Hope deferred makes the heart sick...

The following is a part of a series of posts that will take you on a (very personal) journey with me through the story of our family. If you are just now tuning in, take a minute to start back at the beginning and catch up. Click here and here to read the first two posts. 

I had always dreamed of having a big family with my kids close together in age. I envisioned siblings that doubled as playmates and best friends. And from the calendar of events kept neatly in my mind, I could foretell the ideal arrival times of our various children. For some reason, I just assumed God and I were on the same page with this. 

By the time Caedmon was 6 months old, I was ready to add to our family again. Andy was on-board with the idea of having our kids really close in age, so we threw caution to the wind and began hoping for Baby #2.

Month after month began to go by. At first I didn’t think much of it. I told myself, “I’m still breastfeeding. That might be affecting things.” Or, “Andy traveled some this month so that could explain it.” But there came a point when I knew something was wrong. There was every opportunity for us to get pregnant, and we just weren’t. 

My unwavering confidence in God’s sovereignty floated back and forth between comforting and distressing. I never doubted that God is over all things and that He is the One who gives life. So it seemed to me that if He had decided not to give us another child, He must have a reason. I took it on as my duty to figure out what that reason was so we could remedy it and get on to my calendar of events…a calendar which was already running dreadfully behind schedule. 

Everywhere I went the world seemed over-populated with pregnant women: the mall, the playground, church. It felt like I got word on a weekly basis that a different friend was expecting. I watched my sister suffer through horrible morning sickness, twice. I helped throw baby showers for several close friends. I knew people who weren’t even married at the time get married and have multiple children all while I was still hoping for our next child. In my heart I celebrated with them. The sadness that I felt over my own situation didn’t rob me of the joy that I felt for them, but it did complicate my questions.

About 2 years in to our struggle with infertility, one of my best friends found out, much to her surprise, she was expecting their 3^rd child. She didn’t even know how to tell me. Her husband told Andy, who shared the news with me over a lunch at Noah’s Bagel…I remember it so vividly. I received the news with joy but found myself shaking with sobs later that day. The first half of her pregnancy was spent trying to get her mind around the fact that she was about to be a mother to 3 children ages 4 and under. Of course, by the time her precious son arrived (and even before that) she was elated to welcome him into their family. But it was, for us, a strange juxtaposition of trials. God was teaching both of us about His Sovereignty over life and death. We were both learning to accept His timetable for our families. 

For me, the struggle with infertility was a lonely road. It’s not that I didn’t have people in my life who loved me and would have wanted to help me carry that burden. It’s just that I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to be a drag to be around. I feel like talking about infertility is some kind of social faux pas and that no one can relate unless they’d walked that road. Telling someone else that I was struggling with infertility felt, at best, like admitting a failure and, at worst, like confessing an awful sin. It was somewhere in between telling people that I didn’t get the job I was interviewing for due to my sub-standard performance and confessing to my mentor that I struggle with porn. Nobody really knows what to say when you launch that one at them. So you just don’t. At least not often. 

The struggle seemed too intimate for casual conversation and too painful to bring up with a girlfriend over lunch. I dreaded the thought of being the phone call that no one wanted to make, so I rarely talked about it with my family who lived cross-country. It was easier to keep things light, to focus on the countless things that were going well in our lives, and to try to pretend like the pain wasn’t there. 

But the pain was there, sometimes like a dull headache, sometimes coming in waves so strong that I didn’t have time to catch my footing before another one pushed me under. The reality that I understood far too well was there was really nothing these people who loved me so much could do to take the pain away. 

I remember one phone conversation with my sister where she braved bringing up the topic. I was at the playground with Caedmon and just had to sit down on the side of the sand box to try to maintain some level of composure while in public. I remember there being long stretches of silence as we both just cried, neither one of us knowing what to say but knowing she felt my pain as intimately as only a sister can. 

There were nights that I found myself slipping into Caedmon’s room just to watch him sleep. I would lie down next to him, so close that I could feel his breath on my skin. And as I squeezed that little body against my own I would think of all the love I had in my heart, not only for him, but also for another child. I longed for Caedmon to have a sibling. Our family, somehow, felt like we were missing people. Like we were not yet complete. And after I had no more tears to cry, I would go crawl back into my own bed and fall asleep emotionally exhausted. 

When life hands you a hurt that you don’t know how to make sense of, your mind begins to grasp for meaning, clinging to anything that can alleviate the ever-haunting “Why?” in your heart. Some of my thoughts went like this:

Perhaps God wants me to enjoy intimacy with my husband without just seeing it as an opportunity to get pregnant. If I could learn this lesson, then surely He would bless me with a child. 

