Sigh. Once again the Universe is testing my mettle.
As if any of us need more evidence that living infertile in a fertile world ain’t easy, I got a zinger of a reminder today.
There I was innocently taking a bite out of my bagel this morning, clicking over to see what search terms were bringing people to my site when lo and behold this gem was coiled up like a snake waiting to attack in the search term queue: “how to get your barren friend to stop being a weird bitch”
(Really Universe?! I mean REALLY!??!!? — I’m not even done with my first cup of coffee!) Catty responses started tumbling through my head. 
Then I started thinking about the sheer hostility dripping from the query.
I don’t know what’s more unsettling:
1) that someone could actually be so stone cold insensitive
2) the fact that my site comes up as the second link for this obnoxious query on the world’s most used search engine
3) that this little present comes on the heels of my last post about National Infertility Awareness Week, which you may recall, contains a link to a study about the importance of social support to couples who are confronting infertility. And I quote:
“Ifinvoluntary childless people are not getting any social support,or if they are unsatisfied with the support given, this mayresult in even more distress.”
So my dear readers, how would you like to respond to this cretin masquerading as a human being?
October 22, 2008 10:38 pm
Wow. Just wow.
And I hope to never have that nasty a person consider me to be her “friend.”
So any response to that question would have to include a definition of the word friend, perhaps a stun gun for reinforcement, and a plea that she just leave that infertile alone!
P.S. Now you are the first hit – congratulations!!
October 22, 2008 11:11 pm
Well, that’s easy: To whoever entered the query- you’re not really her friend if that’s the way you think. You’re just somebody who’s in for the good times instead of trying to understand and comfort. that’s not real friendship.
Ug.
October 23, 2008 12:36 am
I think I’m speechless.
The really sad thing is someone out there has someone they think is a “friend” — someone who is putting that into a search engine with them in mind.
October 23, 2008 1:21 am
AH, g.oogle has bitten me in the arse so very many times I shall offer my commiserations that you’ve been blasted. I usually cop p.orn, though. Dirty stuff, too. Goodness knows what they make of my site….
J
October 23, 2008 2:12 am
Ok – the good news is – that the friend (using the term loosely – as in not really a friend, but a cold, back-stabbing bitch) came to your site and maybe (we can have a faint glimmer of hope) got a dash of freakin reality about life as an infertile.
October 23, 2008 4:47 am
Excellent point — the very act of searching on the topic indicates the potential for personal growth on her part…
October 23, 2008 1:05 pm
I think my most shocking searches have been for the plan b emergency contraceptive pill. I had one recently — “what to do when plan b makes you feel sick” Ha! The irony!
October 23, 2008 1:13 pm
Well, I think your blog is one of the best places for her to find the answer to that question: by understanding how it feels to be barren. So in short, to that person (or people with similar problems!), the best way to get your barren friend to stop being a weird bitch is to read this blog. You’ll understand her much better, and then you might change the weird into wonderful 🙂
October 23, 2008 1:22 pm
I’m stunned, again. Maybe it was the same person who ridiculed “Conceive” magazine at my obgyn’s office. Except I don’t think that woman was smart enough to even know the word “barren.”
October 23, 2008 1:34 pm
(BTW, you’ve been tagged. Details at my blog.)
October 23, 2008 3:04 pm
YIKES!!!
Hum… that quite possibly could have been my mom… she has more or less said that same thing to me…. *sigh*
October 23, 2008 3:05 pm
1.) Listen to how she feels.
2.) If she needs money for fertility treatment give it to her.
3.) If she wants to adopt squirt out an extra one and give it to her.
4.) If she endeavors to remain childless, stab yourself in the eyes so that you can know what it’s like to go through life without something so basic and crucial to human existence and therefore have an experience from which to be able to muster true empathy.
October 23, 2008 4:29 pm
People never cease to amaze me.
Hopefully this person read some of your insightful entries and came away a better person.
October 23, 2008 4:59 pm
WOW! All I can say is WOW. I guess they really aren’t friends because I sure as hell wouldn’t want my friends talking about me like that. I hope she got a good dose of reality from you!
October 23, 2008 5:14 pm
I am speechless.
I am just going to say this . . . I hope that the barren but human one has ditched this heartless “friend” already.
October 23, 2008 5:22 pm
Like someone said, at least she’s making a small effort to understand and (maybe) offer support. Even if she’s doing it in her own obnoxious way.
October 23, 2008 5:25 pm
Here’s my pedantic answer to that query: The original meaning of the word “weird” in Middle English was loosely associated with fate, as in the three weaving women who determined people’s fates in Norse mythology.
Ergo, our “friend” is a weird bitch because she’s been royally kicked in the ass by the Fates. She’s likely a bitch because her friends are such blithering idiots.
Next question, please.
October 23, 2008 5:38 pm
Oh, yes Me. I totally agree.
1) make it your #1 priority to make her feel better
2) accompany her to blood draws, HSG tests, RE appointments, ultrasounds, give her the hormone injections, dispose of her needles in the sharp container, donate your uterus for service
3) if that doesn’t give you compassion, consider yourself a waste of skin.
October 23, 2008 5:51 pm
Maybe stop referring to her as your “barren friend”. It would be a start.
October 23, 2008 8:46 pm
what a shitty friend!
October 23, 2008 10:47 pm
A weird barren bitch. Umm. What a classy thing to call a friend. By weird, do you suppose s/he meant ‘cries when I tell her I’m pregnant with my fourth’? Or ‘didn’t want to come to the giant super-cool shower for my twins’? Or ‘Got kinda tight-lipped and went home early the night I told her she just needed to RELAAAAAX and go on vacation. I mean, a vacation has got to be cheaper than the two failed IVF-thingies she just did…’?
Argh argh argh some people.
I hope s/he stopped to read your blog and got even just a smidge of insight. People can be amazingly stupid about their nearest and dearest, and sometimes it takes another ‘outsider’ voice to get through to them.
(Am having similar problems with my mother, who thinks as I got pregnant once the whole future is sunshine and roses and seventeen grandchildren and KEEPS SAYING SO, even though it took three years, surgery, and drugs to get that one pregnancy and then I lost it. And I am ‘dwelling on it’ and ‘need to get over it’ and ‘am being pessimistic’. Not that I am in the least bit angry or hurt by this, oh no).
October 24, 2008 7:57 am
I’m still stunned. just wow.
with friends like that…
I love shinejil’s response, and zee’s too.
October 25, 2008 1:36 am
I am still chuckling that this supposed “friend” would actually use “barren” in a search engine!!! Hilarious.
I have NO doubt there are people in my life who mistakenly consider themselves “friends” who say horrible things about me (except I doubt barren is in their vocabs) and I couldn’t care less.
About a year ago I made the decision I was tired of putting my own feelings and needs aside for the sake of keeping the peace or making others more comfortable. As a result, I may come off as a weird bitch to some. Oh well.
I have finally – after SIX years – figured out who my true friends and most trusted family members are and also have no doubt they are finally starting to understand. Others will just never get it, because they can’t.
October 25, 2008 6:18 pm
I say turn the question around:
“How do I get my weird friend to be more sensitive to the fact that I can’t have children?”
Consider swopping ‘heartless, selfish and insensitive’ for ‘weird.’
October 26, 2008 4:47 pm
In response to the inquiring “friend”: Stop acting like an ignorant, self-centered, heartless asshole and your barren friend may tolerate you a bit better. I don’t think you really need to worry though. With your nasty attitude, I doubt you’ll be friends much longer.
November 1, 2008 11:39 am
I like “Me”‘s answer.
Bea