Maybe No Baby

Happy New Year!

I can't believe it's already February.

Seriously, guys.

Where does the time go?

I am staring down the five year anniversary of my first date with Hubs (Valentine's Day) and my (gulp) THIRTIETH birthday (the 23rd). I can't even get my head around that one.

Since I wrote last, I've been doing a lot of thinking. Processing, more specifically, my emotions in the wake of Asa Raye's due date in December.

Here's the quick details of where Hubs and I are at in our quest for a baby:

We are working once again with the Ob/Gyn who performed my laparoscopy in September 2015. There's a real possibility that I've had a recurrence of Endometriosis since the surgery, which is why we haven't been able to get pregnant again since the miscarriage in April. So, we're heading into a three month round of medication to suppress the Endo, and then we can start trying again.

It's amazing how life-changing infertility can be for couples, if I am honest. It's a frog-in-the-pot kind of thing; you know, where you can boil a frog if you put them in cold water and slowly warm it up?

Fertility struggles are like that.

First, you start trying, and when it doesn't happen after a few months, you suddenly find yourself sucked into a vortex of doctor's appointments, medications, charting, supplements, and then suddenly, years may have passed.

It's been three years for me and Hubster.

Three years filled with some pretty tough moments. Infertility presents you with all kinds of dark holes to fall into: marriage tension, self-loathing, faith crisis, isolation, and that's just to name a few. Anyone who has suffered through a major medical situation in their life knows how fast your whole world can become wrapped up in the stresses that accompany it: insurance, blood tests, doctors, clinics, hospitals...uncertainty.

Fear.

Anxiety.

I've learned that the best antidote for anxiety and fear is a heart of thankfulness--keeping your eyes on what you have, rather than what you don't have. And if you are interested in reading about how life-changing thankfulness can be, check out Ann Voskamp's book, One Thousand Gifts.

I am thankful for so many things in my life, not the least of which is the faith that's helped sustained me through this process, as well as Hubster's solid faith and unfailing support.

It's that support and faith that seems to have brought us to a place of rest recently.

Choosing to take a break from trying to have a baby is scary. After all, I am about to roll over to my thirties, and the years of childbearing are dwindling. A few months of not trying feels like major missed opportunities. And my approaching thirtieth birthday reminds me of how long we've been trying to have a baby. I was twenty-seven when we started making the effort to conceive. Now, here I am, heading into a new decade, still without a family. That makes me sad.

But choosing to take a break from baby making is also liberating.

Hubs and I are working on a few big projects right now: ranch plans, finances, and my Master's thesis. We have plans to take a big trip this summer after my graduation.

It doesn't seem so bad to not have kids or be pregnant at the moment.

Taking a break from baby making means I redirect a lot of my mental and physical energy, and I need all the energy I can get right now. Writing a Master's thesis, as it turns out, is pretty taxing!

And as we've been talking and thinking about this break, I have come to a place of peace about it, because I can finally say: maybe we won't have children, and that will be okay.

I'm not saying I suddenly don't want to have a baby; I still do. And my heart still carries sadness over the loss of Asa Raye, and over the difficulty we've faced in starting a family. I don't believe that sadness will ever go away.

Yet I am finally in a place where I can see that a life with no children wouldn't be less of a life, it would just be a different life. I don't know what it will look like anymore than I know what a life with children of our own might look like.

But I do know this: first, I am forever grateful for my marriage, which isn't somehow "incomplete" without a baby. And second, kids or no kids, I know that the Lord has good plans for us, because that's what He's promised.

So maybe we'll have babies. Maybe we won't.

But either way, it's all right.

I'm all right.