In this episode, I open by talking about the big decision to “pull the goalie,” as we called benching our pregnancy defensive line (my birth control pills). It was a momentous moment! And then… the score remained 0-0 for a long, long time. In fact, it still is.
A global pandemic, a foster pup, a couple of job changes, and more… all of that was going on while I undertook both big steps and baby steps (see what I did there?) towards pregnancy and parenthood… As I got to know my body and navigated both feelings and logistics.
So, this episode is a bit of a winding one, all about what 3 years of open-ended “trying” has felt like, emotionally and physically.
Things to think about as you listen:
If you’ve also experienced infertility, or are in the midst of it right now, how did that affect your desire to be a parent?
In this episode, I open by talking about the big decision to “pull the goalie,” as we called benching our pregnancy defensive line (my birth control pills). It was a momentous moment! And then… the score remained 0-0 for a long, long time. In fact, it still is.
A global pandemic, a foster pup, a couple of job changes, and more… all of that was going on while I undertook both big steps and baby steps (see what I did there?) towards pregnancy and parenthood… As I got to know my body and navigated both feelings and logistics.
So, this episode is a bit of a winding one, all about what 3 years of open-ended “trying” has felt like, emotionally and physically.
Things to think about as you listen:
If you’ve also experienced infertility, or are in the midst of it right now, how did that affect your desire to be a parent?
[00:00] Krissie: Ocella, my brand of birth control. My best friend, Ocella, has been by my side for 19 years. For 19 years, she has protected me and my goal, my uterus. She's been amazing. She's my best friend. When I picture Ocella, I picture a soccer goalie, but I want you to picture, like, a soccer goalie who's wearing bright neon tights, a Jane Fonda leotard, like Madonna gloves. She's got her hair crimp. She has, like, 100 scrunchies. And there's confetti, because, of course, she has confetti. So it's like confetti in the air like this, blocking the gold. It is amazing. She kind of reminds me of me more best friends, like OBS, the sperm. They're like the New Zealand All Blacks rugby team. Now, I don't know if you know much about rugby. I actually don't, but I know the All Blacks because they do a tribal Maori war dance at the beginning of every rugby game. So I'm picturing them doing this tribal war dance as they are coming towards the goal, and there's a hundred of them, and they're dressed in black, and they are very beefy, muscular guys, and they're coming, and their tongues are out, because that's what they do in the war dance. And their eyes are open, and they're like except they do it. It's actually really scary, but also because I don't exactly know how Rocky works. I think there's, like, one ball I picture them with soccer balls, black soccer ball coming at Ocella, soccer balls applying, and she's like, oh, I'm just, like, walking them like this. Hello. Yes. 19 years. Zero goals, zero pregnancies. She has been freaking amazing. There's a lot of other things that we've gone through over 19 years, too. She's traveled with me to over 30 countries. She has seen me with every haircut you can imagine the bob, the pixie, the braids, the rapunzel hair. She was even with me when my husband buzzed my head and then forgot to put the little thingy on and gave me a big old bold spot right here. She was with me when my college boyfriend told me that he could see being with someone like me in ten years, but not today. She was with me when my boyfriend of five years proposed to me on a beautiful Brazilian beach of Sunset. And a few hours later, when I told him I wasn't ready. She was with me on my wedding day when I got down on one knee at the altar in my wedding dress in front of all of our friends and family and asked my husband to marry me. She has also been with me when friend after friend after friend has had child after child after child. But every month, we celebrated a new victory, because the worst thing that could possibly happen to me was to get pregnant. It would ruin my life. This was beaten into me by parents, school teachers, friends, me. The worst thing that could possibly happen to me is to get pregnant. Three months ago, I told us all I didn't need her anymore. I sent her away. I pulled her from the game, if you will, and now, overnight, I'm supposed to just flip a mental switch and go from pregnancy being the absolute worst thing that could possibly happen to me to actually wanting it, to being like, yes, send in those hundred rugby players and their **** balls. Send in the sperm. Yes, go. Hasn't quite worked that way. I just feel kind of open and vulnerable. And while everyone around me has been having children or wanting to have children and known forever, they wanted to be a mother, known how many kids they wanted to have and how far apart, I just feel like I'm starting on this journey of wanting that. And I feel confused because it's like, do we try to have a baby or do we just not try to have a baby? Or how long do we not try before we have to try? Because it's just not working. And I just want to be and allow it to happen. But I'm 36, and if and when I get pregnant, it will be called a geriatric pregnancy. Apparently, I'm old, and I will be advanced maternal age, like some ******* French cheese. And meanwhile, the balls are just coming at me. The worst thing is that when I hear parents talk about what it's like, it feels like they're just surviving. They say things like, I just get up in the morning, I get the kids ready, I go to work, and I do the same thing over and over and over again, and I am exhausted. And then in the same sentence, say, but it's worth it.
