The infertile part of our lives...

I always imagined how I would announce my pregnancy, even after starting my first of four IVFs, I had visions of how it would go.  Tears, laughter, relief, I would tell my expanding  stomach how hard we worked for it.  I would tell my baby how I put countless needles into my muscles and more hormones into my body than anyone could ever imagine.  He or she would hear about our miscarriages and the difficult times.  Our baby would know how insurance covered 0% of our treatment and how we spent it’s entire college fund trying to bring it into existence.  Our baby would know our frustrations, sadness, and heartache, but most of all it would know our love.

   At the beginning of this journey I wrote a letter to my children telling them how much I loved them and that I would do whatever it took to get them-my children might never read that letter.  Now these visions I've had are replaced with the unknown.  I might never make that announcement.   I might never talk to my child.  The hardest and most gut wrenching thing is-my husband might not either.  My husband might never teach his son to be as good of a man as he is.  He might never hold the daughter that has his eyes. 

Infertility is more than “needing a surrogate,” more than taking vitamins or lying on my back.  Sure we could “JUST ADOPT” but the money is already spent.  “Just relaxing” or “getting drunk” won’t heal our medical issues.  Imagine telling someone with bad eyes that if they just relax they won’t need those glasses after all.  If we just stop trying it’s not going to miraculously get us pregnant, I’m sure you’ve heard “those” stories but I promise it’s more complicated than that.

We can’t say we didn't give it our all, everything in us.  We absolutely did.  Four ivfs, two miscarriages, all of our money, and one dream shattered later and we are still here, still fighting the fight.  In a way it kind of makes us special.  Most people can get pregnant on their own, if they can’t they can adopt or do a fertility treatment and it will work out for them.   In the end they get to hold their baby in their arms.  We aren’t any of those people.  We are something else.  We are an unfortunate kind of special.  Our friends and our family are wonderful and try so hard to empathize.  Thankfully no one can, I wouldn’t want them to be able to.  A few people have walked along this road with us but have gotten off along the way, while we pushed forward, farther than anyone should walk.  We are still walking, still trying to find our way.

Am I mad at God?  I never really was.  I always lived thinking “you can’t have the testimony without the test.”  Now I am re-evaluating what that means.  We have certainly been given the test, so what is our testimony?  I don’t know yet.   But I do think my testimony is coming, I think someday it will make sense and God’s plan will reveal itself.  But right now?  I don’t know.  What I do know?  I know I love my husband more now than I think I could have without our infertility.  We have faced the worst and held on to each other tighter.  I don’t take that for granted.  I know it can break people, break marriages.  God and my husband have kept me alive during this, not just alive but happy.  Yes somehow I will be happy anyway.  We are hurt, and we are sad but we are not broken.  We are just infertile.