I loooooove the zeitgeist of this group. I have been turning an idea about a blog friendship over and over in my head, and then I see two great posts on friends: “Speaking of Friends,” from Sandra, the International Adoption blogger and “Friends,” by Mo the Korean Adoption blogger.
My post is on how I am still learning to be a friend, but, thank God, my friends have a huge tolerance for my mistakes.
My parents have always been big on self-sufficiency. They’d have to be, coming to a totally foreign country with no family or friends to help them, and I admire this. However, one thing I absorbed was the idea of “never letting people know you’re in trouble.” Our family’s whole talent was keeping a good face on everything, never being in a situation where we had to accept help. I remember in high school, in the dead of a Minnesota winter when my mom forgot to pick me up from gymnastics, that instead of calling someone else to come pick me up (and I’m sure there were dozens of people I could have called, neighbors on down to classmate’s parents), that I RAN home. And because we live in the place that Willard Scott often announces at the coldest place in the nation, I frostbit my ears…all because I wouldn’t ask for help!
Recently, I was going through a rough patch, and I received this package in the mail from my college roommate. It was a hand knitted shawl, with a beautiful prayer of comfort attached to it. My friend is a physician with two children, she’s incredibly busy–I couldn’t imagine where in the world she would find the time to knit this gorgeously huge shawl (in purple, our favorite color)…and even more, that she would think to do this. I’m always afraid to “intrude” or do anything that would call attention to any less-than-happy scenario, so if the situations were reversed, I don’t know what I would have done.
I remember the first time our son was hospitalized, I saw this weird vision when we were in intensive care–it was my friend hurtling through the door; she must have driven all this way from another state, sneaked in with her hospital’s ID, and I have never been so glad to see anyone!
What I have been thinking lately, is how interdependent life is, but how I, personally, with all my crises and business and “do-not-disturb” thought patterns often put off contact with my friends. In the triage of our lives, there’s always some other crisis going on, but that doesn’t mean I can’t drop people a line…instead of thinking I must actually write a letter, or stake out a time to call, why not dash off an email?
What does this have to do with fertility? Despite my being somewhat of an inept friend, at least others give me the benefit of the doubt…and friendships can have real, material impact on our lives, in ways beyond the emotional.
I wouldn’t have been introduced to my current doctor (in California) unless my friend Mary had been looking out for me, and when she met him (for something totally unrelated); amidst her own issues, she had me on her mind enough to ask him all sorts of questions and determine that he might be a good fit for my various health problems, including fertility problems, she took the time to pass all this on to me.
In turn, if I wasn’t on this great internet list for parents of disabled kids–which is full of support and hard science–I wouldn’t have been mentally receptive to his idea that my current doctors were WRONG.
Friendship is more than having lunch together. And in a situation, such as fertility issues, adoption, where knowledge is power, it’s nice to get a little help from our friends.
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