The Gift

One of my friends lost his 16 year old son yesterday in a car accident.  We all know there are things in life that just shouldn't happen:  the child dying before the parent, the parent dying while the child is young.  Horrible, heart-shattering events that everyone worries about, and prays never happen.  I don't know what I would do in such a situation, how I would react, cope.  Ever since I heard the news of this young boy's death, the same story keeps running through my mind and I wanted to share it.  I can't credit where I heard the story.  I only remember the point of the story, none of the details.  I've searched online and asked a few friends if they've ever heard it.  If you have, and you know where it originated, please share.

The story goes something like this:

A day comes that a woman's daughter is taken by death.  The child is young, say 6 years old.  The mother cries out to God "Lord! Why have you taken my beloved child from me?"  The Lord comes to her gently, "It was my child's time to come home to me."  The mother repeats: "But why, Lord? Why would you make me want this child so badly?  Why would you give me time to love my daughter so completely?  Why would you take my beloved child from me?"  And God says to her "If I had told you before placing this child in your womb that you would love the girl, that she would be your greatest joy; and then I had told you that I would take her away after 6 years, would you have asked me to not give you the child at all?  If you knew?"  The mother thinks for a minute, too stunned to respond at first.  "No, Lord.  If I had known I could only have my child for 6 years, I would have gladly taken your gift.  I would have cherished every moment I had with my daughter.  I would never have chosen to deny the joy of my child only to avoid the pain of returning her to you."  To which God replies softly, "This is why, my child."

I'm sure I've retold the story with a definite lack of something, but you get the gist.  When I found out I was pregnant with my eldest daughter after having 2 miscarriages, I was reminded of this story.  I told everyone I was pregnant right away, even though there was a chance I would not be able to keep this pregnancy either.  I wanted to cherish every moment I had with her, even if I never saw her face.  Even if God called her home before I could meet her, I knew I wanted this experience.  And I'm sure that my friend and his wife who lost their young son would feel the same.  I hope they find peace and comfort in knowing they would not have denied the joy he brought them if they had known he would go home to God so soon.  May God bless and soothe these parents and the family of this boy in this time of deep sorrow.

In search of Fertility

When my husband and I decided we’d like to have a baby, it certainly didn’t come easy.  It’s all kind of hazy now, but I think we were about a year or so in trying when I went to the doctor for help.  See, I have PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome).  For many women, PCOS means infertility – for me too.  I wasn’t ovulating, or as I liked to refer to it, “my parts don’t work”.  So, Doctor O. promptly put me on Clomid and we got pregnant on the second or third cycle of this.  A pregnancy that ended just as promptly at 5 weeks.  Of course, I was sad, but I had read up on the treatment and knew that miscarriages are likely both with PCOS and with Clomid usage.  Plus, many women miscarry early on like that, so no worries – let’s try again. 

The second miscarriage was devastating. 

            Two in a row was not common. 

                             Two in a row was punishment. 

Maybe God didn’t think I deserved to have a baby. 

Doctor O. didn’t want to waste any more time: I was already in my 30’s, so I was referred to a reproductive endocrinologist – Dr. G.  Specialists don’t just put you on a medication, they do extensive testing.  Testing which revealed I was not immune to rubella, so I had to be vaccinated and wait another 3 months before trying to conceive.  We discovered I had endometriosis, among other surgically corrected issues, any of which could be causing the problems.  And top it off with a “rare genetic defect” of MTHFR, a mutation that causes one to not absorb folate (essential to the fetus), leading to miscarriages, still-births, birth defects, etc.  Hmmm. 

Maybe God didn’t want me to have a baby?  Then I thought: if that were true, He wouldn’t make me want one so deeply.  And He wouldn’t have guided me to a job years earlier at a Catholic organization (where I would have health insurance that covered all of these tests and fertility treatments.) 

So, on we went - I injected myself with drugs to make me produce follicles, drugs to make me ovulate, and after timed intercourse, drugs to prevent blood clots.  I had multiple invasive ultrasounds to monitor my follicle production.  If there weren’t enough large follicles, then more waiting and more injections.  Around the third cycle, Doctor G. started talking IUI (intra-uterine insemination).  He said that beyond 4 cycles of what we were doing, the success rate was extremely low.  Randy and I had decided early on that we didn’t want to push things that far – if we couldn’t get pregnant without resorting to IUI or IVF, then we would stop trying.  

This cycle was strange – I started the injections without my period (if you don’t ovulate, you don’t always get a period, so the doctors would just start you over growing new follicles.)  Then about a week in of injections, my period came suddenly.  Doctor G. had me start my injections over (they were in increasing dosages).  When the follicle check came, there was only one viable follicle.  Defeat.  I insisted we go ahead with the injection to force ovulation anyway since it was our last cycle.  And… two weeks later, we found an embryo!  Success!  I went back to work that day, and I told everyone I was pregnant again.  Most of my friends knew about my previous miscarriages, and were surprised and concerned that I would make announcements so soon.  But I told them “I don’t care if I’m pregnant for only four or five weeks again – I’m going to enjoy every second of it while it lasts!”  Baby Lauren was delivered by c-section (no easy birth either, of course) five days after my 35^th birthday – 38 weeks, healthy and strong!

My point in sharing all this: 

God is good!  He will lead you to where you need to be, when you need to be there.  I gave everything over to Him with that last cycle.  I would have been heartbroken to have had another miscarriage – no doubt.  But I truly did relish my pregnancy (at least until the last month – who really enjoys being as big as house and peeing her pants?)  And I knew that God would take me where I needed to be, even if that wasn’t to being this baby’s mother.