[06:03] Krissie: Okay.
[06:04] Krissie: I don't understand that. But here's what I do understand. Ocella is gone, the goal is open, and we are choosing this.
[06:35] Krissie: Hello, everyone. Chrissy here. What you just heard was me at my friend Drew's storytelling event in March 2020, telling my first ever live story on stage. Side note, an interview, Drew, in season one of this podcast. So for a super juicy discussion about following your intuition, even when it makes no sense, check it out. But the story I told on stage clearly was about how Joey and I made the decision not exactly to try to have a baby, but to stop trying not to have one. For us, that was the moment I went off of birth control pills, and we called it, as you've just heard, pulling the Goalie. A previous guest has called this same phenomenon, quote, taking down the barriers. I've heard going for it, getting it on, making the baby. One friend and this is my favorite has referred to it as carpet bombing the eggs. Clearly, the winner for some people pulling the Goalie is pretty quickly followed by the big old, as you heard me describe in the story. But for us, the game has been more complicated. To give you an idea, much like in many professional soccer games, we've now spent a long time playing hard lol, wink wink, nudge nudge, but are still died at. So much has happened since then in the world and in our lives. Thinking back on it now, telling that story on stage was an incredibly vulnerable and new experience for me, specifically telling a story in public while still living it. The funny thing is that's basically what this podcast is too. But back then I was newer to sharing so openly and I remembered days before being so nervous that I curled up in a ball on the floor feeling like I was going to puke from the fear and the stress of going on stage and sharing something that was so close to me. I was editing and reediting the story, sharing it with friends and getting feedback right up until the moment I went on stage and when I did to my Hype song Walking on Broken Glass for all you any Linux fans out there, the lights were so hot and blinding, I couldn't see the audience at all. It was like I was standing in the dark but sweating my pits off. And then I was like, who are all these strangers in this space? Even though I knew that Joe and my dad and my friends were there, I was an eight out of ten from an anxiety perspective, honestly, probably one of the most anxious times I've been, and I've been on stages before. But it was the vulnerability, the depth, the openness of this story that made it so tough to say it out loud. But I'm really glad I did it because it's so cool to have captured my feelings in the moment when it was all happening and to keep doing it now with you. It turned out though, that the decision that the pulling the goalie that felt so huge in that moment was actually the start of a lot more confusion, ambiguity and unforeseen circumstances. So the rest of this episode very much reflects that. It's more stream of consciousness going with the flow of what was in my brain as I was reflecting back on that time. And it's probably more of that than you're used to from me, but it honestly reflects how I felt and how it felt. So with that, let's keep going. Pulling the goalie means stopping the forms of blockage where sperm cannot meet with egg. There's no more person, in this case little birth control pill that is blocking it, making it not happen, though interestingly, it's not actually what happens, right? There's no blocking in birth control. It's like the soccer players aren't even on the field, kind of. It's like they're on the field, but their legs and arms are tied ish like a condom might be an actual goalie. So this pulling the goalie episode, I think is the thing that people who have reached out to me on the Internet, and friends also, but just like strangers have reached out about but how do you make the decision? Because if you are a person with a ******, with a person with a *****, there ends up being a moment where you can be open to being pregnant or not. Like where you stop things like birth control, condom use. IUD use.
[12:16] Krissie: Yeah.
