Strategist & Story Crafter in San Francisco

Grandmother Power & the Rabbit Hole of Infertility

Posted on May 11, 2013

I’m participating in the Grandmother Power Blogging Campaign created by Tara Sophia Mohr and Paola Gianturco. This post is my little contribution to what has been an abundance of good thinking on grandmothers.

-

My Grandmother Power story may be a little different, in part because of what power means to me and how I associate it with my grandmothers. It is also because it is Mother’s Day weekend. Over the past few years, the weekend has given me extra pause, and I’m writing with that on my mind.

When I consider how my grandmothers have reflected power, I come to their deep and consistent influence in my life. When I was young, their influence was often practical — listening to how a classmate had hurt my feelings, picking me up from school when my parents were working and I got sick, and so on.

As an adult, their influence has worked on a more spiritual level, even though (or maybe because) they have both died. With one grandmother in particular, my father’s mother, her power has shown up in direct ways. Years after her death, she continues to shape my story.

-

Mother’s Day and I have had an odd relationship ever since my husband and I discovered that we have unexplained infertility. We started trying to get pregnant in 2009. For about two-and-a-half years we went down the rabbit hole of the many ways to start a family.

Infertility creates a lot of noise. The noise of people and their anxieties and hopes for you, and the theories they offer to troubleshoot your uterus. The look on your parents’ faces when you tell them you’ve been trying for a year, and no matter how many times they ask for a grandchild, it doesn’t change the results. The nurses saying that maybe we just need to “clean the dust bunnies” out of the tubes. The unexpected pain of friends and siblings announcing their pregnancies. The books, the blog posts, the sheer cost of it all.

I had watched friends unravel in the midst of the noise. As much I was anxious about understanding our infertility, I was equally anxious about getting swept away emotionally, physically, and financially in the pursuit of children.

The process of infertility is designed to search for answers about your body. But as the months and years passed, I realized I was seeking clarity about what this meant for my life and my purpose.

I had not grown up convinced I was going to be a mother. I didn’t feel what I’d consider the true rush of wanting to have kids until I met Carl. On our first date, the thought of “I want to have his children” whooshed through my mind, as if my ovaries fell in love with him first.

My sense of parenthood and why it mattered had become tangled up in my love for Carl. This works well when you get pregnant right away. That’s joy. But when your bodies get stubborn, things get confusing fast. We had built a life in anticipation of children. Now what?

At the same time, I was growing uncomfortable with the increasing amount of physical intervention that infertility demanded. I never expected this. I’m a progressive person. I love science. But with every push of dye through my tubes, every Clomid prescription, every blood draw and conversation about hormone hacking, I felt more out of alignment with my body. Like I was holding it hostage until it gave me what I wanted.

-

In the midst of all this noise, I had one of the most powerful experiences of my grandmother ever. She had passed on Christmas Day in 2003, but this experience about eight years later convinces me that a grandmother’s power does not quit.

She had visited me in dreams once or twice before this. Each time, she had hugged me, talked to me, and then disappeared as soon as we let go of each other. So on a night in the midst of the infertility journey, I was thrilled to find her in one of my dreams.

It was a family reunion at a campsite. I had gone back to our RV, and as I opened the door, I realized she was there waiting for me. Immediately we hugged, and she began talking.

She was talking about the infertility, and she started chuckling in the mildly chiding way she always did as I was growing up. My grandmother had invented the art of the gentle scoff. If my mom said something she didn’t like, she would just chuckle in her way and say, “Oh, Annie.” And we all knew the queen had spoken.

So she had visited me in a dream to gently scoff me about this infertility issue. Because she knew that she knew better than I did. She talked about the process, she hugged me in the way she probably did when I was sick as a child, and in the final moments of the dream, she said: “People try like animals for this. You don’t have to.”

I felt it like a truth I had been stabbing at but missing for months.

She didn’t tell me what to do. She didn’t tell me what was wrong with my body. She didn’t troubleshoot or theorize. Instead, in her grandmother wisdom and her grandmother way, she simply implied that I needed to trust instead of fight.

In many ways, her visit became a turning point in the journey. We began asking what our life would look like if we didn’t have children. We realized how many decisions we had made with a family as the context. And when we took away that context, we found other dreams, like our recent move to San Francisco.

