No Consolation Prizes

You guys are so sweet!  Thanks for all the blog comments, Facebook comments, and private messages after the first part of this story posted.  

In case you aren’t already aware, it’s important to know that Josh and I have talked of our desire to adopt children since we were dating.  In fact, our plan was to foster/adopt our first child. We eventually realized that the timing of our move to NYC would keep us from completing the adoption process prior to leaving Alabama, so we began pursuing information about fostering and adopting in New York.  Still, we were many months away from having the NY residency that would allow us to begin that process.  The desire for a family (and the fact that my 30^th birthday was fast-approaching) led us to consider the possibility that our first child would be born, rather than adopted, into our family.

In fact, we told the fertility doctor at our very first visit that we weren’t desperate for a baby, that we knew we would be parents soon, whether through birth or adoption.  As the months passed and Clomid didn’t prove to be my Wonder Drug, I intentionally shifted my thoughts and emotions to becoming foster parents in NYC rather than conceiving a child.  I even told Josh that I believed the day I found out I was going to be a mother, it would come through a phone call from a social worker, not a positive pregnancy test.  I acknowledged to myself and others the possibility that I may never get to experience the womanly rite of passage that is pregnancy and child birth.  That possibility made me sad, and I knew I would always carry that sadness deep in my heart.  But the thing is, I’ve had other really disappointing things happen too, and I do carry that sadness in my heart still. But I also know that we live in a fallen world, and this is not the way it was meant to be.  And I can rejoice in anticipating the day when everything in this world will be made right.  I believe that our sadness and disappointment and unfulfilled longings are meant to remind us that this fallen life is a vapor and is quickly passing, and to cause our hearts to cry “Come quickly, Lord Jesus!”

(I think it’s important to note here that I know the privilege of mothering a child through adoption would certainly ease the ache that infertility left in my heart.  But I don’t think it’s as simple as thinking that once you are the mother of an adopted child, you forget all the longings to conceive a child.  Adopted children are not consolation prizes when God doesn’t allow you to conceive.  My heart desires that the Lord will create our family through both pregnancy and adoption.  Being pregnant now hasn’t made me stop thinking about adoption for the future, and I don’t think adopting a child would have made me forget my sorrow over infertility.  Call me spoiled, but I want to be a mother to both, and I don’t think it’s accurate to think that God answering half of my prayer for children would have made me stop praying the other half.  Please know that I’m not in any way saying that the love a mother has for the child she births is any greater than her love for the child she adopts.  End rabbit trail…)

I was quite proud of the emotional progress I had made in a year.  No more sobbing in my pillow.  No more obsessive testing days before it would even be possible to get a positive pregnancy test.  No more vivid dreams about finally seeing two lines appear.  So when the doctor laid out a plan that involved more intense fertility treatments in NYC, it didn’t take long for Josh and I to realize that wasn’t the path the Lord intended for us.  I told Josh that I didn’t want to pursue any more fertility treatments once we were in NY.  In my mind, when we closed the door in Birmingham, we would be closing the door of all things fertility-related as well.  We had a lot waiting for us in New York, and fertility concerns were something I intended to leave in Birmingham.  We had given it six months; we would always know we tried; and, still lacking any medical explanation, we knew it was still technically a possibility that could surprise us at any time.  In the meantime, we were moving in a few weeks and would begin the foster care process ASAP.

We finished our “last” month on Clomid, and I returned for one final visit to the fertility doctor the week after Thanksgiving…