[12:16] Krissie: So there's like this one moment, and I think the question I've gotten from folks is, but how did you finally decide? How did you decide? Because when you are ambivalent and leading up to the decision, it feels very stressful of like, how am I going to actually know that it's the right time? When do I do it? And I remember feeling a little bit of that stress too. So this episode is about the lead up and even a little bit after we decided to pull the goalie, which for me us meant getting off of birth control, meaning, like, stopping taking a teeny tiny little pill once a day. As I think through all of this, it wasn't just one moment. It was a series of moments that led to what I would call a knowing, a comfort, an ease and clarity that this was the next thing that we were going to do. I even talked to my husband about it, and he was kind of like, yeah, I can't exactly remember what was the thing. And so I think it was a series it was a series of moments that led to us both sort of being like, this is where we're at. So I think the broader context is that for the ten months prior to pulling the goalie, joe and I had decided to take some time to travel the world. We were really fortunate in having some savings and being able to rent our apartment out and leave to do that. And we did travel together for four months, and then he ended up getting this really unique opportunity back in Chicago. So he came home and I kept traveling. So we were actually pretty much apart for six months with I think we saw each other two or maybe three times during that six month period just about a year after we got married. And the impetus for the trip was partially like, well, we don't have kids yet. We've got some savings. I've been wanting to do that, take a world trip like this since college. There's never a right time or enough money or leaving career at the exact right moment. And I was feeling this pull towards it. And Joe was starting to realize that the job that he was doing wasn't for him long term. And so it was kind of like, okay, let's take this time. And we did, and then we were six months apart. And then during that time is when I had all of these realizations in Poland when I was reading little fires everywhere. I had this realization with little fires everywhere that I could be a mom and I didn't have to be a perfect mom. Every mother is going to have their challenges and be imperfect and this moment of like, but I could do it. I could do it. I could be an imperfect mom, right? There was something about these two imperfect moms with these imperfect children that made me want to in that moment of finishing the book. And that was probably in July, right? And so I come home to Chicago in late September of 2019, having just finished my travels, thinking about what's next for me from a job perspective. Our two bedroom apartment was rented out to a lovely couple who needed it for another, like, six or so months. So we were like, all right, let's just be in this 500 square foot apartment that we had rented in a different area of Chicago. And we were in very tight quarters in the small one bedroom. And as the weeks and months started going on, as I started working on some business ideas, the way that the conversations went with him and I were like, we did the big travel adventure that we were going to do before kids. Now that that travel adventure has completed, it was like we started to see it from a different lens, as if it was the turning point of like, now we will start trying to have kids because the adventure is behind us. So that's not how we intended it going in, but like, retroactively, I think we started to see it that way of like, okay, we did the travel thing. Well, now there might be this other adventure. And so we ended up pulling the goalie in December of 2019. We all know what happened three months later, right? The pandemic hit. We were in this tiny little apartment very shortly after because we were having so much I was having so much time at home. Joe actually had was working for the mayor's office in Chicago at the time, so he had to go into the office the entire time as an essential worker. We also ended up adopting a greyhound because there were so many tracks that were closing. In fact, the entire state of Florida was starting to close tracks because it was going to be illegal the following year to race greyhounds. So here are these, like, three very large mammals in this very small space while a pandemic is raging. And it became less of a decision in my brain and more of just a feeling that I had in my body of just, okay, it's time. It just sort of was, like, clear from my body that it was just the month that I was going to stop. Meaning we are trying, but not trying. There is nothing blocking us from getting pregnant. But at that point, those first three months, I wasn't actively tracking my period cycle or when I was ovulating or we were just kind of trying to have fun with it. Although very quickly you start to kind of know the timing of things and it almost unintentionally becomes more intentional. So, yeah, it was an odd time. I think there was just a lot of emotions about what was happening in the world. Like, we were wearing masks and kind of barely able to go outside. We also weren't in our home. We were in kind of like a foreign place to us, although we had made it a home. So it almost sort of felt like the baby thing was not as important as everything else that was happening at that time. Plus, we kind of had a fur baby that we started taking a five and a half year old, five year old fur baby. That started to take up a lot of our time and energy. I'd heard so many stories of people having gone off of birth control and their bodies taking a long time to