You Must Be the One

Yellow-Positivity

C/W: Infertility

She turned to the sunlight And shook her yellow head, And whispered to her neighbour: "Winter is dead."

-A.A. Milne

Another month.

Another test.

Another disappointment.

Another hope, lost.

All the "you can try again's" and the repeated, "you're young and healthy, just keep the faith, " and her personal favorite, "it'll happen when it'll happen," were just reminders of how deficient she felt.

There was no real reason why she was having trouble getting pregnant. All of the doctors reassured her that her body was strong enough to carry a baby, to sustain life, and that sometimes, it took longer for certain women than it did for others.

It was supposed to serve as a comfort and in a small way, maybe it was. She also knew she wasn't alone. Many of her friends had struggled with infertility, many had gone onto do IVF, and in the end, many of them had healthy babies in their arms.

But she knew it was not without tears and struggle. It was not without wanting to throw in the towel and a few times, as she'd witnessed, first hand, it wasn't without leaving a relationship totally unscathed.

They'd been trying for a year now. 12 months, 365 days, and lately, she didn't confide in anyone anymore, not even her mother. Everyone was supportive, lovely, even, but it was difficult for them to grasp why IVF wasn't something to be considered lightly and even her friends who had gone through it didn't understand her reluctance.

The idea of more potential heartache was too overwhelming to even think about. At least while they were trying without the extra intervention, she could keep telling herself that it would happen when they weren't expecting it to.

What kept her going, more specifically, who kept her going, was Bradley and Lea. She'd worried in that year of unsuccessfully trying to conceive that her marriage would perhaps bend under the strain, if only slightly, but the opposite happened.

They had always shared in victories and in triumphs, championing the other. Likewise, grief, sadness, strife were coped with together, too, often hand in hand. The fear that this would be the thing to cause little chips in the surface was irrational and she knew so, but she'd seen the strongest relationships shatter over less. And she had to acknowledge that any number of hers in the past most certainly would not have survived.

There was no perfect way to grieve what never was and she was sure that they'd made mistakes, but the lines of communication were open; they made certain of it.

It became sort of a monthly tradition of going away somewhere for the weekend. Typically, a mini vacation served as a distraction of sorts from a negative test, but Bradley reassured her that they'd keep going no matter what the outcome was. In fact, he said, he was sure that one day, the trip would be a celebration.

His positivity was infectious. She trusted him beyond words and if he truly believed that it would happen for them, sooner rather than later, how could she not?

So, as she stood in their bathroom, the unopened test sitting on the vanity, the exhaustion set in before she even made a move.

After the first few times, she looked at the results alone. It wasn't because she didn't want him there or the need to put on a brave face or anything like that. She couldn't bear watching his face crumble when she showed him that solitary line. It broke her heart.

Sometimes, she'd test when he wasn't there and casually mention it after they'd had dinner or got Lea settled down for the night, as though the whole idea of not being able to conceive didn't weigh on them.