The Early Days of the IF Blogosphere

Substacker (that sounds weird as an adjective, but I guess “blogger” did, too, once upon a time) Haley Nahman writes from time to time about their family-building experience. Her writing reminds me of the early days of the infertility blogosphere. One of her recent newsletters most of all.

She talks about finding the TTC boards and her assumptions about the people writing and answering questions online. Why were they so laser-focused on trying to conceive? “Who else would be so eager to sacrifice their bodies, their autonomy, their time, their freedom? I wasn’t the same, I assured myself, as I exhaustively scrolled their posts, my browser set to incognito.”

You know where this is going. “And so the forums became my little secret. Outwardly, a joke; inwardly, a comfort. Trying to conceive made me feel so nuts and unlike myself that it wasn’t too difficult to split my consciousness this way.”

But the unpacking of how those feelings play out reminds me so much of early IF writing. I don’t mean early in the journey. I mean early IF blogosphere, where we shared a much deeper story than what unfolded on the bulletin boards. Where we admitted deep truths and talked about what they meant. Coming to a deeper understanding of what made us hope or want to hope or how we felt about that hope.

If you’re not reading her, I recommend her Substack. It’s frequently about things other than trying to conceive, but I’ve definitely appreciated these posts.