Saturday, May 3, 2014
Mother's Day: Still the mother of them all. It's never too late to celebrate
NATIONAL
INFERTILITY SURVIVAL DAY® Sunday, May 4, 2014 Breakfast in bed Spa Day Mani-pedi Facial Massage Makeover Sunday Brunch Roses Romantic dinner Weekend getaway Girls' day
out Girls' night out Chocolates Champagne/Mimosas Shopping spree Another idea Redeemable: Husbands, best friends, dear friends, sisters, moms, mothers-in-law, any good listeners with demonstrated
empathy and encouragement!
9:49 am edt
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
People often ask me what kind of event I’m having or planning
to have for NATIONAL INFERTILITY SURVIVAL DAY® each year. The answer varies. There have been years when I’ve teamed up with infertility specialists, other
authors and health care professionals to offer advice and encouragement to hundreds of people at a time. There have been times
when I’ve joined with local vendors to raffle off gifts to those who need a lift. There have been book signings and
giveaways. But the truth is, NATIONAL INFERTILITY
SURVIVAL DAY®, which celebrates its first decade next year, is more conceptual than it is event-driven,
although it can be that, too.
Like a happening. Like a Yoko Ono for infertile families. Not the Yoko who in the eyes of some, (still after all these
years), is the chick who messed up The Beatles. No. The Yoko who self-published a conceptually compelling book — Grapefruit
for those who don’t know — available on Amazon.com (4.5 stars as of this writing). Who, like it or not, made people
think differently about all kinds of things. Think
differently about infertility. Think differently about adoption. Think differently about what might be by this time next year. How would you like to celebrate possibilities on May 4, 2014?
11:43 am edt
Tuesday, July 2, 2013
Sunday, May 4, 2014
Save the date to save your sanity.
NATIONAL INFERTILITY SURVIVAL DAY®
Is coming for you. Start
smiling now. And start spreading the news.
Each year, more and more people learn about this special day. Help share
the power of NATIONAL INFERTILITY SURVIVAL DAY by telling a friend!
12:43 pm edt
Saturday, May 4, 2013
It's tomorrow! Sunday, May 5, 2013 Have you had enough? Mother’s Day is nigh. And I am sick of hearing about it. Not that I would reject a few
flowers, some perfume and lots of love. It’s just that every year around this time, I’m reminded of the dark days
before I had a daughter. My daughter. The most remarkable girl in the world. The daughter of dreams. This year, National Infertility
Survival Day is tomorrow, Cinco De Mayo – May 5, 2013. For those who seek support and sisterhood. For those who don’t
know how to comfort a significant other. The sky, as they say, is the limit. Show a little love and a lot of sensitivity.
Boost her spirits and spend a few duckets. Sunday the 12th might be nigh, but it ain’t the end of the world
or the last word. And don’t forget Cinco De Mayo. See, we don’t need an excuse to celebrate. Only hope and happiness.
Cheers. Salud! To you cheries.
2:33 pm edt
Saturday, September 8, 2012
The constant battle for the ultimate state of control “So, next time you see a pregnant woman, kick back and have a martini. With
extra olives. Sashay by with the best body you can muster in the highest heels you can navigate. Wax buff with a Brazilian
bikini wax. Let’s see her get into that position…”
Infertility Sucks! Keeping it all together
when sperm and egg stubbornly remain apart, page 20.
I wrote that more than 10 years ago. It still helps. It’s
a state of mind that says, things are broken. But I am not.
Alas, shoes and martinis and bikinis can be bought.
Not so for the kind of body that one wants to sashay and display.
It’s not just about looking
good. A healthy, supple body can also be a more fertile body.
This weighty matter has been another struggle for
me and many others, one that I now realize has gone on way too long — since I was a teen, always fighting to be teeny-tiny.
I have always thought that there’s no time for fussing and fighting my friend. And yet I’ve been fighting
myself for years. It’s asinine and it’s over. I’m over it.
I’m having fun with it now.
I find it interesting and even amusing how our environment tries to lure us into eating and drinking stuff. The way restaurants
show pictures of food — pictures taken with the care of a wedding photographer; the way certain ice cream shops create
a scent so pleasing as to cause passersby to salivate like Pavlov’s dog. (It’s not always only about The Beatles.
Just usually.)
I have taken it upon myself to turn these ploys upside down and inside out. So, here’s an
erstwhile eight-inch pizza that at one time, only briefly, had the snake-like power to tempt:
No more.
Here’s a recipe that will enable you to have your ‘za and eat it too. No guilt. Just yummy.
½
piece of Flatout Flatbread (I like the Light Italian Herb.)
