Redefining family

Many years ago, a piece was circulating via email about Urban Tribes and their role in a person's development during their single years. I really liked this piece for a few different reasons, because I was never much of a dater yet I had a good support system through my friends.

What stuck with me through all of these years, though, was this idea of family. Traditionally, we've defined family as being composed of individuals who are genetically related: you have a mother, a father, grandparents, aunts and uncles and siblings. The phrases "blood is thicker than water" and telling someone "we're the same blood" have been ways to emphasize the strong tie family has and how important it is to us and our society.

So what happens when blood relatives let you down? In the case of infertility, this will happen more times than not and to varying degrees. Whether it's parents prying too much about when you're going to have children, a relative's remark about how you just need to get a surrogate, a cousin talking for hours upon hours about how difficult is it to be pregnant, or learning your younger sister is pregnant. In an ideal world, we cry, but the love and support for one another would help us through those difficult times, building strength within the family.

But sometimes this doesn't happen. Sometimes, in all the excitement of a grandchild, your mother tells you to get over yourself because your sister is going through something really hard. Sometimes you're told you're being selfish, that you brought this on yourself. Sometimes "family" causes more harm than good.

About 5 months ago, I made the difficult decision to cut off contact with my family. Infertility was not the reason for this, but it certainly was the straw that broke the camel's back. For years I've had a difficult relationship with my mother, filled with multiple incidents of abuse, mainly verbal but also some physical. Still, I hung onto the relationship because I craved family. I craved it so much that shortly before my official diagnosis, I tried confiding in both my parents about my pain and sorrow of not being able to conceive.

My sister's announcement that she was pregnant was a blow, but I was determined to be there for her and support her. What drove a wedge was not her being pregnant, but her using her pregnancy as a weapon to attack when an argument ensued. What continued to make things difficult was the gossiping that was happening on both sides of the family, with Grey and I being judged continually and told to "just relax." But the final straw was an email in August, where I was told that Grey and I should adopts my cousin's son because the state was pulling him from the home. It was only following a heated phone conversation, where I indicated that Grey and I were not ready for that path, that I was told "no child you adopt will ever be yours."

Since then, I've found that I've been in a process of redefining "family." During this journey, both Grey and I have met many people on the same path, forging new relationships. In addition, our relationships with  some friends and family in the Pacific NW has strengthen, with them being huge sources of support during this period in our lives. But probably the biggest change has been finding this community; finding others who are on this journey to share stories. Initially it was a place to gain information and read about others people's experiences, resulting in my feeling a lot less lonely when everyone around me was able to get pregnant so easily. What I never expected was to form friendships with a number of bloggers nor that in my darkest hours, it would be getting those emails that would help me through those moments of grief.

In a non-traditional sense, while living on the island of IF, we come together as a tribe; we redefine our family. My family is no longer restricted to a blood relatives, it includes kindred spirits, women and men I've met during this journey who understand my grief, my excitement and even my dreams. In during moments of crisis and joy, we come together to support one another, despite different points of view and being at different points in our journey.

Ethan Watters said it best:

 Tribal behavior does not prove a loss of ''family values.'' It is a fresh expression of them.