My doctor called today to tell me the news I had been dreading. After this, our second round of IVF, none of our embryos had survived. After two years of trying to get pregnant, three miscarriages, four rounds of IUI, two cycles of IVF, a year of acupuncture, six months of Chinese herbs, and countless tests, it was finally clear—we were not going to have another child.

I knew this moment could come. In fact, at almost 45 years old, it was the most likely outcome for me. My eggs are old. Every day that goes by, it is less likely that one will be strong enough. But probability and statistics go out the window when you want something so badly. And when you have hope. As my good friend said today, hope is the only way to stay on this journey. But it doesn’t soften the blow when you get to the end of it.

A lot of people gave me hope on this journey, and I am so grateful for all of them. I flew to NYC twice to work with a fertility doctor there, partly because I’m a homing pigeon for NY but mostly because the doctors in Ohio shook their heads when I suggested IVF. I was old, they said. It wouldn’t work, they said. Why spend all this money for such low odds, they determined. Well, it turns out that they were right. But anyone who truly knows me knows that I’m not easily dissuade. From the very first conversation I had with my NY doctor, she had hope. She had positivity. She radiated the strength I needed to keep going on this seemingly impossible journey. She was my north star.

My husband is my rock. I could fill this page 100 times over and still not have enough words to express my gratitude to have him—a healthy him—in my life. My friends are a network of support I will be eternally grateful for. When I started this journey I could never have imagined how many shoulders I would need to cry on, hands to hold mine along the way, arms to hug me, smiles to help me wipe the tears away.

My acupuncturist and herbalist are my heroes. Their entire beings radiated hope. Not to mention they kept me calm and balanced through everything. My yoga teachers were a godsend. I still remember the day one of them suggested that I stop trying to make myself feel a certain way or think a certain way, and to just sit with whatever I was feeling—only then could I really be in it. That seemingly simple piece of advice changed my life, and my outlook on everything. We all try too hard to make ourselves feel a certain way and then feel guilty when we can’t. I catch myself doing it all the time, but now I pay more attention to that ping pong game inside my head. I tell myself that I should be grateful for X or joyous about Y—but does any of that really erase the pain and heartache of other situations? No. Does masking or hiding your feelings really make them go away? No. Does telling yourself to be OK with whatever happens really make you OK with whatever happens? Definitely not. As the wise and wonderful Deepak Chopra says, “Nobody can change their mind by trying to change their mind. Nobody can get rid of a thought by using a thought.” What I’ve realized is, I can be grateful for the wonderful, amazing, and joyous daughter we have and still feel pain that we won’t have any more. I can appreciate all of the love I have in my life and still be f–ing pissed that my husband got cancer, that both of my parents died, that my mother-in-law is very sick, that Covid happened, that I’ve lost three pregnancies, etc. etc. etc. So if there is anything positive that I can take away from this journey, it’s the liberation of giving myself permission to feel what I feel, think what I think, and be who I am and not putting pressure on myself to feel, think, or be anything else.

So maybe that’s the reason I’m even sitting here today, writing about my rotten eggs and our painful journey. To share that guiding philosophy with you and hope you might find some liberation from it, too. Be kind to yourself. I’m going to try to be, too.