The Salty Chip Dilemma

Have you ever been eating potato chips, and you get one that's drenched in salt? It's perfectly crunchy, super salty and it's the reason you eat chips in the first place. The salty chip is perfection in a snack; totally satisfying. Except, if you're like me, once you get the salty chip, you can't help yourself -
you want

    just     one     more.

I guess it's greed, and unfortunately the salty chip dilemma seems to apply to several aspects of my life. I struggle constantly with my desires. "If only the girls would sleep all night in their own beds..." Well, they do now, but it's not enough. Now I want them to fall asleep in their beds, and to do it without meltdowns or me sitting in the dark for a half hour. I want time to myself at the end of the day, but I don't want to be up until midnight to get it. I want my husband to do something besides sit in his recliner engrossed in tv. I want to be able to take a shower in the evening without it meaning the girls will stay up even later. I want the house to be clean, but I don't want to do it all myself. I want to be a stay at home mom, but not a housekeeper, and with time to myself each day. (Oops, there it is again.) I have beautiful children and a wonderful husband, but at the end of the day I resent them for "making" me take good care of them, while I set aside my own needs. So there you have it: I'm greedy and selfish. I get the salty chip every day I look for it, and then I spend the rest of the day looking for another one. Maybe the first step to recovery really is admitting you have a problem...

And once everyone has settled in for the night and I finally get that time to myself - I thank God for giving me such a great family. I look back on my day and become aware of all the great moments I had - tons of salty chips. In fact, it turns out I had to eat the whole bag before recognizing how good they were. And the dishes will be just fine sitting in the sink overnight.

A little about me..

So, inspired by Momastery, (thank you Glennon and Please see my recommended blogs) I have decided to try blogging. I used to write many years ago, and I get a lot of good comments on my facebook posts, so I figured what the heck? I’m raising two young daughters with my husband. Until August of 2011, I had lived most of my 40 years in my childhood home in rural Illinois. My husband and I bought the house in 2003 from my parents when they moved. After experiencing a couple of years of very little employment for my husband, and several talks between us convincing him that I truly was fine with moving away, he began searching other states for a job in the summer of 2011. Rather quickly, Randy was offered a position on a farm in South Dakota, and then even more quickly – we packed up, I quit my job, and we moved 12 hours away from our families in a matter of about a month. Everything about the move felt right, as if God had laid out this plan for us, and we didn’t look back.

Now, I’m once again a stay-at-home mom. My eldest, Lauren*, is in Kindergarten this year. My youngest, Paige*, turned 3 last November, and spends all of her time with me. We volunteer at the YMCA twice a week – I get adult contact, she gets to play with some other kids. We didn’t want for me to work right away after moving here in order to give the girls plenty of time to adjust. And frankly, Paige was never happy with daycare. She cried at drop off every single day for over a year. I’m hoping to get her into a preschool program next fall.

My goal with this blog is to have an avenue in which to vent. I believe humor is the best way to bring people together and the only way to survive the craziness that is our lives. I also think that mothers should support each other with honesty and empathy. We can all contribute to each other’s happiness by sharing the truth. And, blogging is a lot cheaper than therapy.

*Yep, names changed to protect the innocent. :-)

Motherhood

When I graduated high school, the only thing I knew I wanted to do "when I grew up" was to be a mom. Maybe all women feel compelled this way to become mothers, I don’t know. But when it finally happened for me (after many years of struggles), I spent the first 3 months of her life thinking "I was wrong! So wrong!" I was convinced that the poor child was doomed because I was her mother.  I couldn’t get anything right.  She cried, she spit up constantly, she didn’t nurse well.  The wave of pure love didn’t wash over me, natural instincts didn’t kick in; sure I loved her, but I was terrified of her.  This wasn’t how motherhood was supposed to be and since no one had warned me, I was positive I was the only mom who ever felt this way.  I was in a constant state of panic.  Someone was going to see how unfit I was and take her away from me.

The funny thing is: that while all of this went on inside of me, I don’t think anyone realized.  Her first daycare provider even commented on how calm I was; she’d assumed I had other children.  The truth was that I was frozen in fear by this screaming child.  I didn’t know what she wanted; I didn’t know how to calm her. And I was grateful that someone else could hear her, because I’d begun to think I’d lost my mind.  I handed over my baby for two reasons: 1. because I was desperate, and 2. so that I would know my daughter was safe there.  I then quickly became friends with that caregiver for two reasons: 1. because she was compassionate and sympathetic, and 2. so that I would know my daughter was safe there.  Turns out my maternal instincts were in fact, in working order.  They were just hidden behind the thick walls I’d built around myself.  (But that’s a story for another day.)

I still question myself daily on my mothering abilities, and my daughter is 5 now.  Her sister who’s 3, shares the struggle with us.  I get it wrong all the time.  I beat myself up over my feelings.  But the older I get, and the more these children love me despite my flaws, the more I realize I am good at this.  Motherhood is an emotional rollercoaster.  Many of us get overwhelmed; most just don’t admit it publicly.  Thanks to my tendency to be overly honest and blurt things out and especially thanks to other mothers who have, in turn, shared their struggles with me and the world; I now know I’m not alone.  I’m not crazy, although sleep deprivation and constant calls of “Mama?!” do make me disorientated.