee if you will. He is very quiet, very self confident and an introvert. However, if someone crosses him, well, he changes. I have seen the change in his face many times - the face of a stranger. If any idiot crosses him or enters his world, he is a ferocious fighter. God forbid a man should cut my husband off in a car because he will follow him home and beg him to get out of his car so he can kick his ass.

My sweet introvert genius husband = an aggressive avenger of the righteous. He is my Superman who fights the bullies of this world.

How would he be when he had to handle my stress too?

When I started my injections and during the process leading to the retrieval, I was in my pool of calm.

"I cannot be bothered" was my mantra.

If I had a child, I would do everything and anything for the good of the child. You need my thumbs?....... Take them....... here. You need my legs?........ Take them........ here. You need my heart? .......Take it......... here.

I took care of my future children (eggs) like a lion mother.

"I cannot be bothered" said I to the every day screw ups with my RE office or nurse.

"I cannot be bothered" said I to the ten people that would normally get on my nerves on any given day.

Who the hell am I to act like I am so knowledgeable now.

I feel like I have been bitch slapped. That is what this so called depression is about.

Yes, I have been bitch slapped.

Do I really have it in me to do it again? To lay on that raft and surrender?

I have a count down of a week and a half before the injections begin.

I am not sure that my gold medal winning husband of IVF #1 is up to the challenge again.

Who am I kidding. I am not sure that I am up for it again.

I have prayer cards that are in my wallet, by my make up mirror, by my phone, by my bedside table in my car and prayer medallions about fertility everywhere you can imagine. (Perhaps I will post the prayers at a later date)

I don't know that someone would meet me and walk away with a feeling of "she is so religious" but I pray every day.

I think that there comes a time in even a non-believers life, where they pray. I cannot imagine an atheist with a dying baby or dying wife who does not pray........hoping it really means something.

I have come to question God. My husband who was raised in private Catholic schools growing up is not religious. I have never heard him pray EXCEPT for the morning we got the call that none of my eleven eggs fertilized.

We came downstairs for breakfast about 2 hours after the call and I told him that I needed him to pray with me. Pray for a miracle. He prayed in Latin that morning at our breakfast table.

When we later found out that 5 fertilized with rescue ICSI and then the next day that everyone was stunned because 9 had miraculously fertilized, I attributed it to all of the prayers.

When we got the call one hour before we were to get the embryos transferred that all of them were severely chromosomally abnormal, we felt like God was punishing us. Why would He let us have such miracles to make it hurt worse?

The pain of hopelessness is crippling. No wonder I have felt crippled for the past month or so.

I need to believe again. In myself. In my husband. In God.