The Needles.

The pills, and the patches, and the suppositories, and the needles. The needles.

If you know anyone who’s gone through IVF, they likely have a box hidden in the back of their closet or propped up way high on the top shelf, perhaps its been stored in the garage, or maybe it’s in the unfinished part of the basement where nobody goes anyway. Maybe it’s in the guest room closet, or they’ve even given it to a friend or a family member to hold onto. But there is, or at one point was, a box. A box that everything was packed into when the time came to move forward, or to move on.

Nearly every IVF patient I know has admitted to this.

That box is overflowing with quiet desperation. It’s filled with hope. Hurt. Ache. Loss. Questions. Fears. Patience. Impatience. Memories. Devastation. Miracles. Badges of Honor. History.

It’s all of those things, and more.

Beyond a dictionary of emotions, that box is filled with needles. Needles and syringes. Maybe vials and even colored vial caps. Depending on the size of the box, maybe there are some empty pharmacy bottles once chalk full of pills, or even empty cardboard boxes once filled with medication patches. And sometimes, just sometimes, there are pregnancy tests. Positive. Negative. Some combination.

That box tells an entire story without using any words. Without needing any sound.

The contents of that box illustrate a battle you can only understand if you’ve enlisted in the war, if you’ve fought in or alongside the individuals and the couples and the families like ours.

Those needles? Every single one of them were plunged into our skin, deep into our flesh, pushing in medicine to manipulate our hormones, to change our cycles, to control and demand that our bodies try harder and more intentionally to do the one thing we all so deeply and desperately wanted - to create and/or grow a baby. Those pills that we diligently swallowed once, twice, three times a day? The patches we carefully placed in a row along our abdomen, removing them two days later and placing a new row on the other side, alternating for months at a time? And the suppositories, inserted every night at bedtime, consistently? They all held the same purpose - force my body, force our bodies to do the thing that they wont do on their own. Grow follicles. Release follicles. Let the embryo implant. Keep the baby growing.

Before bed one night not too long ago, I was watching a new episode of a new TV show - a very normal concept that honestly and unfortunately still remains pretty far out of my comfort zone to begin with these days - and out of nowhere, I felt an urgent need to pause it in the middle. Before that night, I hadn’t thought about my box(es) in quite some time. But in that moment, in the moment I hit pause on the remote, I immediately needed to get out of bed, leave my room, and go check to see if mine were where I thought I’d remembered leaving them.

Not leaving them, that’s not the correct term.

The place where I intentionally put them, hidden in plain sight, only accessible by me, stacked one on top of another, four tall, nearly reaching my hips, taking up a good chunk of space on the left side of the floor in the closet in my office.

My four boxes are the same - they’re the same dimensions, the same clear color with the same matching green handles that snapped them shut, and they’re each labeled by the same purple post-it note inside the box facing the front of the container.

“B”

“N&V”

Dec 2021/Jan 2022

Spring 2022

I have collections of needles spanning five years of time, even though for all intents and purposes our infertility journey didn’t truly end until three more years had passed. Those years were filled with conversations, appointments, tests, procedures, therapy and trauma, trauma and therapy. There were no more IVF treatments, but I never once stopped believing that our family was not yet complete.

That’s partially why when I found out I’d conceived naturally in the spring of 2024, just hours before I found out that pregnancy wasn’t viable, I was shocked, and then shortly after emergency surgery I disintegrated - mentally, emotionally, and physically.

Even then, even after being told that it wouldn’t be safe for my body to try and carry another baby, our infertility journey didn’t technically end until just two months ago, when I underwent surgery for a hysterectomy.

And then, that night, I found myself sitting on the carpeted floor inside my office closet, looking at my boxes and sobbing as I texted one of my closest IVF friends.

“Do you still have a box?” was all I sent.

“I did. I finally got rid of it after our baby was born. I cried throughout the whole thing.” was the reply.

It’s not just me.

It’s not just because of the finality of the decision.

It’s because of everything held in those boxes.

When I first saw them in the closet tonight, I thought fine, this is it. I’ll dump them all out on the floor. I’ll take the photo. The photo that sums up the visually tangible part of my infertility journey in one shot. And I’ll add the letterboard. Maybe it’ll say “IVF doesn’t always end in a baby” or “Not all babies are born alive” or “Not all babies grow to term” - it’ll say something powerful or important or something that evokes a feeling, even just in me, and then ill put every single needle into a cardboard box inside a garbage bin and light that box on fire. Or push it to the curb the minute I see the collection truck making it’s way to my house, preventing me from ever changing my mind.

But all I saw in that plan was hurt.

Ache.

Devastation.

Desperation.

Someone who hasn’t yet reached release.

Who hasn’t yet found acceptance.

Who isn’t yet okay.

So instead I left the boxes where they were. I shifted around the items that had been placed in front of them. I turned off the light, texted my friend, and shut my computer. I got back into bed, exhausted from the all consuming sobbing that I’d done, and I closed my eyes, wondering if, and if so when, I’ll ever reach a day where I don’t feel robbed of the thing I wanted most in this world.

All I know right now is that day is not today.