Life After IVF: 15

Every year around the new year, many people set resolutions. They give the new year as a reason to start over, to reset, etc. After 2020, I’m sure most people are thinking this. I have never been into new year’s resolutions but I have always been into the constant betterment of yourself. I know many people are just trying to forget 2020 and move on but I am choosing to remember it. Now, someone reading this can say, “Well yeah, because you are having a baby and that’s a good thing.” Yes, but that didn’t happen until August of 2020. There were many dark, cold, lonely months of 2020 before that. There were many months of setback after setback in our IVF journey. We went from being 3 days away from starting meds to 2 months of everyday wondering if we would ever be able to start up again. No one had the answers. We were forced into the great uncertainty; everything in life was uncertain. But isn’t that kind of how life always is? Even when we think we are in control, or everything is going good, is it really? Are we actually in control? Not really. We give ourselves (and others) this puffed up chest impression that everything in life is in fact how we planned it. And that’s what 2020 did. It broke that impression because in those moments, everyone was given the right to not be okay. Now as we recover, or try to recover, we need to remember those times. For me, it was in those times that I so feverishly clung to my faith. Even though I questioned what was going on around me, as did we all, for some reason I remained in complete peace. It was as if I thought, “Well, I’m obviously not in control and maybe that’s okay.” I was in complete surrender to God. Something I can honestly say I have never done. Psalm 119:71 says, “My suffering was good for me. For it taught me to pay attention to your decrees.” Now that’s not a verse you would see hanging up on a cute plaque in your home. But. It’s true. Even though my IVF journey was incredibly painful, the suffering was good for me. Because it showed me who ultimately is in control. Now, a skeptic reading this could argue that I only feel this way because I got “a happy ending.” But let me tell you. Previous to IVF, I went through over $10,000 of fertility treatments that did not result in a happy ending. In fact, the only thing those treatments gave me was despair and heartache. But I look at those in the same way. In those treatments, I did not cling to my faith. I pressed and pushed my way and did everything in my power to make it happen. “In my power.” Not God’s power. And yes, that suffering was in fact good for me. Because in a harder lesson, it made me realize I wasn’t in control. So see, there are many ways that these stories and situations can go. And we can battle the analytics on them all day. And when I am done going around in circles about the details, only God remains to keep me grounded. And as I look at 2021, I see hope for the future. Not just because I am having a baby which is a positive experience. But, because even if and when those trials and setbacks come my way, through God, I will use them as set forths.

And for now,

Xoxo