I carry my grandmother’s words with me every day. Whenever I feel unmoored, wondering what the infertility means or getting unexpectedly weepy over a happy family, I return to those words. And I try to trust. I look at the path I’ve taken since hearing her words, and I realize that I can only choose gratitude… for that path and for her.

Categories: Change, Family

Four months of falling in love with San Francisco

Posted on May 5, 2013

This weekend marks four months since we began our San Francisco adventure. I’ve never been a place-driven writer, which is probably why I haven’t chronicled every moment of discovering San Francisco like some people might. That’s something I’d like to change, so in honor of our four-month honeymoon in this sweet city, I present (some of) what I’ve learned and observed so far:

I need Golden Gate Park in my life always.

It’s basically our backyard. Good luck trying to get me to move to any neighborhood where it wouldn’t be in walking distance. I admit to occasionally welling up with tears when Carl and I are in the middle of the trees, walking around Stow Lake, or heading to the Pacific. There is no place where I feel more grateful for our new life here than when I’m in Golden Gate Park. Carl pointed out how well-used it is and the kind of community energy that creates. On any given day we can go for a walk and be with other people who are simply enjoying themselves in a beautiful place.

The public transportation is not that bad.

The N will probably be 30 minutes late tomorrow to punish me, but really, if you are coming from an area where communities actively campaign to be removed from the bus lines, Muni is like a public transportation paradise. I don’t miss having a car. I only miss driving when I’m angry about something and wish I could hit the highway and listen to Oasis loudly to make me feel like I’m in college again… being angry on the Muni is just not the same.

The weekday rhythm is just better here.

I will never go back to having 7 am breakfast meetings. I’m ashamed that there was a time when I’d wake up at 5:30 am so I could get ready, scrape and warm up the car (stupid Michigan winters), and be on my way by 6:30 am to make it to such a meeting. Yes, I’m still working more than I promised myself I would. But it flows more easily. And I’m hopping on a train, people-watching, and drinking coffee to get to an office by 9 am instead of the Michigan alternative.

Business casual is actually business casual…

Thanks to a lifetime of Catholic school dress codes and persistently looking young for my age, I have often made poor fashion choices. “Business casual” often meant relying on a suite of cardigans. When I got sick of being judged for looking young, I began chopping my hair short, dying it darker, and wearing an assortment of suits, including a regrettable pinstripe ensemble. It was difficult to feel at ease in my own skin in these so-called “business casual” environments. Now that I’m in San Francisco, I’m not sure I ever worked in a truly business casual office. I wore a suit-type jacket on my first day of work, only to find colleagues wearing jeans, boots, and statement necklaces. When I made the expected self-effacing joke about being overdressed, they laughed with me and promised that we’d get a memo if a meeting called for dressing up. I breathed easier immediately.

…and people are damn stylish.

When we first arrived, I told Carl I had to get rid of my clothing (the little I had brought with me) and start over. I had no idea how frumpy I had become in Michigan, in part because of the weather and probably also because style and taking care of myself were not top priorities in the midst of closing a business. I may not feel this way once I’m a long-time resident, but what I love about San Francisco style is that it seems individualized and subtly curated. It’s still possible to spot trends, but for the most part, I sense people are dressing for themselves, in whatever way makes them feel good. People have a wide range of styles – usually the unifying trait is that you can tell the person put some thought into how they’d present themselves that day.

That’s the part of San Francisco style I’ve had the most fun playing with… rather than mimicking a trend, I’ve been starting to think of my look with a deeper sense of intention. The ever-loving feminist in me says there is no way I should be identifying with fashion like this, but the wiser woman in me, the one who is moving headlong toward 30, says that this is more about self-respect than anything else. This has probably been my most unexpected area of learning so far.

People love food. Proceed with caution.

The variety and appreciation of food is something that drew us to San Francisco. Carl and I are not foodies in the sense that we know how to cook or are gourmet literate. We just love a good meal, good wine, and long conversation. In general, that’s the vibe of San Francisco. But there is certainly a know-it-all undercurrent if you care to find it.

