Finding Hope During Infertility

My favorite blogger, Jon Acuff, wrote about hope yesterday. I don’t know if he ever went through infertility—most guys don’t seem to volunteer that information—but he definitely understands how it can feel to long for hope. To think you’ve grasped it, and then feel it slipping away. He writes:

“Hope is one of the first things that disappears when you get lost. Your ability to see beyond your current circumstances is chased south by the shadows. Your ability to dream and plan and hold visions close to your chest fades until hope feels foreign and far away.”

He’s right, and it can happen in an instant. One minute, you think this could be the month when everything changes, when all the meds and shots and office visits and heartache become worth it. Your hopes are high… the counts look good… and then… no heartbeat on the ultrasound.

No baby.

As the shadows deepen and the realization chases hope away, a part of you knows you’ve got to reboot and psych up to do it all again. Muster some more hope, even if you’re not feeling it. Because otherwise, how are you going to keep doing this? And what other choice do you have?

As the tears start to fall, you wonder, will it ever happen for us? Jon writes:

“There’s a temptation to believe you’re doing something wrong if you don’t feel hopeful 24/7.”

That’s a trap a lot of us fall into, thinking "it's all about me and what I did (or didn't do)." We start doubting the hope that seemed so prescient just before we got the news. We begin thinking that this moment’s lack of hope not only mirrors a past full of failures, but also foreshadows a future of many more. And then, we sink into the darkness of despair.

We want to escape this awful place — this terrible feeling — and something urges us: grieve the past, push through the present, and seize control of the future. It’s the only way to get what you want. Believe in yourself, and don’t give up. That’s the only way. It’s what’s working for everyone else.

Don’t fall for the lie.

God says, receive my grace for all that is past. Trust the plans I have for your future. And meet me here in the present. I will give you peace in the midst of uncertainty. Trust me with all your heart; don’t trust yourself to make sense of this. Believe that I have a plan and a purpose, and I will show you the way out of darkness into hope and a future [Prov 3:5-5, John 14:27, Jer 29:11].

Despite our hunger for hope and our desperate need for help, we’re tempted to turn our backs. To say, No thanks, God. I want a baby, and you didn’t say anything about a baby. I want control, and I think I can have a baby if I find the right doctor, and take the right medicines, and eat the right foods, and get the right exercise, and do the right things, in the right order, at the right time, on the right month…. And, I hope that’s true.

I... I... I....

What if it's not true? What if you're not in control of this story? Then, what happens to your hope? The shadows lengthen at the thought.

But, what if you're not meant to be in control? And what if that's a gift? What if you haven't failed? What if it's just not time yet? What if God intends to transform your experience before your baby comes? What if there is so much that you don't understand?

"I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you.... [Eph 1:18]. There is a hope that transcends the moment of bad news, the blood counts and test results of this day, and the despair that's guaranteed to be part of this journey. It's hope with staying power.

It took me awhile to find it, and longer to trust it. But it changed everything.

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Find more cause for hope at PregnantWithHope.com

Can We Talk About Infertility?

If misery loves company, why do we insist on isolating ourselves when we need support the most? One woman with the courage to go public with a private loss wrote this in a Newsweek editorial:

“The doctor said the test had indicated an unviable pregnancy. I started talking to other pregnant women (who seemed to be all around me) and learned what no one tells you until devastation has set in: up to 25% of pregnancies end in miscarriage.

People keep too mum about private tragedies such as this. True, miscarriages are not catastrophic, especially in terms of sheer commonality, but it can tear away a piece of you that you didn’t know was there. We need to talk to each other, rather than suffer surrounded by silent sisters.”

She’s right. We need to talk to each other. Suffering in silence only compounds the sense of isolation we already feel in the midst of infertility.

So, why don’t we talk? Why don’t we tell each other, “I lost a pregnancy” or “I lost a child”? The tidal wave of grief is already washing over us. The only way to get a lifeline is to call for help.

