What Matters Most
musings on the mundane and magnificent from a Christian perspective
Two years ago, I stumbled across a medical report in my patient portal, one that I had never seen before. The medical report was titled “Tissue Exam,” and it was from my D & C procedure after I had a miscarriage in 2017.
With the startling realization of what I was about to read, I clicked on it. It hurt to read the heart-breaking contents but doing so delivered a little closure to that painful period in my life.
After I miscarried, I often wondered what became of the tissue that was extracted, whether it was donated to research or discarded, and if so, how. I still don’t know what became of it, and maybe it’s better that way, but now I know this: the size and color of the dead tissue that was once my living, loved baby.
“Received labeled “products of conception” is a vacuum container which is opened and shows small fragments of tan-brown tissue. The recovered tissue fragments measure 5 x 3 x 1.5 cm. The tissue fragments are entirely submitted in three cassettes.”
My one pregnancy, my only chance to be a mom whittled down to tissue fragments. And when the tissue disintegrated, so did my dream of motherhood.
Because I never got pregnant again. We consulted a fertility specialist who said I wasn’t a candidate for IVF using my own eggs. Our options were limited to donor eggs or donor embryos. And while those are certainly viable options for some, for us, it just didn’t feel right. Considering the expense involved and not having a guarantee of success, assisted reproduction was a closed door for us.
Adoption wasn’t an option, either. My husband was fine with us trying to get pregnant. More than fine, actually; he was excited! He wanted me to be a mom, and he wanted us to have a baby of our own. He was crushed when we lost the pregnancy. But he was nearing 50 then and already has a son of his own, so he didn’t think adoption was something we needed to pursue. And that was a decision I understood and accepted. It was a hard choice but the right choice.
And since pregnancy never happened again naturally, motherhood never happened for me. A long-held dream dissolved with my declining egg count.
I’ll never be the mother I always saw myself being. But I can be the stepmother I need to be now, the one I want to be faithfully. I can love the people I do have in my life. And I can care for all those whose life path intersects with mine – children at church, neighbors, the man with the sign on the street corner, friends, and family.
I have a lot of love to give.
And I can do just that. I can live a meaningful life despite the fact that my one pregnancy ended in tissue fragments. That tissue was scraped out of me; I didn’t feel it at the time, of course, because I was under anesthesia.
I‘ve been feeling it ever since, though.
I feel sadness at not being a mom, but I also feel peace. My heart bears the deep, wide wound of infertility – a scar I will carry for the rest of my life, but one that has healed.
And healing is a good feeling. Knowing that the death of dreams can never drown out the life inside me. Knowing that I can be broken-hearted yet remain whole. And knowing that no matter what happens, no matter how hard the hurt is, there is a greater reality. God’s love is bigger than the biggest hurt I face.
And that truth enables me to find healing and to keep going, even when dreams disappear and prayers go unanswered. I hold on to what matters most. I hold on to Him – to life eternal and love unfailing.
“Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed,” says the Lord, who has compassion on you.
Isaiah 54:10 NIV
I originally wrote this in the fall of 2016.
And I wouldn’t change a word.
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Last week, I had a check-up with my ob-gyn. Now that I’ve discussed pregnancy at length with my endocrinologist, it was his turn. Doing my best to keep a lid on my excitement and appear somewhat normal about this emotionally charged subject, I told him my plans to get pregnant.
I was not surprised by his response.
I’ve heard it before, read about it, and chewed on it with each passing year. Still, his words were no easier to digest just by being prepared to hear them. “Your fertility at 39 is not what it was at 29. It’s not what it was at 19, even.”
The excitement I had going into this appointment was dampened by this unfortunate reality. This is a truth I can’t ignore, can’t wish away. I must acknowledge what I’m working with: I’m a 39-year-old cancer survivor trying to get pregnant for the first time. At 39.
It is what it is. Wishing things were different won’t help me now.
The choice before me is this: to let the process of trying for a baby be overshadowed by fear or undergirded by faith. I choose faith. Even if I never get pregnant, I would rather try with hope in my heart and deal with disappointment than go through this process holding my breath, riddled with doubt, constantly waiting for bad news.
Yes, I acknowledge the difficulties ahead; I’m well aware of the statistics. But I choose not to spend emotional and mental energy on “what if.” I choose faith.
And that same faith will be waiting for me at the end of this road ready to carry me if this process doesn’t turn out the way I want it to.
I acknowledge my age, and I also acknowledge the greater truth that God’s purposes will stand. God is greater than a number, than my health, than any circumstance I face. The purposes and plans He has for me are a certainty nothing can hinder.
So, I’m not going to fear infertility. When I get pregnant, I’m not going to fear miscarriage. I’m not going to fear complications. I choose right now that fear will not have any part in this process. Come what may, I choose faith.
It’s never let me down before.
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That was five years ago. And just like I said, faith was waiting for me at the end of the road, a road that did not lead to a baby.