adjust. Like periods not coming for many, many months, irregular periods, like not knowing when you were going to have your period. And I had been on the pill for 17 years, like, literally half my life at that point. So I was kind of convinced, like, this is going to take some time for my body to regulate, but it regulated pretty **** quickly. Like, I think my first two months, it was like 28 ish day cycle. I could even feel I was on a growth journey of learning more about my body anyway and like, tuning in more to my body. And so I could even tell when I was ovulating on which side I was ovulating from because I would get like, just a slight ovulation cramp feeling, especially on the right side, less so on the left. So very quickly was like, okay, I think things are working. Things are working very early on, too, probably in the first four to six months, there was one day where I just started to have really terrible cramps, like awful for like 24 hours. But I don't even remember. I don't think it was even kind of combined with a period at first. And it was sharp. Oftentimes period cramps, for me at least, are quite dull and just kind of like just like an aching all over. And this was like sharp pain. And I was scared. I was like, did I have a super early miscarriage? And then I remembered that I had had cysts way before ever going on birth control. That was actually part of the reason I kind of went on that birth control. I had several burst cysts as a teenager. And the way that they saw that was I did an ultrasound and they could see the liquid, like, post having ruptured. So it was like, oh, yeah, that pain that you felt that you came in for, that you made an appointment for that you no longer have. Yeah, that was a burst cyst. And so, again, it's the middle of COVID so I couldn't go in to see the OBGYN. So I did a virtual appointment. And she was like, yeah, it's probably either super early miscarriage at that point, I had also started my period, or even probably more likely, if you've had cysts in the past, it was the first cyst. So there was all this and then there was sort of like, probably multiple months of noticing just period cramping getting worse and period length getting shorter. And I had been on the pill for so long, I didn't really have many cramps. I had some, but it was pretty minor. And I was like, waking up in the middle of the night with cramps and not being able to fall back asleep and sitting on the toilet and bending over and this is just very not normal. And so I think that also kind of spurred this yearning to connect more with my body and just figure out what's going on in my body and to learn more about my cycle and to know what is happening in every given moment of my cycle because that **** is not taught. It's wild if you think I'm almost 40 and learning the differences in cervical fluid, like what's actually happening at various parts of my cycle. It's kind of wild that I just didn't know or I had never really needed to know or wanted to know because it was like birth control takes care of everything. Like hormones in, everything's fine. So I think this whole thing has been a bit of a journey of reconnecting with my body, the natural cycle of my body, like what actually happens in it, the pains it might feel, even the shift in my moods, which are definitely more. I notice a very clear, creative period while I'm ovulating and then sort of like a down period. It's very cool to start paying attention to that kind of stuff. There is definitely a bit of a surrender of like, well, it's up to you now, bad. Well, you and Joey, it's up to you, sperm, you bad. Like, take over. I'm just kind of letting it into your capable hands. And then when month after month after month, it doesn't happen, and then even when it starts to be a little bit more intentional, just kind of naturally, it wasn't like, and now we are going to be much more intentional about timing. It was kind of like, all right, we're just getting to be more and more intentional about when we're timing sex. I feel like there was sort of like a little bit of a beat up, like a beat up mechanism. I have some pretty core work around speaking kindly and compassionately to myself. And I definitely noticed how much my head went to sort of these subtle ways of beating up on my body, like, oh, there's something wrong with me when it's not happening. Or like, oh, my body isn't doing what it's supposed to do. Yeah, just looking for what's wrong. Even from the beginning, I don't know. I just had this gut feel that it was going to take some time, that it wasn't going to be easy. And I didn't know why. But if I look back now, I'm like, it's been three years, three months, and we haven't had a single pregnancy or miscarriage. There might have been like, one. But if you look at all the lab works, if you look at all the tests that we've done, there isn't anything wrong with either of us. We are within normal ranges for all of the things that are measured with regard to fertility. Just the other day I had a vaginal ultrasound and they did the Follicle counts and it was like even those right, in the actually high normal range, everything is normal. So why isn't it happening? We just don't know. It's just not working. But yeah, it does feel strange to be ambivalent. Let up, control, trust in the body. And then the body kind of lets you down. And I think I was sort of resenting it because I was like, ****, dude, body, if you were working, then I wouldn't have to be in all this ambivalence anymore because it would just happen. And by the way, during this time too, multiple friends went off of whatever birth control they were on and got pregnant within a month. Like literally first month kind of situation. It was just like, okay.
