Waiting and Tender Mercies

Just a little update and some thoughts on what I'm learning:

Right now we're in a two week waiting period of just waiting to see if the treatments this month worked. I'm pretty sure these two week periods will be my least favorite part of fertility treatments.

I alternate between feeling hopeful that things will have worked and feeling a true lack of hope and thinking this won't have worked because nothing will (at least not anytime soon). Even when I feel hopeful, I worry about getting my hopes up too high just to be let down. Obviously I still have a lot to learn in terms of trusting in the Lord and his timing and giving my fears over to him so I can feel hope.

On top of the emotional challenges of these weeks of waiting, they currently have me on progesterone in case things did work (it's good for the egg or something important like that). And that means side effects because hormones mess with you. I haven't been sleeping well, and I often feel bloated/uncomfortable. These are often some of the earliest signs of pregnancy, but I have to keep reminding myself that it's probably the drugs and not to read into it.

So, suffice it to say, things are still hard. It's hard to imagine having to do this sort of thing for months or even years. And I have even greater respect for those who have been on their own fertility journey for much longer than I've been on mine.

But, even though I still have a lot to learn about trusting in the Lord, I have still seen so many tender mercies from him during this experience. I thought I'd briefly tell you about some of them.

Shortly before my tumor was diagnosed back in fall of 2013, I went to a temple session. We had already been trying to have a baby for a while, and I was discouraged. As I went to the temple that day, I went with a question in my heart: Would I ever get to have children, and if so, how much longer did I have to wait. As we entered the celestial room, I grabbed the scriptures and opened them to a random page. And on that page happened to be D&C 121:7-8.  I love this scripture, and it has long been a favorite. And as I read it that day, I felt a sense of peace. I felt that the Lord was telling me I would have children, but that I needed to trust him and wait on his timing. I even felt like it would happen soon, but of course the Lord's concept of "soon" is very different from mine.

This wasn't a huge moment or revelation, but a small tender mercy that has been followed by many others during this time period of waiting. There have been scriptures shared in Sacrament Meetings that were just what I needed that day. We once had a beautiful Sunday school lesson that focused on "waiting on the Lord" and how we should be aware of and kind to those who are waiting, just as Zachariah and Elisabeth waited.

I have found great comfort from various scriptures. For example, I had never before realized how many women in the scriptures had this same trial; Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, Elisabeth, and Hannah. Each of them was eventually blessed with a child, and that gives me hope. Their stories of faith are a great example to me.

There have also been many conference talks that have given me comfort and peace. There is one in particular from Elder Packer that I love. The talk is really about Elder Packer's testimony of basic gospel truths, but at one point he briefly talked about the blessings and importance of raising children. These are the words I love most from that talk:

"Those who do not marry or those who cannot have children are not excluded from the eternal blessings they seek but which, for now, remain beyond their reach. We do not always know how or when blessings will present themselves, but the promise of eternal increase will not be denied any faithful individual who makes and keeps sacred covenants.

Your secret yearnings and tearful pleadings will touch the heart of both the Father and the Son. You will be given a personal assurance from Them that your life will be full and that no blessing that is essential will be lost to you.

As a servant of the Lord, acting in the office to which I have been ordained, I give those in such circumstances a promise that there will be nothing essential to your salvation and exaltation that shall not in due time rest upon you. Arms now empty will be filled, and hearts now hurting from broken dreams and yearning will be healed."

Aren't his words beautiful? I read them often when I begin to lose hope and feel discouraged.

The final tender mercy I want to mention today is how much love and support I have felt from my friends and family. I am so grateful for your thoughts and prayers. I know they make a difference, even if I simply feel less alone.

I hope that in whatever trials you are facing, you will also find those beautiful tender mercies of the Lord. If there is ever anything I can do to make your burdens lighter as you have done for me, just say the word.

Mother's Day and Starting Treatment

To some extent, I'm not even sure what I want to write in this post, so bear with me if it's sloppy/all over the place. (It is.) I edit too much at work to want to edit my own blog on the weekend :)

So..Mother's Day. I absolutely love my mom and am so grateful for her. And I know so many mothers who deserve to be honored this weekend. But, I'm not exactly looking forward to this weekend, because Mother's Day last year was a really hard day for me.

It was the first year that I really knew something was wrong, that having a baby wasn't going to be very easy for us. The first Mother's day when I really wondered if I would ever get to be a mother. And on top of that, it was in the middle of the treatment for my prolactinoma. I wanted a baby so badly, and I wasn't even allowed to be trying to have one. Church...was almost torturous. Well, I live in "happy valley" where babies and toddlers abound, so many Sundays are almost torturous in their reminder of what I don't have. But, Mother's day was especially bad. Luckily Jacob and I were in the library that day, so I felt sacrament meeting before they did the whole honoring mothers with a gift thing, but I still remember feeling like I was just going to start crying at any moment.

