First Birthday Party Experience...and then some...

Well, my friend who was my first close friend to be pregnant (in the way that I was around her the whole way through her pregnancy and after) just threw her little girl her 1st birthday party. So, first one of those I've been to...

Children's birthday parties is up there on the list of events infertility patients don't like to go to, or it is just a trial to endure. Christmas (when you see family that may not know your situation or all the other kids are experiencing Christmas), baby showers (for obvious reasons), births (for obvious reasons), mother's/father's day (the days everyone at church boasts about how blessed you are because God chose you to raise a child, and you're left out of that wishing you weren't), and birthday parties...

This was a doosy! If you know our situation...D was highway patrol, and that ended quickly and semi-painfully. Aside from family everyone at the party was couples. The husbands were all CHP, the wives were all pregnant, had two kids, etc...  Talk about a nightmare. We really didn't know anyone terribly well, D is a superfriendly person and was able to relate to some of what the guys were talking about...but the second he said he was with the CHP anymore they shut him off (one person literally stopped talking to him altogether and walked away!)...really? and these are you're church friends??? wow, we feel so welcome and love and feel Christ-like attitudes being poured out! I had nothing to talk to anyone but my friends sister about (and that was mostly talking about everyone else), because I tried to stand with a group of the ladies and "She just had him, he's x-lbs x-oz"..."oh, she's doing ok, she's on bedrest right now"..."oh we just found out we are pregnant!"..."ya, only a few more weeks..."..."we start so-and-so in school soon".....wow, ok, had enough of that.  I've read stories and heard about how horrible that can be...but it felt as though we didn't have anywhere to turn from getting hit with something...

Needless to say, the long drive home (and through traffic no less) was long, and sad, and depressing, and we were exhausted from pasting our smiles on...