Saturday, April 30, 2016

Not Yet Fertile

I was thinking of laying low this Infertility Awareness Week. 

Because this is one of those ugly hard months. The ones where it doesn't feel okay that other women are pregnant, where I can barely manage a congratulatory "like" on yet another pregnancy announcement. Because why not me?  Why this cross?

I'm turning 35 in five weeks. Back when I was 22, engaged, and planning out my perfect life, this is the year I would have my final child, probably our fifth or sixth.  

Because surely I would be old and have a big family, so why risk anything less than perfection?

Man, that girl was not great. 

Instead, I'm watching my minimal fertility sputter out.  The cycles with signs of fertility are fewer. Every month, I watch the window slide a little further closed. 

My two girls will turn 11 and 4 this summer and I'm working hard to fully embrace this picture, without daydreaming of another. 

Every day, I pray for peace with my life just this moment as everything is. 

As I am. With the family size I have. I pray to dive down deep - not into accepting where I am, but actually reveling in where I am. 

I pray for joy, even as the crashing wave of another unsuccessful cycle swallows me whole. The cycle where all the things lined up perfectly....and still...no. 

I pray, as I ask you to stand with me just a moment and feel this crushing weight. Imagine with me a moment what it is to take a gift for granted, and then spend the next ten years begging for it. 

Like thirst for water in the desert, it burns. 

Some months, I find an oasis. In the midst of my desert, I find respite. I laugh and cheer those swimming in the ocean. 

I pray for them when the water is so deep it scares them. All the while, happily sitting next to my puddle. 

Other months, the sun has scorched the earth and I'm thirsty. I can see the water, but I can't have it. 

This is that month. Where I'm struggling to stay upright. Not because I'm depressed or unbalanced, but because this cross is heavy. This road is hard. 

Infertility is sad and hard and grief-stricken.  The desert can wither your soul, or that heat can become your refining crucible. 

It's who I take into the desert that matters. 

It changes who I will be when I emerge. 

To all my fellow desert wanderers, this week, praying for you is getting me through. 

To all my friends in the ocean, I'm loving you hard and praying you stay afloat. I'll find another oasis I'm sure. 


16 comments:

  1. Stunning. Thank you so much for being open about your heavy cross. You are a wonderful woman and friend and I wish so hard I could alleviate it for you.

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  2. This was really beautiful. You make it easier to understand infertility, which I need, with close friends in the same situation. I found myself praying for you as I read.

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  3. Thank you for sharing. Praying for you and everyone who shares this heavy cross.

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  4. This touched me so much, because I'm right there. My husband and I married later in life and were fortunate enough to have one living child within the first year of our marriage only to have two miscarriages last year. Since our first miscarriage, I've been making a late night adoration hour once per week to pray for the grace to accept and be okay with our little puddle, knowing that we will probably never swim in the ocean, and a year later I'm starting to feel my burden a little lighter, the family joys a little sweeter. But there are still moments when it's so heavy, when it feels so absolutely hopeless and futile to even pray for more living children that I just sit and cry. Thank you for being so open and honest, and for sharing in words what many of my friends really cannot understand, as much as they try to.

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  5. This touched me so much, because I'm right there. My husband and I married later in life and were fortunate enough to have one living child within the first year of our marriage only to have two miscarriages last year. Since our first miscarriage, I've been making a late night adoration hour once per week to pray for the grace to accept and be okay with our little puddle, knowing that we will probably never swim in the ocean, and a year later I'm starting to feel my burden a little lighter, the family joys a little sweeter. But there are still moments when it's so heavy, when it feels so absolutely hopeless and futile to even pray for more living children that I just sit and cry. Thank you for being so open and honest, and for sharing in words what many of my friends really cannot understand, as much as they try to.

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  6. This touched me so much, because I'm right there. My husband and I married later in life and were fortunate enough to have one living child within the first year of our marriage only to have two miscarriages last year. Since our first miscarriage, I've been making a late night adoration hour once per week to pray for the grace to accept and be okay with our little puddle, knowing that we will probably never swim in the ocean, and a year later I'm starting to feel my burden a little lighter, the family joys a little sweeter. But there are still moments when it's so heavy, when it feels so absolutely hopeless and futile to even pray for more living children that I just sit and cry. Thank you for being so open and honest, and for sharing in words what many of my friends really cannot understand, as much as they try to.

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  7. Beautiful post, thank you for your honest and sincere post. Praying for you...a fellow desert wanderer.

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  8. This writing is so haunting and beautiful. It captures those difficult feelings so poignantly. Still and always praying for you so much.

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  9. So much love to you, friend. Carrying your heart with me today.

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  10. This was a beautiful and deeply moving post Annie. I am praying for you.

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  11. Oh my heart. I am praying for you today friend.

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  12. Your posts often hit me like a punch in the gut. A good one. A wake up call to be more sensitive to those around me and to try to bear the burdens in my life, whatever they are, with the grace that you bear yours. As always, you are in my prayers. <3

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  13. Well said. Beautiful.

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  14. Beautiful and we'll said. My husband and I have been in the desert 8 years this month, with no children.

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  15. Beautiful and well said. We will have been walking in the desert 8 years this month. Thank you for you insight and view that you share with others.

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  16. You describe this so perfectly. Sitting here with my puddle today, and thankful for your openness and encouragement.

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I welcome positive, supportive sharing in this community. God bless!