What’s stopping us?

Pride is what silenced me. I hated to admit I was failing at something so many other women seemed to accomplish effortlessly. Seemed being the key word. If the Newsweek writer is to be believed, there were miscarriages going on all around me. But no one talked about it. Those silent sisters kept their secrets and I foolishly believed that I was alone in my misery. That I was the only one struggling to catch up with everyone else’s instant gratification.

Now, consider this: “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble” [James 4:6].

Ouch.

My pride was rooted in a desire for self-reliance and control. I was raised to consider self-reliance a virtue…an admirable quality often seen in leaders… the mark of a “can do” go-getter. And control as the holy grail. But God doesn’t see it that way. He sees arrogant self-centeredness that refuses to make room for Him. Or worse, an entitlement attitude that puts me on the throne and Him at my beck and call (in the form of “I want/I need” prayer).

“God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

Thank goodness I finally set my pride aside and began to share my struggle. Grace came from all around me, in the form of stories shared by women who’d also kept their struggles secret. All of us had bought into the lie that we alone were failing to conceive. We alone kept miscarrying. Meanwhile, “we” were everywhere.

Don’t make my mistake. Share your story. There’s a silent sister out there suffering, and she needs to hear it.

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Find more cause for hope at PregnantWithHope.com

Infertility and Surrender

What does it mean when prayers for a pregnancy don’t get answered? When a baby doesn’t make it to term, even though you pray for its health and beg God for its life? When an adoption doesn’t go through, even though every step in the process has seemed like answered prayer?

There is no public dialogue on questions like these. Maybe they’re too difficult, or too emotionally-charged. Maybe they force people to think about things they’d rather not consider, or confront truths they’d rather avoid. Whatever the reason, the absence of answers leaves us alone with our thoughts. And those can be devastating.

“Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” What are we supposed to make of these words of Jesus’? They used to submerge me in despair. I was praying. I was believing. And instead of a baby, I had miscarriage after miscarriage – leaving me with the question: What am I doing wrong? Why don’t my prayers get answered?

Are you wondering the same thing?

Here’s what I’ve come to understand:

At first, my will wasn’t aligned with God’s. My will was: give me a baby now. It was, to be perfectly honest, an infantile kind of willfulness that was too obsessed with gimme! to consider God’s purpose or His timing. I wasn’t praying with a servant’s heart; surrender was nowhere on my radar screen. My prayer was more often, “why not?!” – and sometimes, I didn’t even wait for an answer.

My prayers were more about entitlement than obedience. Without realizing it, I presumed that I knew best. That a child now was better than a child later; that this pregnancy would trump a future one; that the sooner I got a “yes,” the happier I’d be. It was all about my plan (now!), not God’s plan. It was about satisfying my intense desire (entitlement), not about serving God’s purposes (obedience).

My impetuous neediness wasn’t all that mattered to God. Despite my sense that I couldn’t hang on much longer without getting the baby I wanted, God knew I could. He resisted my pleas with patient wisdom, despite the fact that my suffering broke His heart. Over time, my broken spirit became a malleable one, and God made me more of the steward He wanted me to be for the soul He’d always planned to entrust to me.

Then, I learned to pray for God’s best. Instead of trying to wrestle with God over whose will should prevail, I finally began to demonstrate my trust by letting go of my desire to control. I chose to trust that God intended to make me a parent – in His way, in His timing. With that choice to surrender, came a wave of peace. And with peace, came a pregnancy… that went to term… and brought into the world the baby intended for me.

“Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” For a long time, I didn’t believe that I had received anything. Where was some evidence? All I could see was that I hadn’t received what I wanted. But, when I learned to pray for God’s best – His best timing, His best plan, His best reasons, His best outcome – and trust that I had received a “yes” in response to that request, everything changed.

Surrender was the secret to victory.

Imagine that.

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Find more cause for hope at PregnantWithHope.com