Our Story

Here I am-month 19 of trying to have a baby, month 5 of being on the fertility drug Clomid.  I understand that some people try much longer than us, and I feel bad for them, but it doesn’t change our story.

My husband and I have been married for three years next month.  From the beginning, if my husband had said, “Let’s have a baby” I would have been on board.  But I didn’t ask if we could start trying because I was in school, had student loans to be paid off, and we were renting a one bedroom apartment.  In short, we weren’t ready.  But I was ready long before my husband was.  About two years ago I started asking (begging might be the more accurate term) my husband if we could start trying.  We knew a lot of people that were getting pregnant with their first child and I wanted to be part of that group too.  I looked forward to setting up a nursery, to hearing the pitter-patter of little feet running down the hallway.

Finally, in December 2014 my husband agreed that we were at a point where we could start trying to have a baby.  We knew going in that chances of getting pregnant right away weren’t great-I had just gotten off the pill and on average it takes one’s body about three months to be “normal again” and up to a year is normal, but from the first month I couldn’t help tracking my cycles, getting excited at every sign that MIGHT mean we were pregnant.  Six months came and went.  I started to track my body basal temperature (but this difficult when one works night shift three days a week.)  So after a month or two of that I started to buy ovulation test kits.  They said I ovulated every month but my cycles were long and it was difficult to predict when it was going to happen.

Yes I wanted the attention.  I was excited to tell my husband that were expecting and began looking up fun ways to do this.  I was excited to tell our families, who had no idea we were at that point.  I wanted the excitement of buying little outfits.  I wanted to hear the congratulations from friends and strangers alike.  But I also couldn’t wait for the private moments-the first time I would feel a baby kick, my husband talking to the baby and telling both of us good night.

After a year I saw a doctor.  After drawing blood levels, and my husband being tested there was nothing conclusively wrong.  I began Clomid.  My hormone levels immediately said I was ovulating (but there was nothing saying that I wasn’t before.)  Clomid said that most people are pregnant after three months of being on it.  Three months later, I still got my period.  So we continued Clomid, but I also had an HSG test to see if my fallopian tubes were open.  They were.  So, the Clomid continued.

This past month of being on Clomid, my cycle was long-it has been regular each of the other months while I’ve been on Clomid.  As the days passed I was more and more convinced that I was pregnant.  And then yesterday I got my period.  It felt like I had lost a baby.  It feels a little bit like that every month.  Every time I get a period, I lose the hope that was a baby.  Because I automatically know the due date when I get my period.  After this going on for over a year, I automatically know which holiday is coming up in about 8-12 weeks that would be a good opportunity to tell family.  Like many woman, I have names picked out.  Every month I lose all of it.  I’ve lost all of it for 19 months now and I don’t know how to keep going.

I don’t want to keep trying but even if I stop taking clomid, I will still wonder and hope and cry every month.  Even if we’re not trying, I will still be trying.  I hear to “relax and stop trying” all the time, but how does one do that?  How can one go through this loss and grief month after month?  I’m tired; just exhausted by all of it.

And that our story.

Infertility in a Labor and Delivery Nurse

Everyday I help women bring their babies into this world.  I help and rejoice and listen to the wonder in their words and watch the amazement in their eyes.  I watch and listen to this and can’t help but think “Why not me?”

I’ve driven home in tears because of beautiful deliveries and beautiful families and not knowing when my time will come.  I trust that God knows what he’s doing, but that doesn’t make this time any easier.

I’ve had those patients that have struggled with infertility for years and finally they get to welcome a new baby into their family.  I’ve had those patients who didn’t know they were pregnant for months.  I’ve had those patients that do drugs throughout their pregnancy and don’t deserve to be a new parent.  I watch people of all kinds of backgrounds come through the hospital and I do my best to love every one of them.  But then I go home and wonder why them?  Why not me?

I wonder if I’ve done something or am doing something.  Is this my fault? People reassure me that it's not, but I’m at a loss.  Would I be a bad parent?  God promises that he will set the barren woman in a home as a happy mother of children, but I know people for which this doesn’t happen.

I get down on my knees in prayer. I weep and cry out to God.  I beg and cry; I get mad at him.  Nothing that I do makes any difference.  It seems to me that my prayers aren’t being heard. I’m surrounded by pregnant women at work both my patients and co-workers, at church, my family…it's hard.  As happy as I am for all of them, it's hard to watch their happiness and not know if my dreams will every be fulfilled.

I help others bring their babies into the world but I can't help myself and my husband. Every month the hope grows only to be crushed...again. And again.  Hope hurts.

People ask me all the time when we're going to have kids and its like a punch in the stomach, or in the heart.  It's not up to me.  It's up to God.  I keep praying and as much as I don't want it to, the hope keeps coming back.

Wait, Be Strong, Take Heart

“I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.  Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.” Psalm 27: 13-14

A lesson I’m learning whether I wanted to or not.  I’m tired of waiting!  Nothing in this world is in my control, nothing at all, and I’m learning this lesson more strongly than anything else right now.  We can try to force God’s hand in certain things (not that it really ever works).  We can be convinced we found “the one” and get married, get a job, etc, but if it’s not God’s plan, it won’t be the best.  Then there are things that yes we should pray about but we have more than one “good” option-things like where to live, which house to buy, how to spend our money.  And then there are things like having a baby, a person giving their life to follow Christ, and our health that we have absolutely no control over.  We can pray and hope and cry and plea but no matter what we do or what we want, it’s all up to God (whether we believe or not).  And that’s just plain hard.  Making choices is hard for me.  Having no choice is harder.  There are things that I get down on my knees and pray for, things I’ve prayed for for years, things that I’ve grieved over, and still they do not happen.  Like I said, I’m tired of waiting.  But what choice do I have?  Even through all of this, I cannot imagine not having a God to trust in.  He hasn’t listened to me, and as hard as it is, he doesn’t have to, but if I didn’t have him, there are things in life that would be unbearable.

He tells us to be confident that we WILL see the goodness in the land of the living.  With God, there is goodness in this world; we don’t have to wait for heaven to see it.  We are just told to wait, be strong, and take heart.