On average, I visit my family about twice a year. I stay just long enough to be grateful for my own bed when I return, and try to space the trips to land right around the times in the calendar that I’d be homesick.

It’s funny to watch the progression of us, the nuclear unit as we grow, evolve. Splitting off in our own pieces, not quite separate units unto themselves, since none of us has procreated yet.

Funny to have conversations with her and my parents about the trying to conceive process. Something we never discussed. Strange to share some of it with her, while we were so discreet at the time. I valued my ex-husband’s desire for privacy more than my own need to share my pain with the ones I love.

She’s starting to worry, though in that early stage that those of us who move into treatment look back on wistfully. When you were concerned, but before you did temperatures and medications and injections. Before your heart breaks a little more each month. When the disappointment is merely sad, and not crushing.

I’m excited at potential aunthood, but sad knowing we’re not those close sisters who bond over everything. I’m far away, and I’ll be torn between being happy for her (and my parents, who desperately want grandchildren) and sad for myself.

I’ve seen these people, who are a huge part of my life, become different people than I’d envisioned. It’s interesting to see where they go, what they’re doing. It’s also a little bittersweet to go there and see how much I don’t get to be a part of. It’s still so hard to have my heart in two places.