And emotions on Mother's day when you want to be a mother but aren't, they're really confusing. Because part of you really appreciates it when people go out of their way to honor all women, not just mothers. But, part of you feels like that's just rubbing it in your face. At least, that's how it is for me.

And there is really no point in sharing this except to help you all be a little more aware of those who may be aching this weekend. And also to help you all understand if I seem at all grumpy this weekend/ don't share all those wonderful videos, etc about motherhood that bounce around Facebook. I can't watch them without too many of the feels, the unhappy, I-can't-deal-with-them feels. So I don't watch them anymore. Which means my mom isn't going to get very many shout-outs from me since I won't be sharing many mom-based posts. But, I do love you mom!

Anyway... the somewhat interesting thing I have to share today is that I finally started a treatment! We've finished up all our initial tests at the fertility center and they didn't find any specific cause(s) of our infertility. While it's nice to know that there isn't something wrong with us that would be impossible to fix, it's also frustrating, because how do you fix a problem when you don't know what the problem is?

But, we're moving ahead with a treatment cycle (Clomid and an IUI for those of who talk the talk/care for details). While I'm excited to finally be doing something, I'm also fairly nervous.

A lot of those nerves are about what side effects I might be dealing with. Today was my first day on the Clomid, and it's already bothered me with a headache and short bout of nausea. I'm hoping that's all I have to deal with. And obviously if it works, it will be totally worth it.

Some of those nerves are for if it actually works. While I'll mostly be happy/ecstatic/over the moon if that happens, actually becoming parents is kind of a big deal. And a really big change. Obviously that's the outcome I want, but, it still makes me nervous. And, while I'm not really worried about my prolactinoma in all this because mine is tiny, it can also be effected by pregnancy, so I have that little extra worry as well.

The large majority of the nerves though, they're from the worry that it won't work. That I'll get my hopes up just to have them utterly crushed. That is what scares me most. Because the pain that comes after getting your hopes up, it leaves me feeling broken and wondering why I let myself hope and care in the first place.

But I also worry about what we'll do if this doesn't work. Right now, I don't know what that will entail. I do know that we'll be trying this treatment for at least 3 months. After that, we'll either try it for a little while longer, or we'll reevaluate. This is when we start looking at what I think of as "big deal" treatments, like IVF. And the "big deal" treatments; they're not cheap. None of this is super cheap, but our insurance is awesome and is covering most of it 100%. But, when we get to the "big deal" treatments, they won't be fully covered anymore.

So, I'm basically a jumble of feelings and nerves these days. (I can blame that for this post being so messy, right?) A lot of it I can't even put into words, but I feel like I need to try, which is why I'm writing this post. In the beginning of all of this, I felt very lonely, and I have felt very strongly that I should be willing to be more open and vocal about my experience. There is nothing to be ashamed about in infertility. It is a slightly awkward topic because of it's connection to intimacy and because people who don't deal with it aren't that open about whether they're "trying" or not. But, I think it's a topic that needs to become less "taboo" or be less in the shadows.

By its very nature, infertility is a heart-breaking thing that tests you to your limits. It feels like something that will never end. And while you can sometimes forget about it and enjoy other aspects of life, it is always lurking. For the women especially, every period you have is a painful reminder that you can't ignore even if you want to. Perhaps I'm weaker than other women who deal with this, but I will tell you that most days I feel very broken. Some days I wonder how I will even put aside this ache and go through my daily life.

And this is why infertility shouldn't be a secret thing anymore,  because those who deal with it need so much love, support, and understanding. This is why I've started telling you guys my story, because it isn't something I can handle on my own anymore.

I'm sorry that this post has been such a mess. In large part, I just wanted to update you all on where I'm at. And I really do mean to post more inspirational/ uplifting posts about how this is helping me grow. But, I think first, I have to share the parts about the hard things too. If you've read to this point, you're awesome, and I love you!

And, Happy Mother's Day to all you women out there! Because all of you, whether you have children or not, have a divine heritage and calling of Motherhood from our Heavenly Father.

(This is something I'm trying to learn that will hopefully show up in a later post, but if you're childless, like me, and need something to help you through this weekend, the little booklet "Are We Not All Mothers?" by Sheri Dew is a great place to start. It's based on a Conference talk she gave, which you can find here.)