[27:45] Krissie: I was.
[27:46] Krissie: Envious because they had also been people who were kind of like on the fence. Should we do this? Yeah, I think it might be time. And then it was like, cool, well, now you don't have to continue to make this decision to try over and over and over and again while being ambivalent. Like, at this point, you're like, cool, you've got a baby on the way. And it's done in a way, right? You could still be ambivalent, but you have a child on the way. I think in some ways the ambivalence can be tiring. And then it's sort of like I think there's another layer of beat up that I've noticed around. Why can't you just know? Come on now, right? Sort of just know already one way or the other, if you want this. And so I think a lot of the journey for me has been around accepting that it's okay, that I don't know. And that doesn't mean I have to pour energy into the ambivalence. And the question because I think I was at one point just like, putting a lot of mental energy into the, like I don't know, Dewey. I don't know. Yes, no, and for sure that cycles. So I feel like actually even a few weeks ago, I was much more in that cycle again of like, oh my god, yes. No, yes, no. And that correlated to us going to a fertility clinic. So it was like, okay, we're taking an extra step in this direction of potentially having a child. So, yeah, all of those same thoughts come up because it's like, we're being more intentional without being certain. So of course there's kind of like a flare up of all of those thoughts. But I definitely yeah, I remember from being like, god, just, like, want it to happen, because then it not happening. Could be another ten years, and then I don't know, I get some comfort of like, well, you have a child that's also going to be ten years. It's just going to be a different kind of not knowing. It's going to be like, oh, my God, I'm figuring out how to parent. Like, I don't know how to parent. There's unknowns everywhere. And so I think I'm continuously working on my mindset of just being okay with where I am, which is a constant focal point of affirmation, perhaps, that I need to come back to. It's okay. Where I am is okay. I think in general, my feelings I've been having more feelings on both sides of the line of feelings of increased sadness when I am not pregnant and simultaneously bigger feelings of joy. And I don't know that I would want my life to change. And I feel great about possibly never having children, and that that's okay too. It's like, on both ends of the spectrum, I'm just feeling more, which is kind of unexpected. There were many moments, probably about a year, six months to a year ago, where there was, like, synchronicity after synchronicity happening that in my mind was pointing to the direction of, like, this is going to happen for you. Things like, I went to an event, and there was, like, a Tarot reading, and of course, I pick the goddess of fertility, and I go to a reiki community reiki session, and I happen to be the only person who showed up. Talk to the woman about how I want to sort of be in this question of pregnancy and do I want this. And she happens to share with me that she has one child and she feels like today is the day that she is going to try to start having another child and then does this whole sort of fertility reiki session with me. And then this other thing happens where I'm with a group of women, and I'm doing another sort of visualization candle making event, and we have to pull an envelope from a bunch, and that's the goddess that we were going to put on our candle. And it was another goddess of fertility, a different one. And it was just like all of these little signals that I think were leading to me actually really hoping and believing that this would happen by the end of the year, that there was almost like a bit of magical thinking of, like, oh, my God. All of the signs are pointing to, this is going to happen by the end of the year at that deadline that I had set, because I've put all of this intention towards it, and then it didn't happen. And honestly, there haven't been as many synchronicities. And I think I was disappointed and sad and just sort of maybe even a little resigned of like, okay, well, now this means there's a whole new, different kind of push that needs to happen. So, yeah, I think just, like, really being with all of the sadness of it not having happened also then opened up kind of like, well, life is to be lived. I don't want to just kind of wait around for this thing to happen or not happen. Let me go and do some fun things in the moment. And then, honestly, there's been some just kind of a series of the series of sort of tragedies of people kind of in my sphere, young people passing away. And I think three people specifically, all in a month, all under the age of 44. And then I think I've been kind of in this. Like, there's been a bit of a negative headspace of, like, a little bit of overwhelm trying to process all these different feelings, trying to feeling the sadness of this 26 year old who collapsed at the end of the marathon that he had been training for, not his first marathon. He was my coaching client. Like, I saw him every