We are not pregnant this time. These are some of the hardest words I’ve had to say to you, telling my hopeful horde that we didn’t get our wish is so depressing. My prayer this week has been “Dear God, I’m not talking to you. Love, Kate” I don’t even know what to say about it. Sometimes you follow all the instructions, you weigh all the odds, and it doesn’t work out like you hoped. I look at all we have done to try to bring our babes into our arms and I can not believe this is my actual life. Fundraising and traveling to Prague then to Barbados 3 times every few months asking for your financial support as we try again. I have timers going off throughout the day reminding me to pop a pill or stab myself in the belly with a syringe full of medicine that will probably get my baby to like living in my body. 6 precious clusters of our DNA have been photographed under a microscope in a petri dish and given to us, they are in a file in the back bedroom. Dreams Deferred.

I went back to work the day after we got home from Barbados, and most of my clients are regulars and tell me things like “we have been praying for you” or “keeping our fingers crossed this is it” and I have such joy in taking care of them. Today, however, I had a new client and I read her intake (thank God I started doing online intake this year so I know who is about to walk in my door) and learned that she is 34 weeks pregnant. I briefly consider cancelling “due to snow” but I remember that I just took two weeks off and spent all my savings (for the 3rd time in a year) and I dig deep and try to center myself. I text a couple close friends and they pep talked me into taking care of a woman who is wearing the shoes I have been wanting to wear for a long time now. Some people visit a little during massage, some just zone out and are quiet. I don’t mind either way…usually. She starts our hour together by saying “so, do you have kids?” and proceeds with “so many people are pregnant because of COVID quarantine, I mean what else was there to do” and closes with “that was the best massage of my life, thank you”. So I guess even though I was rolling my eyes sometimes I was still able to do my job and she left feeling better than when she came. I took myself to Dandy’s for tots and grabbed a vegan milkshake from the food cart down the road, told myself I’m amazing, and let out a couple tiny tears.

When you are 39.5 and you want kids and COVID quarantine isn’t quite enough, and you have just lost your 4th pregnancy, you don’t really get to slow down and grieve like you might if you were someone else. You have to move forward because science takes time and is expensive, how soon can I get back for another egg retrieval when do I need to start meds are the questions you ask in between blank stares into space and bouts of random crying. I feel like our friends and family might be secretly thinking “How far will these Pentzes go, when is enough enough?” because you are nice you don’t say that to my face but the answer is we will go very far and it’s not enough until we have our kids in our arms. Some of you have asked “why don’t you want to adopt”? First of all I’m guessing you know that adoption isn’t less heartache or less expensive, and it’s also not a guarantee of a baby joining your family. I’ll explain it to you like this: When it’s your birthday you get to decide what you want for dessert: Cake, pie, cookies, candy, maybe you aren’t a dessert person at all and you prefer some fancy cheese. When it’s your family you get to decide how you want to grow it: Biological kids, foster kids, adopted kids, surrogate kids, maybe you don’t want any kids. I’m just a pie person, I eat cake when I come to your birthday because it’s what you like but as for me I want to grow a baby inside my body who is genetically related to me. So far it hasn’t happened but not one doctor has ever said there is a reason why it won’t eventually work. There is not a medical reason that we know of that will prevent us from having a family this way, so we are going to keep pursuing it. Thanks for asking.

We have no embryos left, as you know. What this means is that we will have to do a full cycle of IVF. This will be my 3rd time doing an egg retrieval and it’s a lot of work, and a lot more money than a frozen embryo transfer. I don’t know where we will find the energy or money, I’ll clean out the couch cushions this weekend and maybe think about selling my kidney. (I’m kidding, I will keep all my organs) I’m already knee deep in research because it’s my coping strategy- get more info!! I’m surprised to learn that there is still more to learn, I have come across some articles that have diagnostic suggestions I’ve not explored, or recommending medications we haven’t tried, even some discrediting tests we have done. There is so much to think about, so many phone calls to make, so much expense analysis to review. There is also a lot of rest and sadness to move through. As always if you are in shoes like mine please reach out, I recently learned that a friend said my writing gave her the courage to try IVF and she’s halfway through her pregnancy. What a great outcome, I’m so exuberant for her and really humbled that my words helped. The reason I write is to connect, and even though I’m sad I am available to you.