1,385 days, this is how long we waited. Nearly 4 years of praying, tears, frustration and acceptance seemed to be something to address rather than just dropping the news that it FINALLY happened and moving on.
I don’t know what I want to focus on with this. Saying thank you to everyone for prayer and support is a big one but also showing a part of the struggle so you can see just how significant this little heartbeat is, seemed worth a wordy post.
I felt every one of those 1,385 days. I say acceptance in that list of experienced emotions because in this last year I guess I started to get to this point. I wouldn’t say I was there graciously but I looked to the future of our family of three and started to see the positives. I started the mental planning and telling God, ok, we’ll be ok, but please just protect my heart.
You see, it’s not just the letting go of your plans for the future, of never saying my ‘children’ or not seeing a whole new individual made up of you and your favorite person but it’s the not knowing why and seeing everyone else get to do it so easily. They plan it and it happens, they could even accidentally do it and it all works out. That was the worst, the “oh, we didn’t even plan it.” Bitterness is a real part of infertility folks. I will address this more later.
We went to doctors, took the invasive and non-invasive test and everything looked great. I did ultrasound after ultrasound at all stages of my cycle to make sure something wasn’t coming up that they didn’t see and again, it all looked great. We did 5 rounds of Chlomid and I just never wanted to do the 6th and final round because I knew that would be it. We decided this would be all the medical intervention we would pursue and taking that last round meant we would have come to the end of our rope. We had a cutoff point of trying and one of us (Dom) would get fixed to make sure we had real closure as far as the possibility of getting pregnant.
Having this little “plan” just put more pressure on it. Days turned into weeks and weeks into years. I have had friends pop out 3 whole children since I had my first and every birth announcement killed me. People telling me, it will happen, killed me. Those telling me oh, we had trouble too, took us forever to get pregnant and then the second one just showed up out of nowhere, killed me. A little etiquette on dealing with someone who is going through infertility, especially someone who is going through secondary infertility, stick to sympathy, stick to support and leave out the “light at the end of the tunnel” talk. I get you’re trying to be helpful but my future doesn’t look just like yours and my hopes are fragile. Just sit and be sad with me and offer prayer.
I know all people were trying to do is help, to be positive and encouraging but each timeline or example they presented I took on as a possibility for me and as it passed, more bitterness crept in and it made the inner battle even more treacherous. On the other hand, I soaked up all the “we are praying” and listening ears and if you ever deal with someone going through this, offer that. Just be there, you don’t need to be creative and chipper, just be there.
All of these struggles made the acceptance part very difficult. Getting through all those big brother/big sister pictures and seeing people fill up whole tables at restaurants with their families and saying how amazing it is to see how different their personalities are made me focus on asking God for protection of my heart. That those positives I was focusing on of our Three Musketeer future wouldn’t be brought down by the heartache as time went on.
And so, in all of this, I stuck to a revelation I had probably a year in. I read Psalm 77 and it was a huge savior for me and helped me at my lowest point. It starts out with the psalmist lamenting, wondering where God is and asking if God has forgotten about him but then they choose to think this way:
Psalm 77:10-12
Then I thought, “To this I will appeal:
The years when the Most High stretched out his right hand.
I will remember the deeds of the Lord:
Yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago.
I will consider all your words and meditate on all your mighty deeds.”
Again, I had ups and downs but remembering the past and how He is always there and what He has done helped me to know that one day I could look back and see His work in this.
The future is not guaranteed. Even in our last trimester, there are so many possibilities for our future to change. Even Sophie at 4 years old is not guaranteed. So, I have to hold them both with open hands but man oh man it sure is great to have a chance.
So, thank you to all who prayed. To those who listened and hugged and yes, even to those who said it will happen, I thank you so, so, so much. We are in total shock and just trying to enjoy the opportunity to go through each step again and cannot wait to share God’s work in our lives through this little one.