I did get pregnant – once – but the pregnancy didn’t last long enough for fear to have a chance to creep in. I was having a D & C just a few short weeks of getting a positive pregnancy test. And I wasn’t able to get pregnant again.
I’m infertile yet full of faith. I have faith that what needed to happen in my life has happened, that circumstances are what they need to be, even if unexpected. I have faith that if I was supposed to be a mom, I would be and that, for me, being a stepmom is enough.
Faith doesn’t mean you always get what you’re hoping for. It doesn’t mean that every prayer is answered.
What faith means is a calm, confident assurance that you will be okay – regardless of how life plays out. It’s not an abstract theory, it’s not an emotion that can come and go, it’s not a crutch just to help you process life’s difficulties.
Because the whole point of having faith is the object of our faith – God. We have faith in Him because He has proven Himself faithful in our lives and in the pages of Scripture. We trust Him because He is trustworthy. And because He never changes, the basis of our faith will never change. Our faith can grow stronger and stronger with each passing year, with each crisis we face.
A crisis in life doesn’t have to lead to a crisis of faith. When our faith is based on who God has revealed Himself to be – and not on us getting everything we want, having every prayer answered just the way we want it to – then our faith will be unshakable. And it will sustain us in all the times when things don’t go the way we want them to.
I know trying to get pregnant month after month, the indescribable pain of miscarriage, the startling reality of infertility are not easy to overcome. It can be hard to wrap your brain around it – and hard for your heart to move on – when your situation is the exact opposite of what you wanted.
But I’m here to tell you from my own experience that healing is possible. And though it may not be easy, there is a way forward. And it all starts with faith – in a faithful, loving God.
I’m supposed to be at a birthday party today.
Four years ago, I was pregnant for the first and only time, and December 30 was my due date. Today, of all days, I feel my lack so keenly.
I never got to experience what it’s like to feel a baby move inside me. There will never be a little human running around who looks like me. We didn’t even know if the baby was a boy or a girl, but I think she was a girl. Or at least, that’s how I’ve come to think of her. My feelings are all I have to go on. All I have are a few black and white ultrasound pictures and memories.
These are the thoughts swirling in my mind as I sit on the couch with my dog. Since I work from home, he is my constant companion. He sits in my lap when I read my Bible in the morning, he tries to do Pilates with me, he follows me all around the house. He’s my buddy! I’ve even prayed for him a time or two. Yes, I know he’s only a dog, but I said a quick prayer for him when we dropped him off at the kennel for the first time. I couldn’t stand it if he got loose or hit by a car because I just love him so much.
If this is how I feel for a dog, how much more would I feel for my child?
Love’s Long Ripening
I can imagine that love – a love I had for my children before I even got married, a love accumulating inside me over time. It was a love I poured out in prayers, journals, letters to my children. It was a love expressed in preparation; I stretched myself, worked on issues, and grew so I would be the best mom I could be for them.
And that love for my baby didn’t end when the pregnancy ended. Only now I don’t have anywhere to bestow it. It’s just hanging in the balance. A love years in the making not come to fruition.
I think of how great that love could be if it had been able to be fully expressed. If it had a recipient – a living, breathing child of my own. How amazing would it be if the love that had incubated in my heart could have been finally released?
I’ll never know what it’s like to love someone as a mother. And in the four years since the due date that never was, I’ve come to terms with that. I have grieved the loss of motherhood in general, and I’ve also grieved the loss of that individual life. I have mourned, and I have healed.
A few years ago, when the pain of miscarriage was still raw, when motherhood was a dream I was still hoping to attain, and when I was in counseling, my therapist suggested an activity to aid in healing. This was my journal entry from that time:
This is going to be a tough one. Another seemingly innocuous situation that should be easy, but for me is anything but. It comes in different forms – a conversation, a moment in a TV show, a scene in a book – but it always has the same effect. Some reference to motherhood makes me flinch. The ramifications of infertility are endless.
Today, it’s in an English lesson I’m teaching online to a seven-year-old boy in China. I’m supposed to be teaching him to say, “This is my mom.” Slide after slide in the lesson shows a happy mom cuddled next to her child. Mom and daughter hugging. Toddler son kissing his mom. Mom after mom after mom.
There will never be anybody who says of me, “This is my mom.”
I do not resent the chain of events that led to this. It just is what it is. I was single throughout the years of my peak fertility. Once I finally got married, I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer, so we had to put pregnancy on hold. By the time my doctor gave us the green light to try for pregnancy, we were hardly spring chickens. My peers were posting pictures of proms and graduations of their kids – budding young adults – while I was just hoping for a baby. Just one.
We tried everything. I took medication to stimulate ovulation month after month until I hit the maximum dose. Then, we met with a fertility specialist. I read article after article. And I did all this prayerfully; I fasted, and people laid hands on me and prayed for me. We believed, and we hoped. And we waited. And then we tried again the next month. We exhausted all options including adoption, which my husband didn’t feel led to pursue because of our ages and season in life. We tried everything until there was nothing left to try.
My journey to motherhood came to an unexpected end.