The journey

I read this quote the other day. . .

“The pain of infertility is not just about not getting pregnant when you hoped to. It’s mourning the choices that were taken away. Of dreams that were supposed to unravel naturally. Being robbed of time that you thought you had. Moments stolen that you thought you’d experience. You don’t just do fertility treatments and cure all that. You grieve the fact that you even have to, then you grieve the unjustness of having to, without a choice. On a schedule you have no control over. All of a sudden, your own body is turned over to someone else. Your dreams put into another’s hands. Some days this pain manifests itself as sadness, sometimes as anger, but mostly as courage + strength.”

When I was younger, I knew I wanted to be a mom. I wanted at least 3 children before I turned 30. After I met my husband that dream shifted slightly, but it was still pretty consistent. . . We would live in a nice but modest house in the woods. I’d have a flexible job that let me work from home and spend all the time with my kids and husband. We’d hunt and fish and camp and explore on the weekends, and take long trips together in the summer.

. . . Sounds like a great dream right?

I’m one month away from 31. I live in a very old, run down home in town. Not a lot of flexibility in the job, but I do work from home. Weekends are spent at home for the most part, but we do get to enjoy the occasional camping trip and fishing outing. Marty and I have 1 perfect child that we spent many years (and our life savings) to create, and while it’s not perfect – it’s us.
This is us. This is our life.
We have had to mourn the loss of choices that most couples get to make regarding how and when they build their “perfect” family. We had to leave the timing of our conception up to science and medical professionals. There were no surprises, no big reveals, no fun announcements. We experienced a lot of loss in our 7 years of trying to build this life we have. 4 could-be pregnancy losses that we never got to enjoy or celebrate, 1 embryo that was implanted but never grew, most importantly we lost sight of a lot of the little dreams while we fought to make our family dream come true.

We are now reaching the final destination of this 7 year journey. I am one week away from starting to prepare my body for our last chance at another adding another perfect human to our family. I’m terrified. I’m excited. I’m nervous. I’m sad.
I’m sad that this is it. I’m terrified that this won’t work. I’m excited that it might work. I have so many emotions, so many thoughts. I’m truly a walking, talking hot mess mom. This entire process has just been tough. I blame myself often. I carry a lot of guilt about this process. I wish so often that things had gone differently when we started this process all those years ago.
I try to push those thoughts out though because I know that if any little thing was different we wouldn’t have what we do have now.
Fin is the most perfect child you guys, and I know that all moms say that, but I’m serious. He’s so kind, and so smart, and so fun. I truly couldn’t imagine my life without him, and I wouldn’t want to.
So while the internal struggle surrounding IVF and this process as a whole is great, when I really step back and look at my life I’m very grateful for what these struggles have given me.
I fully embrace the courage and the strength it has taken us to get to where we are. I know that no matter what happens these next couple of months, we are beyond blessed to have what we have, and will tackle the outcome of this final adventure with the same courage and strength that has gotten us here.

So send us all the good vibes as we enter this last leg of this difficult journey.
I’ll continue to update this blog for anyone who is interested in following along.

xoxo

A