Of control
A long diatribe that I'm not sure helped soothe or raise my blood pressure.
I try my best to not feel like a victim of some difficult journey. That my problems are somehow more complicated than everyone else's. They’re not. But damn do I stress about them anyway. This thing of living between two countries really does keep getting in the way of my peace of mind, and every year, it seems, it can find new creative ways of showing up.
I am a planner. I make lists, I make calls, I create calendar events, and reminders, and notes, and whatever else you can think of. I like to feel organized, and yes, I worry, I wonder, and I try to the best of my ability to avoid unknowns. Being like this, one would think, should keep me away from stupid mistakes, or just general wastes of time and money. Being a planner as much as I am, should protect me from such anxiety inducing situations. But for some reason, it does not. I keep finding myself here.
I have decided, probably way too late in my life, that it would be a good idea to freeze my eggs. I have decided this when my insurance in the states does not cover it. I have decided it would be a better idea to do it in Portugal, cheaper even. So far so good.
So I make all my plans, prepare for all the things. The first appointment is only possible mid February, so ok, we start there. I book my flight to Portugal for about two weeks after that first appointment, so I can have some time for the exams I was told I would need to do. After the appointment I realize I should actually arrive before my menstruation starts because there's an echography that needs to be done. That plus trying to do the exams in the states... Ok. We adapt. Now I'm thinking I move the flight a week earlier, do all the exams in Portugal. Call the clinic, book the echo, done. Call a lab to know the procedure for getting exams, first come first serve, usually most exams within three days. Great.
Fly to Portugal, and visit the lab place. Just wanna make sure I can show up tomorrow. It's all good, they even give me a little cup to pee in before I show up for the bloodwork. Great. I feel prepared. Strong. Next morning arrives, pee in a cup, draw some blood. "So when can I expect the results? Two or days?". Oh honey no, it's more like a week. "Well but can I add some urgency to it? I need it by Monday". Oh maybe we'll see, but it's very unlikely. Great.
It’s 9 am. I call the clinic to talk to the lady who has helped me so far. She's not in until 10 am, but they think I need to bring the exams tomorrow morning for the echo appointment. She will call me once she gets in. 11:24 am, no call. Anxiously wait to figure out if all of this was for nothing and I'll have to just come back in a month. Quickly do the math in my head thinking if it's better or worse that I go back home to New York or wait here. How much would a flight be again?
I am a worried planner. And I can't escape still feeling like I am a mess. That I should have known, should have planned more, should have asked more, should have flown here sooner. How do people who are not planners even cope? Do they just have such relaxed attitudes, things can happen when they happen, and it's all good? Am I simply too stressed? Is going home perfectly fine? How does one even manage to work in the middle of this?
Ever since I moved from Portugal to the United States, almost ten years ago, every year there's some new form of torture that stretches me between the two countries. Just before I left, while I was still waiting on my first work visa, my old studio had a court case where I was called in as a witness. My boss told me I didn't need to be totally honest, it would all be fine. Ok, right. I dreaded it. As I waited for the visa, the court date got pushed, and pushed, and as I waited further, all I wanted was my visa to be approved so I could buy a plane ticket and run away. The visa came through 10 days before the new court appearance. I claimed to be unavailable and out of the country.
The years that followed were a sequence of visa applications, interviews, documents renewals and all sorts of filling and waiting and flying, and discovering new ways one can pay a lawyer. A year and a half into my life in New York, the company I was working for got sold. I had three months to figure myself out. Start an LLC, sponsor myself, find clients who will attest to maybe one day hypothetically hire me. File the visa, wait, wait and wait some more. Meanwhile do free work and accept to be paid only once the visa comes through. Budget in New York City with $3,000 a month. Breathe out, once the new self-sponsored visa is in effect.
Fast forward to next year, my new employer now says they don't work with LLCs, only S-Corps. And by the way, that takes effect in two weeks. Alright, file paperwork to change the company, pay some more lawyers. Wait, file, wait, and file something else. Except, of course, goverment shutdown. Nothing works for two months. Continue working without pay for those two months until the government unblocks and can process my paperwork as an S-Corp. Save, budget, maintain calm. Breathe out.
Shortly, without even realizing how time goes by so quickly I have to renew the visa, which means I can't leave the country until going to Portugal, interview for it and then come back. Interviews are scarce. Make sure to plan accordingly. Time it out, hope to god the passport I just dropped off at the embassy comes back before the Wednesday flight back, because of course round trip is cheaper. Breathe out.
Give me another year or two, and it's Covid. Nothing works, everything is slow. I have renewed my visa (again), but haven't been to Portugal since. In this new pandemic world interviews are even more rare. If I book I might be able to get one in two months, turn around times are complicated. Flying is impossible. Except my dad gets diagnosed with cancer so, flying, while impossible, is absolutely needed. Passport about to expire, but here we go. Fly to Portugal, quarantine in Lisbon before going home. Apply for a new passport. Wait. Once I have the new one, book the interview. Wait. Apply for a visa with an exception, because, guess what, europeans can't fly to the US right now. Wait. Paperwork comes, book direct flight, and by a miracle two and half months later I'm back home. Breathe out.
That year I flew back and forth from Portugal half a dozen times. For every flight home, I have to spend 14 days of quarantine in Mexico before I am able to enter the US, every single time. I feel lost between the three countries. I am pulled between the guilt and the grief of staying home, and the life giving peace of New York and my own space and time. Go and come back over and over and over again, and then one day, my dad passes. The funeral comes. No more restrictions. We have vaccines now. Covid is over, sort of. Grieve. Breathe out.
Now comes the green card, all the paperwork it entails. I started the process during the year before so I couldn't possibly do the usual two year wait, I needed the green card application version that allowed me to see my dad in Portugal, while still waiting for the visa to come. This means the interview won't be in New York. It will be in Paris. Fine. Let's go.
Wait. Wait more. Wait two years, until you're one day on vacation and you get an email telling you, you have to be in Paris in about three weeks. You have to do all the vaccines now requested in the US, and all the medical exams in France. Book it all. Call everyone. Try to use the little french you know to make sure you're actually getting an x-ray. Do it all before the very unmovable date of the embassy appointment. I plan for a month, rent an apartment. Results should come in about 5 days. Wait. Exams are done. Interview is done. Five days come and go. Wait some more. Wait so much the flight back needs to be changed. Meanwhile pay for another week, and another, at some Paris AirBnb you can't afford. Book a flight to Portugal, because if we're gonna wait in Europe at least in Portugal we won't be spending money. The day before the flight, as I furiously refresh the embassy website the green card suddenly shows APPROVED. No information on where to get it. They should be mailing it somewhere in Paris. Get a phone call from this angel of a person telling us we can actually just stop by and pick it up if we want. Cancel the flight to Portugal. Book a new one to the US. Pick up the green card. Fly back home the next morning. Breathe out.
And now, a couple years later, this. I just wonder if it all needs to feel this close. This dangerous. This stress of having something done just before some deadline. Why? Am I that unorganized, or am I just too worried. Always. All the time unable to see things with hope that things will fall into place. Always assuming that if I don't chase, something will fall through the cracks.
After all this furious deranged writing (my apologies), the clinic calls back. 11:57 am. The exams can come next week. It's all good if it just comes before the retrieval in two weeks. Nothing to worry about. Breathe out.
And now I wonder, how on earth do I think I'll ever be equipped to turn those eggs into a child?