week for eight months and really knew him. Right? And then finding out a woman I had become friendly with who had attended one of my workshops last summer, finding out she had committed suicide. Finding out the ex husband of my best friend and the the father of her children died in his sleep. At the age, you know, all of these folks young, where my reaction was like, Chrissy, let up. Control. You cannot control everything that happens to you in this world. Like, let up with everything related to pregnancy, related to work, related to my coaching business, related to all the things that I'm working on. And then what did I do? I did the opposite. It was like my brain kicked into high gear and it was like, actually, what you're going to do is buckle down to get really hard on yourself, feel like you're behind in absolutely everything. Try to be catching up, but really never feel caught up. And it was just this vicious cycle of I wanted to be in this place of freedom, and it's all, okay, just let it go because your life could be taken away from you at any moment to like, no, **** it. I need to make a bigger difference in this world. I need to hold on. I need to do all the things so that in case I die tomorrow, I will have done everything in. My power to live this glorious life, meanwhile feeling pretty miserable the whole time. So I say all of that because I guess some of the fertility stuff and the pregnancy stuff has been kind of not top of mind specifically in the last month. It's just sort of been like, well, it didn't happen in this time frame that I had really put a lot of hope and energy and excitement around in my mind, the sadness of it not happening. And then sort of all these tragedies happened and kind of just needing to take care of myself with it all. Yeah, that's kind of where I'm at. There's just the other developments since the beginning of the new year, there's been a few. Like one, I found out last year that Joe's health insurance did not cover anything infertility related. But a friend of mine happened to mention that it is Illinois law to require fertility benefits through Illinois insurance. His insurance was not through Illinois, it was through California. Law didn't apply. But in Illinois it is required. So when open enrollment was happening for insurance, I went on to some of these fertility or infertility Facebook groups in Illinois, and everybody pointed me to this one woman, was like, you got to talk to this woman. Her name is Jen Francis in case anybody wants to go find her about getting coverage for infertility. And when you do the math, if you even do one round of IVF, it's worth it. It's worth for me to get on my own insurance policy because it will be covered. Now, it has a very high kind of copay deductible situation. I don't know, $7,500 or $8,000 or whatever it is. But one cycle of IVF out of pocket can be anywhere from 20 to 30. So it's like one, we took this big step of like, okay, we are now paying for health insurance so that if we have to go, want to go and do more invasive fertility treatments, we can do that, and it's more cost beneficial to do that. And then in addition to that, this insurance person who's gotten hundreds and hundreds of women, by the way, who didn't even know that this was covered, had to be covered by Illinois insurance, has gotten them on insurance, which is such an amazing thing. She recommended a fertility clinic because we had gone back in October to Fertility Centers of Illinois, which is like where a lot of my good friends have gone, where it's supposed to be very highly rated. And I felt the process was so impersonal and so cold and such like a cog in their wheel. I didn't want to go back. I was just like, I don't want this. This is not the experience that I want to have. And she recommended this place called Kind Body, and a few things really resonated with me about them. One, they focus on their website on the number of female and doctors of color that they have in their practice. Two, the language of inclusivity that they use across the information that they provide on their website was completely counter to anything I've seen on anywhere else, and very refreshing and again, inclusive. And three, the intake process was delightful. I was shown like, a slideshow of egg and sperm and how things happen and what are things to be looking at. And there was a customer experience person there helping me coordinate my next appointment. It just felt like I was being held with care. I went into the office and the woman performing my transvaginal, I think that's what it's called ultrasound. I had forgotten that I was supposed to have that, and I just thought I was coming in for blood work. So you think you're going in for blood work and then they're like, by the way, you're getting this thing dubbed up your badge, and it's going to take some pictures. And I was like, I just got that done. I didn't realize I was doing that. I'd forgotten, whatever. And she was just so patient, so kind of just explained, like, you may have done this at your last clinic, but there's some more specificity that we have on our machinery that we need from this machine.
[40:43] Krissie: I was like, okay, great.
