First Comes Love ❤️ , Then Comes Marriage 💍, Then Comes.... Infertility? 🥴

So there is no sugar coating what today’s blog is about. It’s right there, smack dab in the title! Conversations about infertility aren’t the kind of thing you can really ease into or dance around. And as hesitant as I am to open up about it, I believe there are so many other women and couples struggling in this area that I shouldn’t shy away from talking about it just because it’s uncomfortable. And I am not uncomfortable out of embarrassment or shame. You can ask anyone who knows me personally. They will tell you that I have been pretty open about our struggle because I believe there is power in sharing my testimony. God told me years ago to share my story because when I was in my darkest moments, it was the testimony of others that kept me going. Knowing that I wasn’t the only one and that there is a light at the end of the tunnel gave me hope when I felt like giving up. A few years ago I shared my Testimony Video and it was one of the most freeing things I’ve ever done. It was the release that I needed and the response I received was confirmation that it was exactly what God wanted me to do. So many people told me they were grateful that I shared because it gave them hope and encouragement that God would see them through the storms they were facing too.

But THIS is different. When I shared my testimony video I was already standing on the side of the tunnel with light. I was already out of the storm. So I was talking about things in a past tense. But sharing our struggle with infertility is uncomfortable because it is current. We are right in the thick of it. There is no surprise baby announcement in the works to share in the next couple weeks. I do not know exactly what our next step is. And with unexpected life events like deployments cancelations and world wide pandemics, every single plan we thought we had has been thrown out of a window. We are in this for real!

Now before I get in to really sharing the purpose of this specific blog post, I wanted to start this off by explaining something that even we did not completely understand a year ago. What infertility is and what it is not. When a couple is struggling with infertility it does not necessarily mean that they will never naturally conceive or that they can not carry their own children. Infertility by definition simply means a couple has not gotten pregnant after one year of frequent and consistent unprotected sex. So if it takes a couple a year and a half to get pregnant and they are having frequent sex with no birth control, then that couple struggled with infertility. Infertility can be but isn’t always fixed with some sort of intervention and there also isn’t always an explanation for why a couple isn’t conceiving naturally, sometimes even after both people go through numerous tests. Infertility is a very broad term used to encompass so many different obstacles a couple could be facing.

So here’s a little backstory about me and my husbands journey to make things make a little more sense:

My husband and I have been married for 2.5 years (3 years in October). When we first got married we decided we wanted to have a year to ourselves to just enjoy being newlyweds and get our finances in order to prepare for a family. Our entire relationship leading up to marriage was long distance, so we wanted to spend some time just enjoying each other. Honestly I wanted to wait more than he did but we compromised and decided we would start trying on our first anniversary. Well our first anniversary came and went and there was no baby or pregnancy in sight. Now we are quickly approaching our 3rd anniversary and we still haven’t conceived.

But this was not my first encounter with the struggles with fertility. As many of you know this is my 2nd marriage (the only one that really counts if you ask me 😂). But I did conceive a child with my first husband about 6 years ago. It was in the midst of a chaotic, dysfunctional marriage that was on the brinks of divorce. The pregnancy was over before I even made it to my first ultrasound. Miscarriage is traumatic in any situation, but adding a divorce to the mix it was a recipe for a deep depression (I talk about all of this in my testimony video). But I say all of that to say that my struggle with fertility dates further back than my current marriage.

But my desire to be a mom dates back even further than that. I have wanted to be a mom since the day my mom brought my sister home from the hospital when I was 2 years old. I know that sounds crazy but it’s true. 😂 Clearly I do not remember when I was 2, but my mom always tells the story about bringing my sister, Candace, home from the hospital. When they brought her home, my parents also brought home a doll for me, so I would have a ‘baby’ too. But I guess after a couple days I realized that my doll didn’t do everything that the real baby did so I lost interested and decided I wanted to play with the real baby instead. 😂 I am also the oldest child and grandchild (on my moms side) so I have been playing with and helping care for kids since I was one. As a kid I never knew what I wanted to BE when I grew up outside of being a wife and a mom. I have since figured what I was going to BE career wise, but the desire for a family has not changed. If anything, since getting married to the right man and having a marriage where God truly is in the center, that desire has only intensified.

