The Pre-Birth Story

I know, I know. I promised the birth story next. This is part of the birth story. I don't think I can justify recording the birth of my child without recording the events that brought her to me. No, not THAT. Silly people. Be aware that this may be TMI for some. I've been needing to record it for a while now, but didn't feel right about it until now. Bare with me.

TR and I started trying for a baby in October of 2007. That's right. Just two short months after we were married. I was ready for a baby. I was so in love with this wonderful man I had married that I was extremely anxious to start our life and family together. We talked about it and prayed about it, and felt ready to get moving with our salvation train. I was prepared for the process to take a while, but I was thinking a year tops.

Months and months passed. I think I spent $300 dollars on pregnancy tests alone that year. I cried every time the test came out negative. TR gave me blessing after blessing. Promises of children filled my soul. Promises that I didn't realize would not come to pass right away. Or even when I wanted them to. Friend after friend and family member after family member announced their effortless pregnancies. Taped smiles and swallowed tears filled the empty void in my heart. I cried in the celestial room of the temple for hours. I was broken. I was broken for a long time. I stopped praying. I stopped asking for blessings that only felt like a hammer to my heart again and again. I stopped going to the temple. Church held no appeal for me. I felt abandoned not only by my Heavenly Father, but by those who loved me most. I wasn't angry at God. No, that's not something you do. I was hurt. I talked with people, but didn't tell the whole story. I cried myself to sleep the days when I got advice and condolences.

I have never been to a darker place in my life. I shut out a lot of people who loved me. In retrospect, I am so thankful for my husband. It wasn't easy for him either, and I knew that. I didn't care. I was numb to anything other than my own pain and heartache. It consumed me. TR would try to comfort me. More plastic masks and fake smiles to him. Looking back, I probably hurt him worse than anything could have hurt me. I shut him out a lot of the time, yet he kept trying to reach me. He talked to me, comforted me when I broke down, loved me just because it was the only thing he knew how to do to help me.

This process lasted over three years.

During this time I had three fibroid miscarriages. A baby that wasn't enough of a baby to show up as pregnant on a stick or requiring an D&C, but that was enough to cause a lot of pain, days in bed, dizzy head, and a crazy amount of bleeding with large clots, not to mention complete devastation and depression on my part.

Please don't think I didn't have any joy in these three years. I enjoyed myself. I did have joy. I loved my husband more deeply than I ever had. I loved my family. I enjoyed the time we spent with friends. My nieces and nephews brought light into my very dark place. There was joy. There was happiness. Sometimes there was enough joy and happiness to make me forget how very broken I was and I could carry on. I was blessed in this time. I had turned my back on my Heavenly Father, but he had not abandoned me like I felt. He blessed me at every turn, I was just too consumed in myself and my grief to realize it. I didn't want to hear it from those who were removed enough to see it.

Near the end of the third year TR and I got insurance. For the first time in our marriage we had real insurance. We had had COBRA and we had other forms of temporary insurance, but nothing that would let us go to the doctor for real. After the insurance kicked in we both went to the doctor just to get checked out. I expressed my concerns to my doctor, feeling void of hope that there was anything we could do that was affordable for two mid-20s. I wasn't regular. I never have been. That makes it hard to plan a pregnancy. The nurse practitioner in my OBGYN office was wonderful. She was the first person to give me a glimmer of hope in three long years. All I had to do was take a regiment of pills, and get some blood work done. Simple enough right? There was the possibility of it just not working, and that was made clear to me, but if after 4 rounds of the clomed (the pill that would make me ovulate) I still wasn't pregnant there was a fertility specialist right in the office. One of the best I was told.

I started right away. I had to take a weeks worth of pills to get the ball rolling before starting the clomed. I was hopeful, I was almost happy. I was scared that it wouldn't work and that dark pit that I had struggled to climb out of would consume me again, but I was on my way up and that was a light in the darkness.

Month one came and went. Not pregnant. No biggie. I still had three more months. It doesn't ever work on the first try. Climb a little higher in the hole.

Month two, not pregnant. There was still hope. No need to worry. Climb a little higher.

Month three, not pregnant. Despair. I was almost out of months. Then what would I do? Slipped a little down the pit. The doctor ordered some tests on TR as well as me. Everything checked out. All was normal and well. It just wasn't happening for us. Doubt crept into my mind. What if I wasn't supposed to be a Mother? What if I never had children? Could I learn to be okay with that?

Month Four. The light of hope that had burned so brightly just three months ago was flickering and nearly completely extinguished. Once again, I was numb. I was late, but I had been the last two months too. I waited almost a week this time. I finally convinced myself to take a pregnancy test just to start my period. That's how it worked. I was late, I'd test, negative, hours later I would start.

TR had gotten the test for me and gave me some "privacy" which meant he was going to go wait in the kitchen until I was ready to tell him the results of the test. Like I said, I hurt him more through this process than anyone else and he was extremely understanding and caring through the whole thing. I peed on the stick and sat in the bathroom by myself, my glimmer of hope growing dimmer by the second. I watched one line appear. Negative. Sigh. But wait, faintly a second line showed. I kept a cap on the light of hope that threatened to blaze again in my heart. It couldn't be real. It wasn't possible. Minutes passed. The second line didn't go away. It didn't get darker, but it didn't go away. TR patiently waited in the kitchen for me to bring him the results. In a haze I walked to the kitchen clutching my little plastic stick.

"Honey, I think I'm pregnant."

I had to repeat myself for TR. I was quiet and unbelieving. He grabbed the instructions for the test. Sure enough, there were two lines. I was quickly scooped up in a tender, strong, caring embrace. I felt. For the first time in months I felt what was in my heart. The flame roared to life warming every aspect of me. A rope was extended to me and I easily sprang from my pit. All those months and years of trial washed away. I cried like I had never cried before. I was still skeptical. We got another brand of test, a digital, clear indicator. No guess work. There it was in beautiful black print: Pregnant.

I didn't realize how much happiness I had been denying myself. I took three more tests waiting for one of them to show me that I was crazy. That night for the first time in many many months I knelt by my bed and prayed. I said a prayer of gratitude. I opened myself back up to my loving Father in Heaven. He touched my soul and showed me that I had not been alone. He had never left me. I was being tried and tested. I hadn't handled it well. I knew that. I had done very poorly. I was full of sorrow for my actions. Not for long. Peace, love, and mercy spilled over me. I was not to feel the pain of this experience any longer.

My pregnancy was blessed beyond belief. I didn't have any morning sickness. I wasn't even really that tired. I was able to work right up until the day she was born. Doctor's visits were easy, no complications, perfect blood pressure. She grew on schedule and everything was perfect. Blessings were given in abundance. So much love was shown to us. I was happy, I was healthy, I was forgiven, and I was turning myself back to the Lord.

Sorry for the deep, dark, depressing post. The next one is better! I promise!

Friday, January 13, 2012