Mmmmmmm booktour

Emilia often describes the intense physical and emotional connection between she and Jack. She often refers to him as her bashert. But after the loss of Isabel, and Emilia's spiral into solitary despair, that connection is damaged. This alteration is noted by Emilia when Jack declines her first offer of physical intimacy since their daughter's death. She becomes "terrified that I have become like Carolyn, cold to sex, unmoved by my husband, uninterested in the passion that once meant everything to me." What sort of relationship do you have with your significant other? Do you feel he/she is your bashert? What effect has IF/loss had on your emotional and/or physical relationship?

To be honest for a long time I wasn't sure that my husband and I were ment to be. We were in love sure, but a relationship takes so much more than that. It was going through IF and a loss that made me wake up to the fact that we were absolutely ment to be together. Sometimes it takes a lot of heartache and sorrow to see how strong your love and commitment really is. After our loss getting intimate was hard for me. I cried and felt empty. It took a while and a lot of love in order for it to feel right again.

Throughout the book my feelings towards Emilia were conflicted. If you felt that way too, why did you also feel that way?

It was hard to like her. My heart broke for her because I can't imagine the pain, but her coldness just irritated me. I've never read a character who could have me go from total sympathy to wanting to knock her out in under a page.

Emilia has a difficult time relating to other women who have had losses in pregnancy, usually because she sees her situation as different and worse than those women who have had miscarriages. She is particularly hard on her friend Mindy. Do you feel like this attitude was justified on her part? Are mothers of SIDs victims much different and worse off than mothers of miscarriages? Or can we all belong to the same support group?

I think that both pains are very real. I really don't think that can be in the same group. To me while a loss is a loss there is such a profound difference between being able to achieve and then losing and not being able to achieve at all. I don't think her attitude towards her friend was justified at all, but in moments of grief I know I have not always been the kindest either. I don't think one is worse than the other, they are just different.

We all have had someone in our lives like William who innocently says the wrong thing more often then we would like. How has your infertility experience helped you respond better to those "innocent yet wrong" comments/questions?

I don't really posess that ability which is why we don't really talk to anyone about it. We still get all the "isn't it kid time" or "have a kid already" comments and I have been so tempted just to get up on the table and scream at the top of my lungs that we are broken. We took years to concieve and then my body betrayed me and I lost it. I've always wondered what the response would be. Instead I just tell everyone we are waiting for the right time and smile politely. Its not their fault. They don't know.