Perhaps there is something that He doesn’t like about the way we are raising our son, Caedmon. If I could just be a better mom, then surely He would bless me with another child. 

Perhaps He wants me to learn some lesson regarding longing for Him or being satisfied with Him. Perhaps He is taking me through this so I’ll be able to comfort others in the same situation. Maybe if I could just learn these lessons, just be a little more perfect, then surely He would bless me with another child. 

Whether conscious or unconscious, verbalized or repressed, that’s where my thoughts lingered.

Andy and I traveled to a pastors’ conference in Texas that February. As much as I tried not to get my hopes up each month, I always found myself praying this would be the month. My mind began anticipating when the child’s birthday would be, how old Caedmon would be, and whether the baby would be a boy or a girl. I was so hoping I would find out at the conference that I was pregnant. Instead, I found out the opposite and told Andy through teary eyes, “No baby this month.” 

I ached inwardly as we sat through the various sessions. One night a mom with two children, probably about 10 and 12 years old, sat in front of us. While the worship band played I closed my eyes and let the words of the songs bathe my wounded soul. At one point I opened my eyes to see both of those children with their hands raised worshipping Jesus. The sight was so beautiful that it made me catch my breath. With tears streaming down my face I prayed, “God if you would give me another child I promise I would raise him to worship You.” 

In that moment the tenderness of a loving Father came and wrapped His arms around me. I felt with such clarity in my spirit the Father say to me, “Stacie, I’m not holding out on you because I think you’re a bad mom or a bad wife or because I’m trying to make some kind of point. You don’t have to “earn” a child from Me.” 

I didn’t walk away from that moment with any answers to my “Why” questions. But I did have a new-found peace that this journey I was on was one of grace. My Father saw every tear I cried and knew the pain that wrecked my heart. He was there with me each night that I soaked my pillow with tears and each time I leaned over the bathroom sink weeping. He was loving me, ministering to me, strengthening me, and rubbing soothing balm on my open wounds.

Caedmon turned 6 this past September and God has still not chosen to bless us with another biological child. But He has blessed us in countless other ways...

...to be continued.

Love Awakened

The following is a part of a series of posts that will take you on a (very personal) journey with me through the story of our family. If you are just now tuning in, take a minute to start back at the beginning and catch up. Click here to read the first post. 

The day Caedmon was born may very well have been the happiest day of my life. 

Andy & I had spent months preparing for this birth. We attended a series of childbirth classes and read several books because I had made up my mind that I wanted to do natural childbirth and we needed to be prepared. At my 38 week appointment, however, my midwife informed me that Caedmon had unfortunately flipped transverse (sideways) and unless he rotated again we’d be guaranteed a C-section. Thus ensued 2 weeks of strange exercises, laying in weird positions, lots of chiropractor appointments, and prayer. Oh, how we prayed. 

We were thrilled when we discovered that he had snuggled back into the correct position and anxiously awaited labor to begin. 

On Thursday morning I was lying on the couch when I felt my first contraction. The thought that immediately popped in my head was, “I don’t want to bring my baby home to a dirty bathroom!” So I jumped (not really) off that couch and spent the next 2 hours on my hands and knees scrubbing our bathroom. It still cracks me up to think that I did that (and that I would likely do it again!).

By that afternoon I was horribly uncomfortable as I waddled through the grocery store getting snacks for our Life Group that night. Andy & I had a dinner appointment with a couple of students from our church who we hardly knew. I forced a smile and tried to be cordial, but I was not in a very social mood. We hosted a Life Group at our house that evening and by the time everyone left around 9:30 I was nearly in tears. I still had not made the connection that I was going into labor and just thought I was going to be this uncomfortable for the next week or two until the baby was born. 

After a hot shower and back rub, I laid down in hopes of sleep. That’s when it finally dawned on us that labor was starting. 

Once I realized that this misery was labor and not just pregnancy woes, my whole countenance changed. It was game time. I was ready for this. I sent Andy to the couch to get a few hours of sleep while I tried to relax in our bed with a movie. Around 2 AM I woke him up and handed him my pre-made list of instructions and last minute items that needed to be packed. 

We gave birth at a wonderful birthing center in Grand Prairie, TX. I really could not have scripted a better environment with its dim lighting, quiet worship music playing, and just Andy, my midwife, and one friend in the room. I labored all through the early morning hours with intense back labor. Andy went through an entire container of lotion as he massaged my back for nearly 8 hours straight! His words of encouragement as well as his steady strength and presence so endeared my heart to him. The birth process was the most bonding experience we’d ever been through. We were in this together. 