Coat lightly with Walden Farms Tomato & Basil Pasta
Sauce
Sprinkle with one stick or one slice of 2% cheese
Cover with six pieces of turkey sausage
Heat in microwave oven for about a minute.
Season to your liking.
Fend off the rest of the
family or make enough for all.
Now, for that maritini… those olives. Oh, yeah, and the shoes. Always the
shoes.
10:04 am edt
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Of drags and dragonfliesSo much change. And most all of it good. A big move has us back in our chosen home, South
Florida, for the first time in eight years. Back to friends, family, food and the beach.
And for me, back to the
bike. For many reasons, none of them interesting to anyone who’s not an avid biker, I was not able to ride (happily,
at least) in Orlando or in Tampa.
What a huge loss. I now realize how much I’ve missed it. Sometimes, we’re
so busy making do that we neglect to record our sacrifices.
Now I see, though. Biking is life for me. I love it.
I love that my body can be moving me over the road while my mind is moving me where it will go. Fixing holes. Wandering. Writing.
The highlight of this morning’s ride was the dragonfly that hovered over the sidewalk in front of me as I wondered
how to avoid riding into it. I slowed, slowly. And when we were close enough to touch, the dragonfly glided left, hovered
higher, a show of mutual respect, insect and Homo sapien, woman and machine, the silky morning air our shared delight.
It’s moments like these that can keep me riding for 20 miles at a time, when time permits. Fourteen years ago,
I was on just such a ride when my third (and last — I can take a hint) miscarriage brought me face to face with a reality
that, unlike that kind and wise dragonfly, would not yield.
Pregnancy and me, childbirth and me, were not meant
to be. It was a few years in the making, but I finally figured it all out, went to China and emerged beyond victorious.
It was about a decade later that I heard a doctor at a National Infertility Survival Day® event deliver a presentation
on multiple miscarriages, in which she cited too much exercise as a contributing factor. Aha. 20 miles, indeed. Would have
been nice to know.
If you didn’t, now you do. Dragonflies are great. Miscarriages suck. Stay active and
healthy and balanced. Follow those dragonflies, but if you’re pregnant, especially if you’re considered high risk,
maybe one pretty butterfly, one cute kid on a trike, should suffice. Just for a few months.
No regrets, ultimately,
here. But it’s better to know. The second best part of the ride this morning? Coming home to a still-sleeping family,
my daughter a cocooned, sweet and blessed being. We make room for each other on the path all the time. It is sublime.
5:49 pm edt
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
This just in: Proud of my Alma mater!Sarah Lawrence College’s outstanding faculty tops The Princeton Review’s
2013 College Ranking among all colleges and universities on the esteemed list. Cheers to some of the best, most inspiring years of my life.
4:18 pm edt
We’re in that summer sweet spot Yes, school is in session and my now-seventh-grader is settling in amidst new surroundings,
new friends and new challenges. This time of year is all about change for my family. Lots of birthdays and anniversaries.
And, above all, my daughter’s birthday (tomorrow) and Gotcha Day (10 days prior, August 12, 2001).
The end
of August is rife with beginnings. Here’s hoping that yours are sweet. And hoping never to forget the magic moment when
I first held her in my arms, mother and daughter, mom and dad, family. Finally and forever.
4:14 pm edt
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Today in infertility historyToday is Mick’s birthday. Jagger, of course. “You can’t always get
what you want,” he consoled me years ago, as I nursed my infertile soul after a trip to the mall with a friend and her
4 year old son, a story immortalized a decade ago on page 23 of Infertility Sucks! Keeping it all together when sperm and
egg stubbornly remain apart. Mick, “singing, it seemed, directly to me.” What I didn’t know then but have subsequently read is that Mick kind of was singing directly to me. And, perhaps,
to you. It seems he wrote the song for Marianne Faithful, who had recently miscarried. Thank you, Mick on behalf of all
of us who have experienced that loss.
Happy birthday. Hope you get
what you need.
11:30 am edt
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Gens X and Y discover infertility's perseverance Infertility is more like the common cold than the exotic disease
it’s still so often perceived as. Not that it’s contagious, of course. Just a lot more pervasive than many realize. In one day this past weekend, I met one woman who has a close relative
who has been struggling for nearly a decade to have a baby. The same day, I reconnected with an old friend who has a close
relative just entering the same ring. May they
both find peace and happiness soon. May they find their way, have their way and have their say. May they have the courage
to share their stories some day, so the next generation of girls and women don’t take for granted what their lives and
their bodies and their relationships will deliver and how. May Gens X and Y soon be rid of their struggles and meet up at last with chromosomes X and
Y in all their glory.
6:06 pm edt

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