The time we stopped prevention...

In Early 2003, we had a special time of prayer together giving God the rights to bless us with a child in his time. I can remember saying to Hedge in a chuckling voice, “I mean what if it takes a few years”.  I had no idea what I was saying at that time. I didn’t want to give into the thought filled fears that my teenage years never brought me one pregnancy scare (and those years should have numerous times). I didn’t know anything about my body then or when I could conceive, but to say I led a foolish life is an understatement. I had no fear that getting pregnant as a teenager was in my cards. It didn’t happen as much as you would expect in the small community in the Midwest where I lived. There was so little for teenagers to do with two working parents just to make ends meet. I think the wild kids in my environment ended up as addicts or as dropouts more than as parents. I was graciously redeemed from that.

I lived a broken life until I was 17. I left it all and ran after Jesus. I ended up thousands of miles away from my former life. Five years later God was restoring my brokenness with His goodness. As a young married couple we were trusting God with every part of our life and now we handed over the timing of when He would bless us with a child. 

So that prayer time shifted us on a practical level. I stopped taking birth control. Can I tell you what a surreal feeling that was to be intimate the first time without a fear that conceiving a life on accident was considered irresponsible?  To be open to what God could do through us was amazing. To trust Him in our bedroom, was beautifully freeing.

I learned quick how to track my body. Who knew how small a window there was to conceive a child. It’s like 24 to 36 hours in a month! What? I mean you can try to conceive as much as you’d like but the actual release of a reproductive egg in a woman’s body is not an anytime thing. I can remember the excitement I felt in finding out when I was ovulating. It seemed so simple, I mean go online find an ovulation calculator and put the first day of your last period in the drop down box with the number of days between cycles. The ovulation calculator will tell you the best five days to conceive. And to top it off it will even give you the DUE DATE of your baby if you do indeed conceive. It’s a piece of cake.

I thought I could follow those steps and I was going to be handed a baby nine months later. I waited anxiously as the days of my next cycle approached. I couldn’t resist the temptation to take a pregnancy test. I had no idea how sad my heart would be when I saw that negative test.

I got a call a few days later that I was going to be an aunt again. Why do those calls that are worth all the rejoicing in the world cause such an agonizing pain? Comparison is a killer, and even though it seriously sucks to feel that way it is human. I shed many tears over friends announcing surprise pregnancies. I would in my heart fully rejoice for their news and simultaneously grieve for my longing.

The next few months were peppered with excitement and silence. I was excited even though it didn’t happen the first month, I was certain that it would happen soon. So I was excited to receive news each coming month. Now I didn’t want to talk about wanting a baby or hoping to get pregnant. I was 22 and we were not established. You get questioned with very earthly concerns when you say that you want a baby and you aren’t sure what the future looks like for you as a couple. Not having long terms plans in place makes you seem unprepared and foolish for talking about a family.  I learned to not open up and share my hopes and our intentions; it was clear that if a pregnancy were a surprise then people would gather around and say you can get through it. Accidental or unwanted pregnancies get so much more support in this world regardless of which view you take. Planned pregnancies are undervalued and overlooked, unless you walk through infertility.

You never think you would be the person to walk through the difficulty to conceive a child and you have no idea how painful that journey is until you are on it.

To mama’s to be:

I so deeply remember that disappointment, you are not alone. You are not less than because you aren’t carrying a life yet. Hold on Mama, He hears your heart and even better He knows your future children so intricately. He is the one that weaves them together.

I look back on this time and I can fully remember who I was. I had no idea I would someday be a mother to six children on this earth. It teaches me to know how to trust him beyond my emotions of the day. It teaches me that as I sit here typing and fully loving my alone time sitting in a coffee shop with headphones in that I am not just this person today. I am also a Grandmother. I am just not there yet, but God knows me there. He doesn’t operate in our time frame, but He can set eternity in our hearts, which includes my future. So have hope in the goodness of God and how He holds your future.

Have hope today mama, that you are indeed a mama, it just may not be today. I pray you would receive a touch in your heart that shakes you past your pain and gives you hope in Him.