Struggling to Conceive, Part One: Conception of Myself

When Hubster and I decided that we would start trying to get pregnant, it seemed to (at first glance) a pretty straightforward proposition. I thought that it would be just that: trying to have a baby. 

Sure, adding a baby to a marriage is life-changing, but it was another step in our journey together, so why not go ahead and start working on it? 

I had no idea that "trying to have a baby" would turn out to be an incredibly painful, difficult, heart-rending, eye-opening, beautiful (and terrible) journey of self-discovery. 

The realization that this process has been a meaningful part of my life was not without some shock value. When we began to try in early 2014, it seemed exciting at first. But then months of struggles with my health (endometriosis diagnosis, hormone therapy, etc, etc) turned the exciting bit into something more...cumbersome. Instead of thinking excitedly of the prospect of being pregnant, I began to dread the coming of my period each month (even more, which I would have never thought possible) and my inner voice scolded me against hope each time I thought there might be a chance...and peed on a pregnancy test. 

Always a "not pregnant" reading, which sent my spirits plummeting. 

As the word "infertility" got casually thrown around, I began to panic more, and feel like every worst case scenario I had ever imagined was coming true. I was going to be infertile and never have a baby and what would my Hubster do with me?!?!? (That was the silliest worry...Hubster is the most kind and gracious man who loves me wonderfully--with or without children). 

And as our fertility struggles continued on, I quickly became aware of something--I was a woman in limbo. I am not a young, single woman any longer, but neither am I a mama. The vast majority of our friends have children, and we do not. We are involved at church, but I'm not a member of MOPS, like all the other gals are. I participate in nursery duty, but I'm not a mama. 

I began to look around and feel so far removed from all the people around me. Couple that with the fact that I felt like I couldn't really tell anyone about the struggle (lest I die with shame or invoke someone's pity), and I got to a point where I felt so alone and without any conception of who I was or what I was supposed to be doing. 

Today, we spent the day out on the lake, enjoying the beauty of God's creation. We took out the jet skis and spent some time on a friend's boat, Hubster and I learning how to surf in the wake (which, FYI is AWESOME. If you ever have the chance, do it!). I found myself on that boat with a beautiful young woman in a scarlet bikini, whose body was lithe and toned and tanned. 

She reminded me of days in college (not that I ever looked quite like that), when my girlfriends and I would shave and lather and wiggle into teeny bikinis and go lay by the pool to tan at the Laramie Rec Center. 

I'm not the same young woman I was when I did that. 

But then I looked at some of the women on the beach, chasing their babies around and splashing in the shallows. Their bodies, every bit as lovely, bear the evidence of child bearing. 

I'm not that woman either. 

I am somewhere in between. 

Literally and figuratively. 

I haven't given birth, but my body isn't as tight and toned as it once was. Tanning is a thing of the past, for so many reasons, and my belly just isn't as flat as it used to be. But I don't wear the battle scars of having created new life, either. There isn't a paunch from where a baby once grew, or stretch marks from 9 months of incubating a little human. 

There's just me.

And I'm somewhere in between those two places. 

Struggle to conceive brought me to the realization that I had (and have) some more learning and growing to do, perhaps before I'm ready to be a mama. 

I'm not suggesting in any way that not being able to get pregnant is something to do with a deficiency in any woman, or myself for that matter. Yet I have realized in my own life that this journey has taught me things about myself that I am glad to know now, before I am responsible for raising my own wee ones. 

This space in between is becoming a space where I am getting comfortable with all the changes my life has undergone in the past three years (starting my career, meeting Hubster, our whirlwind romance, marrying him just 9 months later, moving twice, a job change, a degree, a Masters in progress, two deaths in the family....you get the idea). Until I faced this struggle, I didn't realize that I was feeling worried about whether or not I was a good enough wife. I have had to learn to balance my role as a wife, a teacher, a librarian, a friend, a daughter. I also hadn't realized just how much I wanted to make things happen in my life, rather than just trusting that God would work them out, because He has done so beautifully before. This has been a lesson in faith, and remembering to lean on the Lord's Faithfulness. 

Don't get me wrong...there are still moments where this space in between is still painful. This journey is still causing me all kinds of growing pains that I would really rather not endure. My arms are still empty, and I carry that sadness with me each day. 

Yet I am slowly coming to appreciate that struggle to conceive a baby has also revealed a struggle to conceive of myself and my life, and through that, I feel myself drawing closer to the heart of the Father.

Which is right where I want to be, regardless of the space that I find myself in. I want to be drawing closer to the Lord and becoming the woman He wants me to be. And as fire refines metal, so trials refine me to His good purpose.

I don't know when or if I will have a baby. I hope and pray that I do.

But I do know this: my faith is being tested as I persevere, and this process if maturing and completing me.

Which means that this struggle to conceive, while heartbreaking and difficult, is producing good things in me, even if those good things aren't the sweet little bundle I want right now.

So I thank God for His faithfulness, shed tears when I am sad, and pray for a pregnancy.

James 1:2-4

2. Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3. because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. 4. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.