[40:44] Krissie: It was just like, I felt really lovely and held through this whole process, which was not how I felt at the other place at all. And I think they're really hitting on something because the number of women I've spoken to who kind of say they will treat you like a cog in the wheel, but as long as you know that going in and are like, this is part of a journey and to be okay with it. And I'm like, why does that have to be the baseline? The fact that I've been warned of that and just like, it's okay that you're being treated this way as long as you know it going in. And I'm like, Why, that's ridiculous. I don't want to be no, I want better for something so tender and just like the process of going through fertility stuff should be the last thing that you feel like a cog in the wheel. So I've only done basically two appointments. But the other thing is my doctor. We got her cell phone number, right? She's available. And I'm sure she does that because probably not a ton of people use it very frequently, because it's sort of this, like, oh, you're not supposed to call your doctor, but for the people who need it so nice to have, even with all of this kind of upset going on and the sadness of it, really believing that this was going to happen by the end of the year. And then it didn't. We're still taking active next steps. And I notice I don't feel quite as invested. I don't know how else to describe it. It's like my heart's only partially in it, but then the times that it's really in it, it feels very in. It like it feels huge and overwhelming with excitement. Those moments are fleeting. And the rest of the time I'm kind of like, okay, we'll see what happens. And some fear around like, oh man, what if it does happen? I will say one other thing. Going back to the Pulling the Goalie, I do really believe that I can be happy with or without children. I do really believe that. And I've noticed an increased I think this is the big message for myself and maybe to anybody else listening, but really to myself is like the continuous reminder, maybe continual reminder that whatever my thoughts are, are okay. And wherever I'm at today is okay. And whatever I am feeling right now in this moment is okay. And even as I say that, I notice the tears coming. I'm like, yeah, because I want to remind myself of this more often. It's like, all okay. Well, there you have it, folks, the episode on Pulling the Goalie. Or like my friend Kat said, carpet bombing the eggs. One of my favorite things about recording this podcast has been the comments and text messages and Instagram messages a lot from people I know, but also from people I don't know about, how they've been having deeper conversations with friends about this topic, with their partners, about this topic, about the ambivalence, deepening interactions and engagements. And I just love that. I love, love, love that. And so I'm going to keep putting some reflection questions either at the beginning or the end. So here are a few things to think about either for yourself or if you have a partner with them after you've listened. What are some assumptions you have around the decision to try? Have you experienced or considered the possibility of trying while still feeling ambivalent? What does that bring up for you? Recognition? Judgment? Confusion? Something else? If you've recently pulled the goalie in whatever way applies for you and your anatomy process situation, how are you feeling about it? If you've made this decision in the past, what do you remember thinking and feeling around it? Once again, I'd love to hear from you. And you can reach out to me at Chris Mack Krissmac at Instagram or@gmail.com the other thing I wanted to do, which is a total experiment at the end of this episode, is because I've gotten so many folks reaching out to me to tell their stories, to talk to me about their own ambivalence. I was wondering if it might be of interest for folks to gather virtually on a zoom in a space where everything ambivalence related is okay and safe. So I have decided to do just that. I will be on a zoom on Saturday, April 22 from 10:00 A.m to 11:00 A.m. Central. So come be in that space with me. I'll try to have some of the guests that have been on the podcast to answer any more questions that you might have for them. I'll be there to talk more about my experience, but really I would love for it to be a space for you all to talk about your experience, if that is something that is of interest to you. So you can register at Ask Combivalence. So that's as Khuh.com ambivalence. And again, that's on April 22, from ten to 11:00 a.m. Central. This is like a totally free, random, lovely offering that I hope that we can all spend some time getting to know each other at. That's all for now, folks. Thanks for listening. Bye. Hey, that is a wrap. Good to be with you. Our guest, myself or you, I hope you're there if you have ideas for this podcast, things you want me to talk about, stories that you want to share. I am so open to bringing guests on, to having conversations, especially with other people who are ambivalent moms or ambivalent moms to be or who are on this journey toward motherhood, whatever that may look like for you. So hit me up on the gram. I am Chris Mack. That's K-R-I-S-S-M-A-C on. Instagram. And don't forget to ask to get curious and share with me whatever you're getting curious about, I want to hear about it.