This.
I hope it's ok that I'm referencing someone else's story on here, but this resonated with me in a huge way. I laughed out loud in a few places, and at one point I even felt my stomach drop into my shoes. This dad has expressed every feeling that we felt along the way, and he's done it so eloquently.
I've been incredibly lucky and blessed to see some of my friends, who struggled alongside Phil and I, get pregnant with viable pregnancies at just about the same time that we did with ours. It feels so wonderful and miraculous when you show up to your childbirth class and there is a couple there that you know that has been through the ringer and back--and they are due two weeks before you! One friend who struggled with loss even has the same due date as I do! Being able to see these friends on their journeys to parenthood, after everything they've been through, is the sweetest feeling.
But then there are our other friends... The ones that are still in the midst of that frustrating, depressing, soul crushing cycle that is infertility and pregnancy loss. I have not forgotten how it feels to be you. I have not forgotten to pray for you. And I won't forget to hope for you either. Your "next steps" might be just the thing you need--or, like Dan and Leah, and like us, you might find yourself successful when you least expect it!
Infertility and pregnancy loss are like an exclusive club that no one wants to be in--but once you're in, you're in for life (just like the mafia, I guess, but with fewer guns and more stirrups). It makes you a different person than you once were. It's like a loss of innocence--a new found knowledge that bad things CAN and WILL happen to you. Getting pregnant will not allow you to go back to that person you were before infertility. Carrying a child to term will not allow you to become the person you were before your miscarriage(s). Those experiences shape you forever--for better, and for worse.
We are 31 weeks pregnant now, and more excited than ever to meet our sweet, blessed Trinity Quinn. I think the joy we feel is deeper because of our struggle and loss--or maybe not; maybe we would still feel exactly the same way. What I'm trying to say is-- if you haven't been fortunate enough to get to this point yet, please don't give up hope. There is a reason for righteous suffering, and bearing it with dignity and trusting God through it will give you a strength and perspective that you never would have had otherwise. It's a blessing in a very convincing disguise, if you will.
I hope there are some friends of mine who can read Dan and Leah's story, and read this blog (however infrequently I post!) and take some comfort that there are real people out there on the same old roller coaster as the one you're on.
Dan and Leah's Pregnancy Story
I've been incredibly lucky and blessed to see some of my friends, who struggled alongside Phil and I, get pregnant with viable pregnancies at just about the same time that we did with ours. It feels so wonderful and miraculous when you show up to your childbirth class and there is a couple there that you know that has been through the ringer and back--and they are due two weeks before you! One friend who struggled with loss even has the same due date as I do! Being able to see these friends on their journeys to parenthood, after everything they've been through, is the sweetest feeling.
But then there are our other friends... The ones that are still in the midst of that frustrating, depressing, soul crushing cycle that is infertility and pregnancy loss. I have not forgotten how it feels to be you. I have not forgotten to pray for you. And I won't forget to hope for you either. Your "next steps" might be just the thing you need--or, like Dan and Leah, and like us, you might find yourself successful when you least expect it!
Infertility and pregnancy loss are like an exclusive club that no one wants to be in--but once you're in, you're in for life (just like the mafia, I guess, but with fewer guns and more stirrups). It makes you a different person than you once were. It's like a loss of innocence--a new found knowledge that bad things CAN and WILL happen to you. Getting pregnant will not allow you to go back to that person you were before infertility. Carrying a child to term will not allow you to become the person you were before your miscarriage(s). Those experiences shape you forever--for better, and for worse.
We are 31 weeks pregnant now, and more excited than ever to meet our sweet, blessed Trinity Quinn. I think the joy we feel is deeper because of our struggle and loss--or maybe not; maybe we would still feel exactly the same way. What I'm trying to say is-- if you haven't been fortunate enough to get to this point yet, please don't give up hope. There is a reason for righteous suffering, and bearing it with dignity and trusting God through it will give you a strength and perspective that you never would have had otherwise. It's a blessing in a very convincing disguise, if you will.
I hope there are some friends of mine who can read Dan and Leah's story, and read this blog (however infrequently I post!) and take some comfort that there are real people out there on the same old roller coaster as the one you're on.
Dan and Leah's Pregnancy Story
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