‘I just cried through sex with my husband and I want to tell you why.’

I just cried through sex.

And not because it was just so beautiful, because there were candles upon candles upon candles, or because I had purchased some gorgeous lingerie which hubs admired for the standard 7.6 seconds and then ripped off… I wasn’t crying because we had whispered sweet nothings to each other and I was just so happy I couldn’t contain it anymore….

I cried because I didn’t want to have sex with my husband tonight. I just wanted to sit on our couch after dinner, chat about random things that happened to us today, laugh at stupid things on Facebook (except for the ads halfway through my dog videos – they are never funny, Mr Zuckerberg) then go to bed, cuddle and cut it off before his 7000 degree breath singed my hair off and go to sleep. With him by my side – just like normal. Like a normal night. That I love – with him. But I have to have sex with my husband tonight. Because infertility.

Being told when to have sex completely removes the fun from it. It gets to the stage where if you are going to tell me to have sex, can you also please tell me the position and how long it should take, so that I don’t have to, yet again, think of this. I cried because sex is getting really hard, and it never used to be hard (pun intended). Sex used to be easy, feel good and something we both enjoyed. And now sex is a job. Sex is something we do when we are told to, and don’t even think about when I am not ovulating because what would be the point? Sex is for making a baby, and we cannot make one of those three out of the four weeks of a cycle so why would we have sex?

I cried because we are running out of positions, our go-to moves are boring and I could not tell you the last time I had an orgasm. I cried because foreplay just wastes time, foreplay is only to get you in the mood and there isn’t enough foreplay in the world to get me in the mood.

Monique Bowley and Rebecca Judd take a look at the many ways of getting sperm into an egg, on the first episode of our pregnancy podcast.

I cried because we don’t have time to take our time, this is a job with a deadline and no time for tomfoolery. I cried because having sex with your husband should not be a job or be hard (well, at least part of it should be hard WINKY EMOJI FACE AND THAT IS IT NO MORE HARD JOKES FROM NOW ON THE WORD HARD LITERALLY MEANS HARD AKA DIFFICULT PROBLEMATIC TRICKY TOUGH AND TESTING YOU DIRTY GUTTERBRAINS).

I cried through sex because we thought we would mix it up and take it out of the bedroom but that means risking getting sperm over another part of the house so quick run upstairs and grab the sex-pillow so we can cover the couch. Then he came back down the stairs and started fucking around with a candle and couldn’t find matches and the tiny miniscule part of me that had revved up enough energy to have sex was gone, it died and now I knew what was coming.

I never thought that emotionless sex was possible when you were having it with your husband that you love, but it is. It flat out should not be a thing but it is.

“Having-sex-when-you-are-told-to-fix-a-problem-you-can’t-fix-and-can’t-get-a-definitive-timeline-on-being-fixed” sex is not the easiest sex to put your back into.

I cried because my husband couldn’t stay hard. And I don’t blame him.

Just stop and think about how hard his job is.

It is seemingly the one job he has, right? And because he has one job, and all the focus is on me and my ovaries and my eggs and my injections and appointments and ultrasounds and all he has to do is fucking get hard….

Don’t you see how that makes it harder? Because he seemingly only has one job, that sense of failure if he can’t perform that one job must be fucking insane. He was so angry with himself – but I’m not. I can’t imagine how hard it must be to have sex with your wife when every cell in her body is silently screaming to stop, when ‘I don’t want to’ is written all over her face and when she thinks she is quiet crying but we both know she is not that quiet (he is just too polite to say anything).

She is trying hard to moan and fake interest and say all the right things but she can’t, not tonight, so instead she cries through sex and silently begs and pleads for you to just come already. WTF is wrong with you – I can’t believe you can’t stay hard. How the fuck can you resist that?

He said sorry. I was crying and crying and he was furious and swearing at himself and then he said sorry. I said what for? So you couldn’t stay hard once, I haven’t been able to get pregnant for two years…. I think that puts you slightly ahead babe.

I cried because he asked me if this will wreck this cycle. I said I don’t know. But I doubt it. Not having sex one day is not going to wreck this cycle. I cried because I am going to wreck this cycle. My body will sabotage it and I won’t get pregnant and that will be one more month gone and sex will get a tiny bit harder next cycle.

I cried because this cycle was going to work. We had last month off because I was booked in for a laparoscopy and hysteroscopy - which were all clear. I have all the bits I need, they are in the right place and they are all ready to go (nb: that means open tubes and a receptive uterus…).

I was on injections from the start of this cycle and on day 11 I had a 14mm beauty sitting in my lefty. And I started… I counted ahead to when my due date would be, I thought about maternity leave and knew that this month, this month that worked, I would be on maternity leave for Christmas!

I thought about how we were going to tell our friends, we could do it on holidays in Darwin on our first night together in months, and someone would ask if I wanted a drink, and I would say no thanks, that’s kinda frowned upon when you are pregnant…. super casual and chill no biggie, and they would lose their shit and go mental and I would get the reaction I so desperately crave and think about every time I sit waiting in my doctor’s office to find out if this one is the one and this month is my month.

I cried because today is day 15, and I (still) have a 14mm beauty sitting in my lefty. No growth, no budging, no other prospects and no ovulation.

I cried because the last two cycles that this has happened, nothing happened. I cried because my due date isn’t February, I will be working at Christmas, can’t tell our friends in Darwin, have to increase the amount of injections, have to figure out what to do about work on Friday because now I have a scan, cant skip work on Friday because you need to be able to afford the scan, and have to look at my husband’s face while we struggle through sex tonight knowing that we are struggling through sex because I am infertile, it is me, my fault, my body, my ovaries and my eggs.

I cried because we didn’t get there, we couldn’t have sex, so I know that I have to tomorrow. I will go to sleep and get some peace, and when I wake tomorrow the first thought to enter my head will be ‘we have to have sex’ and I will look at my beautiful husband and know with every fibre of my being that we both don’t want to, but we will.

Because we are tough, and strong, and fighters. My husband is a warrior, I love him with all that I have in my body to give, and I cried because I am hurting him, he is hurting and I so desperately want him not to be hurting.

Infertility is an arsehole.