Chanukah 5770/2009 - Jewish Infertility

SHAAREI TIKVAH/ CHANUKAH 2009
57
lap was empty and my heart even emptier. I would visit
the nursing home on Simchas Torah, deliver shalach monos
for my parents on Purim, and piously peruse varied commentaries
in the hagadah on Pesach – anything to cover
up the layers of pain in my heart whenever a child was the
center of attention on a Yom Tov.
But Chanukah…Chanukah was impossible to avoid. I
couldn't lock myself in a room during the duration of family
parties. I couldn't absorb myself in the food on my plate,
or engage in a fascinating conversation on a mundane, neutral
topic no one was interested in. On Chanukah I found
myself at a loss- and lost.
Bli ayin hora, my in-laws have several
dozen grandchildren. The first couple
of years into my marriage, those kids
were relatively young and well behaved.
But as the family multiplied and the
ages grew, so did the noise level and
whiny demands. It came to a point
where the adults couldn't hear themselves
think, much less speak.
Chanukah gelt was distributed; raucous
games of dreidel were played, with
beaming parents cheering on their
prodigy. Sisters-in-law compared their
babies' weights, eating habits and clothing
purchases, while I silently wished I
were elsewhere. It wasn't unusual for
four of them to spread out on the
couch feeding their infants, while I studied my fingernails
with great interest.
We had good
laughs when we
opened our personal
envelopes
and found just
what we had
needed.
What was a not-yet-blessed woman like me to do?
Enter my Chanukah coping strategies.
For starters, I am blessed with the most wonderful inlaws
a person can find. While they understandably could
not control the rowdiness or cuteness of their grandchildren,
nor could they continuously steer the child –centered
conversation into more neutral venues, they were ingenious
when it came to gift giving. I did not have to sit
through ten minutes of noisy unwrapping of twenty-something
toys. I did not have to sit silently, achingly by, while
my siblings-in-law received mega Lego towers while I had
to make do with a sweater or a scarf. Instead, all of their
children, myself included, received matching, thoughtful
gifts. It was always something practical like a robe, a nightgown,
a set of hand-sewn linen or a cleverly devised gift certificate
for something each of us individually enjoyed.
While Sister-In-Law A received a certificate for a "Move in
Shabbos" and SIL B was awarded a piece of paper offering
3 nights of babysitting and 3 hot meals, I was treated to a
paid subscription to my favorite quarterly bookazine, Horizons.
We had good laughs when we opened our personal
envelopes and found just what we had
needed. Towards the end of the festivities
when Kiddie Krankiness had just
about reached its zenith, and the frazzled
parents began frantically pushing
arms into coat sleeves and legs into
boots, my sweet mother-in-law's hand
would surreptitiously dart into the
room-sized walk-in closet. As the families
trooped out with calls of "goodnight"
and see ya", they would receive a bulky
shopping bag with invisible contents.
Those were the gifts for the grandchildren,
to be opened at home, far out of
my sight. I cannot express how much I
appreciated that quiet, inconspicuous
gesture of sensitivity. The level of pain
and discomfort I could have experienced had I been present
during the gleeful gift opening was completely avoided.
My in-laws truly went out of their way to try to make me
feel part of the festivities without overtly displaying their
empathy and turning this into a pity party.
Of course, when it comes to infertility, every individual
deals with such situations in their own unique way. Some
people rather like to be part of the fray and do not mind
being in the center of the kiddie bruhaha. I'm sure there
are those who would feel offended if their mother-in-law
would employ such a stealth tactic; they'd rather be treated
like everyone else. Since I had made it clear throughout