61.

I have 61 drafts in my folder right now.

515 posts that are published and 61 posts where I don't necessarily want to hit publish, but it feels wrong to erase the words.

You must have those too. The ones that were written in a moment of anger, but you're now embarrassed how you'll come across if you let others read it. Or the ones that seemed funny in the moment and now...not so much. Or the ones that were rewritten and published in another form but you don't want to erase the original draft because it's sort of the story behind the post.

I am about to hit publish on one of those angry ones.

And I'll be frank; I'm embarrassed to hit publish.

But it has been sitting in my draft folder for so long and every time I look at it, I get this overwhelming feeling to either hit publish or hit delete. But I don't really want it hanging in limbo.

I was really angry when I wrote this. It was months and months ago at this point, probably some time in the spring. But I was thinking about it last night because we may have to beg out of a family event because it requires travel in January (and we will hopefully be in the middle of cycling with the clinic). The rational me hears the excuse and knows how it sounds. I mean, really. Can't I put off starting IVF until February? We've been trying for over a year and a half on our own--what's another month or two? It's somewhat distant family, but still.

But the emotional me--the one that feels small and sorry inside my body--says, "I just can't." I don't want to wait any longer. Other people, they can take it on the road. They can have sex in a hotel room and have a baby nine months later. But I can't do that and it isn't fair. It isn't fair to judge my choices against a fertile world. Judge my choices on my terms--on how it feels to have to pay thousands of dollars just to get to the starting line when others walk up there for free. How it feels to take everything lovely out of the act of conception and bring it down to hormones and blood work and scans.

I know that I can't make someone understand. And it is hard to wrap your mind around--what you're willing to give up just to have a chance. And how singularly focused some of us need to be. Some people who train for marathons--they eat, drink, and sleep running for the entire training period. They think about every calorie they put in their mouth and they visit websites about running and they talk about the merits of one exercise shoe over another. And that's the way they get through the marathon.

Other people, they go for a long run in the morning, shower for work, and barely think about it until nighttime when they go to bed early so they can get up and do another run the next day. And that's the way they get through the marathon.

So. I'm putting this post up there. This angry manifesto that was written months ago when a friend questioned the way I train for marathons. Which is all just a euphemism for treatments. I feel out-of-breath from it.

Please don't judge my anger. I've already beaten myself up enough.