Anyway, after years of trying to conceive, a couple diagnoses, massive financial contributions from our community, some medications, lots of prayer, and a few procedures later... I have 2 embryos in the lining of my uterus as I type this! I am carrying life in my body! Life that came from the life of my husband and me! Thank you, Jesus. What a gift. We will know if we are officially pregnant in just a few short days. I am awestruck with gratitude. For like a minute. Then I remember that after all of this I got severe strep throat the day after our transfer. For those of you that don't know much about IVF, being sick after the transfer and during implantation is not a good thing as it could negatively effect the outcome. We had several things planned for this time while I was carrying our babies. We were going to get our pictures taken, finally let ourselves browse through a baby clothes department and maybe even buy something, and visit all our favorite spots in KC. These are things we would want to do pregnant or as a family that we may never get to do if we get bad news later this week. We just wanted to take in this time and make it special. I am too sick to do any of these things though and I've got an illness looming that could decrease the already small odds of this IVF transfer working. I have a choice to make about how I am going to let this affect me. As you've read in previous posts, my go-to move is to ruminate on negativity, or as I often call it, "being realistic." A true pessimist never refers to themselves as a pessimist. This negativity isn't being exaggerated or blown out of proportion, we are convinced this is reality. Every time I hear someone (including myself) refer to themselves as a realist, I know I've spotted a pessimist in disguise, and I'm one of the worst of them! I've got a lot of work to do on this.
After a pep talk from a friend today I am not going to revert back to old ways and ruminate on the negative and all that could go wrong (and is going wrong, and already has gone wrong) here. "I'M DECIDING TO BE RELENTLESSLY OPTOMISITC BECAUSE AS IRRATIONAL AS IT IS, I FEEL LIKE I HAVE SOME AGENCY AND BELIEVING IT IS SO WILL MAKE IT SO. I WILL BE CHEERY AND UPBEAT AND BELIEVE THAT I WILL BE A MOTHER UNTIL I AM A MOTHER OR DECIDE THAT I DON'T WANT TO BE ONE ANYMORE." Thanks, Alicia. Don't feel bad for me or question my intentions here either. I have felt my feelings. I have been "real" and "authentic" and I have mourned and grieved and felt the very deepest pain this process has for me. We are allowed to feel our feelings and I have felt mine. If I want to be a good mother I can start now. When I tell my children, BECAUSE I AM GOING TO BE A PARENT, about the journey that brought us together I want them to be proud of me. I want to set a good example for them. Part of this good example is honoring your experiences and your feelings by grieving, and part of this example is moving forward and clinging to what you know is true based on your identity in Christ.
Here is my relentlessly optimistic reality: I love kids. I am going to be a great mom. I am looking forward to our pregnancy test later this week because I believe I am going to be and already am a mommy. I believe that God has good things waiting for me. He loves me and sees the best in me and is going to cultivate and grow my strengths even more as I journey into parenthood. When it's hard to believe these things for myself, I am going to believe them for my husband. Have you met Mike? Anybody who has spent more than 15 minutes with this guy knows that "Dad" has been written into his DNA. It's who he is. Children are drawn to him and he is drawn to them. If anyone was born to be a parent it is him, and I'm married to him, so that goodness and that promise can spill over onto me, too. I believe this is going to work out for us! I believe this illness/strep throat is yet another attempt from the enemy to try and rob me of the faith and hope I have been working so hard to choose every day. I believe the enemy has no power over me. I can choose hope and I can choose happiness and I can choose optimism because God is good and He loves me. And more about this illness... I have been made more aware than ever of all the goodness in my family and friends who have been willing to do anything and everything for me. We haven't gotten to go frolic about the city with our embryos, but we have gotten to get really real with Jesus when presented with yet another obstacle. Do we REALLY believe in His goodness? Even now? Even when everything is seemingly going wrong? YEP! God is so good!
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