So maybe you are wondering why am I sharing this now. Or you’re thinking that since I am sharing this I must have arrived to this magical place of contentment and I am sharing this as we happily wait on God’s timing. Let me tell you that, though I am working on finding that magical world of contentment, I am NOT there yet! There are some days I am perfectly content and full of faith. But then there are other days where I am frustrated, angry and over it!

Ex: Last week we celebrated the most amazing humans on earth, Mothers. And you would think I would have just stayed off of social media to spare myself from dealing with unnecessary added emotions, but of coarse I didn’t. 👸🏾👸🏼👸🏻 Now on a normal day my timeline is filled with nothing but cute babies, baby bumps, and baby announcements. But Mothers Day is like that times 100. I told myself that I would stay off of social media that day but then I got on to just post a tribute to my own mother and fell down the rabbit hole of scrolling the day away. It was basically a form of self-torture that I couldn’t seem to log out of. Mothers Day was definitely one of the most emotional weekends we have had since starting this journey. In the midst of trying to celebrate our mothers, grandmothers and the million other mothers in our lives, there were many tears, out of frustration, anger and exhaustion. Trying to be there for other people, while also being sad for us is heavy.

When I shared my testimony 4 years ago, I got to show people the rainbow after the storm. But this story is different because it’s still being written. I do realize that it is a lot prettier to share a story from a finish line perspective. It’s a lot easier to say if you trust God, this is what he can do and show the evidence. So why would I share this with you guys now, when I don’t even know where the finish line is. That is a question I have been wrestling with for weeks as I wrote, deleted, and re-wrote this blog a hundred times. I don’t know if God will give us the baby we are praying for next month or next year or the year after that. But I do know that God is revealing himself, his faithfulness, and his glory throughout this journey. So I do not want to wait until the end to talk about it. God is teaching me that there is so much to learn and to praise him for on the way to the finish line.

And don’t get me wrong I would have preferred sharing this as a faith filled success story. But I realized something in the last couple weeks. My husband and I have been watching ‘The Last Dance’. It’s a documentary about Michael Jordan, The Bulls and their final season as a team. It’s showing all the behind the scenes clips and interviews about how they got to 6 championships. Clearly fertility and basketball couldn’t be more different but the documentary reminded me of something important. Sometimes sharing the process (the struggles, the successes, the failures, etc) can not only be inspirational, but when you do get the win it will be even more beautiful.

There are two reasons I am sharing this blog. The first reason is because most people know someone struggling in this area but most ppl don’t realize how many ppl are actually struggling. The stats say 1 in 8 couples struggle with infertility. And for most, it is a silent struggle. Understandably so, considering how intimate this topic truly is. But speaking from experience, the silence makes you feel alone. And isolation is a tool of the enemy (sidebar that is one of my favorite phrases because it is so true in so many situations). He wants us to feel like we are the only ones going through something, when that’s just not true. Community is so important. And I hope to one day create a safe space of support and resources to help comfort and inform couples, that will encourage couples how to advocate for themselves and make the best decisions they can for their families.

My 2nd reason for sharing is because this is a release for me. This is me letting go of the silent weight that I’ve been carrying and I’m hoping that my transparency will help free someone else to. Sharing this is part of my surrender and acceptance that everything is not up to me and I can not control the timing, route or outcome of some things in my life. I am letting go of how I envisioned this chapter of my life story being written and I am embracing the story that God has for me instead. The good news is that God that is a far greater author then I will ever be! 

I know God is going to bless us with babies. Beautiful, healthy, intelligent, curious, adventurous, funny, chocolate, curly haired babies (ok I may have added a few from my wish list lol). God’s already promised us that. And this route he is taking my husband and I on to get there is not just for us. It’s for every person who is believing God for their own babies or maybe even a figurative ‘baby’ (something else you are waiting on God to conceive and birth in you). This journey is about really giving it all to God and trusting that what he will give back will be far better than we were even hoping for!