Once upon a time I worked at Barnes & Noble. I was assigned to Department 3 and Juvie (a.k.a. the kids' section). Our "departments" were arbitrary divisions of the books and merchandise that roughly matched the layout of the carpet and shelving fixtures in the store. I became most familiar with the books that were housed in Department 3 and Juvie, as that is where I'd spend most of my hours helping customers, shelving and organizing. [I loved that job. *sigh*]
The Juvie area of responsibility didn't only include books for children. It also included books for adult customers on pregnancy, baby names, parenting and education. The fertility books, however, were kept in Department 3, about 60 feet away in the middle of the Health section surrounded by books on other afflictions and diseases like asthma, heart disease, AIDS, diabetes, etc. The miscarriage books were kept there too. The label on the shelf even read "Infertility/Miscarriage".
On a number of occasions I would find a female customer standing in the pregnancy aisle, with a sad, defeated look on her face. I would approach her and ask brightly, in my best customer-service voice, "May I help you find something?" even though based on her body language and expression I had a good guess what her answer would be. Usually there was a pause, they would look at the carpet, they would look up, almost embarrassed and ask quietly, "Where are the books on miscarriage?" Sometimes the answer was, "I can't find any books here on infertility." I would give them an empathetic nod (though knowing what I know now, it should have been sympathetic) and lead them back to the Health section. I can understand why their first inclination was to look in the pregnancy section for books on fertility and miscarriage. After all, you can't have a pregnancy (or a miscarriage) without being fertile first.
As I would leave them to browse the titles and continue with my workday I would briefly think about how difficult those few minutes must have been for those customers. Standing in front of all of those pregnancy and parenting books with happy babies and children and bright colors plastered all over the covers. Searching for answers to their own struggle while being bombarded by hundreds of books that reminded them of what they were striving for or had lost. Part of me didn't like the idea of putting the fertility/miscarriage books in with the other disease topics. I don't think that heart disease and diabetes carry the same complicated mix of grief, shame and anger that infertility and miscarriage do. To catalog them the same way seems cruel. But it was still a better choice than to locate those books with pregnancy and parenting. That would have been cruelest of all.
I thought about those customers, and the location of those books, the other day while I was visiting the fertility clinic. About four months ago the fertility clinic moved and it is now located in the large Naval hospital here in San Diego. It is on the same floor and in the same wing as the Fetal Assessment Unit (FAU), the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) and Labor and Delivery (L&D). More specifically, the infertility clinic now shares the same space as the FAU. It's an odd choice for cohabitation - pregnant women and others who hope to be. The waiting room usually contains women who are visibly pregnant, often times with their doting spouse, and a handful of us infertile women, alone. I don't blame our spouses for not coming with us - after all, there isn't much for them to do or see and our appointments only last 10-15 minutes.
The cohabitation of infertility and FAU doesn't bother me, though I often wonder if the pregnant patients are as aware of us as we are of them. I don't begrudge or resent the presence of the women who are expecting, but then again I've come to a certain peace with my infertility. I have to imagine, however, that that isn't the case for all of the infertile women who come through that office. I know that there are infertility patients that are in the throws of despair and depression, grief and confusion, hurt and bitterness. To be sitting there, facing all of those happy soon-to-be mommies, must be incredibly hard for them.
My guess is the hospital didn't think much of the emotional impact of locating the infertility clinic with the FAU. Instead, I wager the powers-that-be wanted to have all of the sonogram and ultrasound machines in one area in the interest of convenience and efficiency. It's too bad. I think the infertility clinic should have been put in Department 3.
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