I am fertile (#InfertilityNotATaboo)

I am fertile, I now have a 7 seven year old - sounds obnoxious , isn't it , well that's the truth and I find it very weird every time I get to hear this told to me "Thank God, all went well for you and you have this child , not many women are lucky". A land worth millions does not promise a yield, industries which has lived a lifetime cannot predict their next year  - For God's sake , I am a Woman human and I was not born with a tag. I mention the WOMAN in particular, for , the four people who live around my neighborhood only seem to have time to find my missing tag.

I indeed thank the almighty for the bundle of joy he has given me , I am here to narrate my first hand experience of my friend with whom I have lived through one of her most unreasonable phase. Her wedding was the most talked about in our circle, she got the guy she loved, she had the best job, she was at the peak of her career, a dream wedding , a dreamier honeymoon in the alps( All comments on had the jealous feel ). It continued in the form of year long gifts, expensive dinners, another tag of best couple and so on.  One day in a group chat ( this would have been just a year after her marriage) , one of the so called good friend went on a spree of asking my friend on the perceived delay of the "third member"and whats the plan , when is it and nothing useful. I thought it ended there.

In the same week , my friend messaged me she has left her job as her doctor said that she should not be under any pressure as this might as well cause a delay.All I asked her was , did she not have any option of keeping the job and working around it and the response she gave me stunned me "I don't want anyone to say that I held on to it and that is why my eggs are not getting fertilized ". Who is this anyone , the brutality is , it is indeed ANYONE and at that point it seems so much of an order, obligation and what not that a human has to come out of you. I believe that in olden times that is what we called slavery. That started my insight into one of the most painful phase one can go through.

For close to 3 years or may be more I have seen her talk to me about things which has shook me from deep inside. Some statements that stood out are "It's he who has the problem but I should ensure that this does not go out ","I decided that we will not tell anything openly ","My mother in law thinks it's me and never her son", "I don't want any of our friends to know as they may be happy that I have this problem". Every week all i used to worry is where is she in all of this - the go getter, the happy wife , the romantic lover. To add , she was given a sheet where every money spent on her was written so that she ensures to make a baby . Lunatic people , if making a baby was in our hands, why would I even need anyone ?

What makes me wonder is this whole process of being infertile ( the way the world names it) seems to be the sole responsibility of Women in most cases. For many in India, this does not sound surprising but what surprised me the most as a friend and a psychologist is the Women in question loses all her identity and just becomes a commodity or say machine which needs to keep putting oil( in form of painful injections and procedures ) until the desired product does not come out. In the interim , the person who owns the commodity or all those who handle it look at it like a rotten one. From a diva to 90 kg, from spotless skin to only visible pores , from a gentle women to an arrogant tyrant she lost all of what she cared for.

Today as it stands , she does not let her son down even for a minute- Yes he is a darling for sure . yet the scare that even a breeze might ruffle his hair and those four people would again point at her and ONLY HER has only made her go far away from us.

Infertility is not ONLY our genders birth right , it should actually be that my gender should be given a birth right of choice to mother one of her own or any !!#InfertilitynotaTaboo- Join Write tribe and InfertilityDost