Two
words have repeatedly cropped up in my mind over the past several months. They started as brief whispers – faint
apparitions of warning that faded into the background nearly as quickly as they
had appeared. With each passing week,
they’ve grown louder, more insistent, more firm, and more tenacious. Each morning temperature read, each
appointment scheduled, each ovulation and pregnancy test taken, each pill
swallowed, each castor oil pack applied, each hovering decision remaining
unmade, each inflammatory food rejected, each medication injected, and each
treatment attempted has accumulated into a massive boulder sitting on my chest
with the two words etched into its side.
The weight of it has grown so heavy – it’s growth so gradual that it
went largely unnoticed (at least by me) until recently – that it has been
suffocating me.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Striving. Weary.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I
can’t count the number of times Tenth Avenue North’s songs “By Your Side” and
“Worn” have started playing in my head lately:
* * *
“Why
are you striving these days?
Why
are you trying to earn grace?
Why
are you crying?
Let
me life up your face; just don’t turn away”
* * *
“I’m
tired, I’m worn
My
heart is heavy
From the work it takes
To
keep on breathing”
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Mentally
and emotionally, I have been caught in the cycle of going two steps forward and
three steps back. Another song lyric
caught my attention during one of my work commutes the other day. Confession time: I like listening to country
music when I drive. Most other genres
either add to my tension and anxiety (driving stresses me out) or lull me into
a dazed sleepiness (also not good while driving). Anyway, the lyric was this:
“In a race you can’t win, just slow it down.”
While Thomas Rhett’s “Be a Light” has nothing to do with infertility,
this lyric stuck with me for a couple reasons.
First, “slow it down” appeals to the part of me that is weary down to my
bones of trying to keep track and keep up with all that I’ve been trying to do
in the infertility arena in addition to juggling all of life’s regular demands,
additional struggles, and worldwide stressors.
Second, some days it sure feels like infertility is a race that I can’t
win.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
However,
I’ve been examining how I view the end of this race; is it one that I’ve really
won once I finally have a baby of my own in my arms? Or does it go deeper than that? And is
pushing so hard to get there faster wasting away the life and joy inside of me
so much that there won’t be anything left by the time I’ve “arrived?” A few hours before writing this, I listened
to a podcast episode of Joy + Infertility with Cathie Quillet, M.A., LMFT (I
highly recommend it for anyone who has experienced infertility or pregnancy
loss as part of their story). Among many
other things, Cathie explained how brain scans have shown that “the crisis of
an infertility diagnosis has the same weight as a cancer diagnosis.” Infertility is a trauma. As such, it has to be dealt with head-on now
(not avoided), or it will inevitably lead to problems down the road, regardless
of whether or not parenthood is achieved.
One example she gave was that research has shown that women who have
gone through infertility are at higher risk for postpartum depression and
anxiety. Infertility can also break a
marriage. The trauma of infertility
cannot be fixed by a pregnancy or a baby.
She expanded on this idea with a challenge that really struck a chord
with me: “If you’re still not pregnant in six months, how can we [still] live
really well? Because that is a lot of
pressure to put on a pregnancy to make you happy if you’ve been living with a
brain that looks like PTSD for how long.
That is an unreliable source of joy and happiness for you.”
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I
went in for a fertility (abdominal) massage this week with the masseuse that
was recommended by a friend. I have been
to her a few times before, and she is phenomenal both in her work and in her
demeanor and encouragement. She prays
over me and with me and is one of the most compassionate people I know. I explained to her that I’ve had pain return
and gradually worsen over the past several months and that my doctor has recommended
another surgery because she suspects that my endometriosis is back. She let me know that fertility massage is
contraindicated in cases of endometriosis, so instead I just got a regular
massage. Afterward, we visited about how
I’m doing emotionally, and she said she really feels like we need to take a
break – that Jon and I need to get away together and rediscover the joy of life
again. Ironically, we were planning on
taking a long overdue vacation this fall, but it will need to be postponed because
of surgery.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
A
friend from my freshman year of Bible college unexpectedly reached out to me
saying that God had been impressing me on her heart that day, and she asked how
I was doing. She reached out on the very
day when both my period started and my parents had to put down the miniature
schnauzer that we got when I was sixteen.
My luteal phase had been longer than normal, and I had been experiencing
several pregnancy symptoms. I knew they
were most likely happening because my doctor had switched me to HCG shots (HCG
is the hormone that causes pregnancy symptoms and that causes an at-home
pregnancy test to turn positive), but I had still gotten my hopes up more than
normal. Baxter was effectively my
emotional support dog through all my tumultuous dating years and my entrance
into adulthood. He continued to be a
comfort to me whenever I visited my parents through all the early marriage
struggles, the multiple occurrences of uprooting and moving in the midst of
unpleasant circumstances, and the five and half years so far of trying to
conceive. I felt so beat up that day,
and my friend’s message was a tangible reminder that even after all this time,
God still hasn’t forgotten me.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
You
see, though all these voices (and more) from unexpected sources have spoken to
my heart in different and meaningful ways to reflect my own heart back to me
and to help me see how this striving and weariness are taking their toll, I
know there is ultimately one Voice behind it all. With the words “striving” and “weary” appearing
in my mind on a nearly constant loop, I finally grabbed my phone, opened up the
Bible app, and typed “weary” into the search bar. Of course, the first verse that popped up was
Matthew 11:28: “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give
you rest.” While I love that verse, I
knew I needed to keep looking. After
reading a few more verses on the list, Isaiah 40:29-30 drew me in: “He gives
strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might He increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired, and
vigorous young men stumble badly….” I
had to open the whole chapter to read more.
Then, I had to go back and start from the beginning of the chapter. Before I knew it, I was reaching for
commentaries, opening up the exegetical and passage guides in my Logos Bible
Software program, and grabbing a notepad to jot down an outline of the main
ideas from the chapter. I am still
wrestling through the passage and deciding if and how to break up the content,
but keep an eye out for future posts if you want to journey with me as I dig
deeper into how to find comfort and strength as I wait on the Lord.
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