At first, we were thrilled to see that every restaurant seems to have dozens of Yelp reviews. Over time, we started to see that a “review culture” can also create a homogeneous sense of what good dining looks like. We’ve started to rely more on our own guts than reviews, and most importantly, we’ve decided that if the experience makes us feel good, then it doesn’t really matter what the foodies have to say about it. Eat on and eat happy.

And a few more observations for now:

  • San Francisco is beautiful by air, by water, by foot, and by train. I hate leaving but I love the view coming home. And sailing in the Bay was one of the highlights of our time here so far.
  • Inner Sunset is not as foggy as everyone says, at least not in the four months I’ve been here. We’ll see how the summer goes, but really, what’s the fuss, people?
  • Having a sense of direction in a new home is such an empowerment boost. The first time we gave directions to someone on the N, it was like we had passed a residency test.
  • I have been to more comedy and other types of shows in the past four months than in my entire life, and I’m hooked. It’s good brain food for writers. It’s also a bonus to see such shows in a place where the artists are genuinely thrilled to be and therefore where they like to try new material.
Categories: Change, Culture, San Francisco

And so begins the process…

Posted on February 18, 2013

I got the call this morning that my grandma passed in her sleep overnight. This is the third time in my life I’ve gotten the proverbial morning phone call, and it never gets easier.

Yesterday was her birthday. She was 86. And while dementia had been hunting her down more and more, she was healthy otherwise and seemed happy. Just three weeks ago, she sold her condo and moved into a new apartment in a retirement community. She told me how nice everyone was and how they made her feel welcomed. They even painted the apartment in all her favorite colors to make her feel at home.

To be honest, I think she was waiting for a place to feel safe so she could let go. For months, years even, she had told us stories of paranoia while living alone in her condo. She insisted people were trying to break in, she feared every small bump in the night (even the furnace clicking on), and she didn’t trust her neighbors.

And despite a lifelong and tradition-steeped faith, she was afraid to die. She was the last of seven children in her family to go.

All my grandparents have died now, and for most of them, I was old enough and nearby enough to watch how they approached death. It’s a beautiful and strange thing to witness how someone dies… not just the moment itself, but the process leading up to it.

My father’s mother co-created her death with God, I think. Hers was the most collective process. She shared it with us, almost led us through it so we could start the grieving before she had gone… that side of the family is more matriarchal, a tone that she set right to the end. She died on Christmas, her favorite holiday. It was beautiful.

My father’s father, my Papa, seemed to think he was preparing privately but some of us knew better. In my last conversations with him, he was more self-reflective than ever, as if I had walked in on him doing an examination of conscience. He died because of complications related to a knee surgery we didn’t want him to have. How he died is murky, but I’ve never questioned why. The man wanted to go home. He missed his soulmate. He had done his homework and then let God do the rest. It seemed a bit like surrender.

And now my mother’s mother. She had the death we all wish for: your family takes you to brunch to celebrate your birthday. You get hugs and kisses and you play with your great grandson. You go home happy, you fall asleep, and you simply don’t wake up. This is how I know there is mercy in the universe. If anyone needed this sweet and simple death, it was my grandma. This is how I know God knew her well.

Of course, I see now that this sweet death stings deeply for those left behind. Even my usual sixth sense didn’t bubble this time, like it did with Papa’s death. It was just your usual birthday phone call yesterday. She told Carl she expected two hugs the next time she saw him. He may have been the last one to talk to her for all I know.

And it’s obviously difficult to be across the country and get this news. I expected that this would happen at some point. Carl and I had talked about it frankly, acknowledging that someday we’d probably get a phone call that one of our grandparents had passed. I just didn’t expect it to be about six weeks after we’d moved.

So our flights are booked for a trip to Grand Rapids later this week. The funeral is on Friday. In the meantime, I am sitting with everything and processing it here in part because I’ve been asked to write the obituary, as I did for Papa.

Writing an obituary is difficult but an honor too. I keep drinking coffee to try and get started, but each time I break down. My grandma got me started on coffee when I was six years old. It’s funny how those everyday routines become the pain points when someone dies. It reminds me that we are all so attached to each other in such simple ways.

Categories: Change, Family