A face with the name

Blogging for me has been incredibly cathartic. My blog became a confessional of sorts, where I could lament the failings of my body, the stress it was causing on my marriage ... and just talk about the every day mundane things that irritated me.

When I first started, I wrote under a nickname, then I branched out into my first initial. But as I got to "know" more and more of you, I brazenly decided to use our real names (still no last names, I'm not that crazy). Admittedly, it wouldn't be that hard to figure out who I really am. I've taken a risk that people who know me in real life, who I have coffee with and work with and shop with could find me. There was a time I thought it was an extreme risk, but now I realize that this - this is a part of me that I'm not ashamed of anymore. I'm not exactly willing to broadcast it to those I see on a daily basis, but it's part of who I am.

Over time, I started thinking of some of you as not just another webpage, but as a real person. Someone who I could imagine sharing our issues with over a nice glass of merlot - or just straight swigs from the tequila bottle depending on our current situation. Blogging became the grown up version of the ultimate slumber party. Over the last thirteen months or so that I've been actively blogging here, I've grown to rely on your support, on your snark, on your collective wisdom. It's an odd feeling - to find this "friendship" with people I don't really know. You may know more about the intimate details of my nether regions than some of my past lovers, but you don't know the sound of my voice, my mannerisms, my laugh. And I think about this from time to time and find it incredibly odd that I am so willing to openly spill out the most secret details of my life to you...

But I do. And it helps. I have a wonderful family - oh sure I bitch about them from time to time, but they do love me - and I know that, and I'm thankful for it. They just don't know how to deal with infertility. To be quite honest, I didn't either before I found myself here. I'm sure I was an asshat to a lot of people without intending to be - before I knew what it was like.

But you understand in ways that they can't, because you've been there. You know without having to be told.

I'm an amateur photographer, and have been mulling over posting pictures about my life... of me... of Michael ... our cats, our house... on here. I was so afraid that this would be the final thing that would "out" us to people who know us in "real life". I have another blog linked through my profile that is amazingly not infertility related that a few select people who know me in real life read occasionally.

I know that some of you have no qualms posting pictures of yourself, and I respect that. I find it interesting to put a face with the name, with your story. Some of you I know would never dream of putting pictures up. It's too scary, too risky. Grrl's post made me think about it - what if I've been right next to you at the bank, or if we grew up in the same neighborhood, or went to the same schools? Would it change the way we related to each other?

I'm in the middle camp right now - and mulling it over. So tell me, do you put pictures of yourself up on your page? Why or why not?