As I watched the sun rise through the window, I knew that a new life would soon be breaking forth as this new day dawned. It all seemed so perfect to me.

After an hour and a half of pushing (it took a while to get all 9 lbs 8.5 ounces out!) my midwife placed that precious, red, wrinkled, screaming baby on my chest and I have never felt more relieved or overwhelmed with joy. Andy and I laid in the bed with Caedmon in our arms for the next hour or two...marveling at his beauty and the miracle that we had just experienced. We called our parents on the East Coast and vacillated between tears of joy and uncontainable laughter as we celebrated this new life together. 

After Caedmon and I took a bath and a nap, we were ready to head home (just about 4 hours after he was born!). When my mom walked through the front door of our house that evening, she was shocked to see Caedmon and me comfortably perched on the couch in my living room. The first words out of her mouth were, “Did you really just have a baby this morning?!”

There were days that first week of Caedmon’s life that I don’t think we put him down all day long. He went from one pair of arms to another as we were all so mesmerized by him. Is there anything more pure and precious and wonderful than a newborn baby?

In the weeks and months that followed, Caedmon and I spent countless hours in my blue cushy recliner that squeaked when I rocked. I would stare at his face and try to memorize his every expression. The way he lifted his eyebrows when he would stretch. The way he would startle at a loud sound. All of the funny things he would do with his mouth. The way he would whimper and pout while sleeping as if having a bad dream. 

I knew that when the baby phase was a distant memory, I didn’t want to have the regret of knowing I had wished it away while I was in the moment. So I chose to sit and stare at a little face that was changing so fast it was almost visible from day to day. 

When Caedmon was placed in my arms for the very first time on that September morning, I was thrust into the world of Motherhood and a love that I had never experienced came alive in my heart. It was a love that started big and continued to grow through enormous right up to the point that I was pretty confident my heart would burst. While laying together in that bed, a lifelong love affair began. 

A Journey

I want to invite you on a journey with me for the next week or so.

The story I want to share with you is the story of our family... a journey of pregnancy, birth, infertility, adoption, and miscarriage. It's a story of indescribably joy and pain so deep that it takes your breath away. It's a story of longings fulfilled, hope deferred, love awakened, and faith tested. It's a story that may leave more questions than answers and expose more raw emotions than most would like to admit experiencing. But this is the stuff that life is made of.

So over the next week, I will share a piece of our story with you in progressive order. If you miss a day, go back to catch up before reading on as each post will build on the previous ones. It may get messy because it is a story that I am still living. I don't have all the pieces neatly put together yet. But, if you'd be willing to give me a little grace, I'd be willing to journey with you down this road of what God has been teaching me. 

'Tis The Season

Well, it's official. Starbucks has declared that Christmas season is upon us, so here we go again!

Looking to do something meaningful this holiday season? I know I always am! The culture we live in has definitely high-jacked the true meaning of Christmas so I am constantly on the prowl for ways to remind my kids (AND myself!) what Christmas is all about.

Here are two great opportunities that your family may want to consider incorporating into your Christmas traditions this year:

Compassion International is an amazing ministry that Andy & I wholeheartedly support and believe in. Their mission is to "release children from poverty in Jesus name."

They have put together a Christmas gift catalog that allows us to donate various amounts of money toward a wide range of different projects. Some of the opportunities include:

• safe water for life for a child and family- $79
• equip a family with livestock- $280
• care for a babies medical needs for a year- $55
• provide garden seeds for an African family- $10
• give a child access to a safe playground- $35

There are a ton of different gifts available and you can even donate in honor of someone. That would be a really special present for one of your loved ones to open on Christmas morning...knowing that they were apart of helping a child in poverty! 

Click here to learn more and to give!

This one always sneaks up on me because the deadline is so early. Collection week for the boxes is November 12-19, so if you'd like to participate you gotta get a move on it! :-)

Operation Christmas Child is a wonderful program that provides a shoebox full of Christmas gifts to boys and girls living in poverty in 100 different countries. Samaritan's Purse is a Christian relief organization that shares the love of Jesus in tangible ways to people around the world in desperate need.

This is a really fun project where you can get your kids involved. I like to do a box for each of my children so, for example, Caedmon will help me pack a box for a 5-9 year old boy and Sammy will help me pack a box for a 2-4 year old boy. Then, we can follow our box online through the Samaritan's Purse website to see where our boxes end up!

Don't have time to go shopping, fill a box, and drop it off? No problem. They've also provided the option to build-a-box online!

Click here to learn more about Operation Christmas Child. Click here to find a drop-off location near you. 

'Tis the season...

...to LOVE like Jesus!

Happy Thursday!

I hope you and yours had as much fun as we did!