Life After Miscarriage: Maybe We Shall

Essentially, I passed go. 

I don't know how the conversation began or why we were discussing fertility at all during a recent doctor's appointment, but when she finished my half-way point evaluation she'd said she wouldn't be concerned at all if I were to get pregnant tomorrow. 

Through a mustered smile, I thought to myself -- maybe she wouldn't, but I couldn't say the same. 

Her green light was unexpected. So unexpected that it left me more flabbergasted than joyful, like I would have expected. 

I'd long been dreaming of the day, the appointment when my crazyhella smart doctor would say that my body wasn't so broken that she would worry about what a pregnancy would do to me, that she wouldn't have cause to believe we'd say goodbye to another baby before we ever got to hold that new life in our arms. 

After John and I left her office, the astonishment of her words, the shock of my reaction didn't wear off. And as days have progressed into weeks, I've become a river of emotion winding wildly down stream through every twist and turn imaginable. 

There's no question of if I want to welcome a new baby into our family; I do. Honestly, we both do. 

But I'm the complicated one who was cleared to pass go but can't seem to collect her $200 and be on her merry way. 

Because now I know that positive pregnancy tests don't always mean baby in arms at the end of a nine-month journey. 

Now I know that we have to welcome all the risks that come along with the chance of welcoming another baby into our lives because another baby, whether living here on Earth or there in Heaven, will indefinitely take up more real estate of the heart and mind. 

I find myself praying, asking God if we should try again to grow our family. If we should journey into three, and I enter into theological discussions about having more kids and the whole "be fruitful and multiply" command and whether or not two miscarriages were clear indicators to let go of the dream of a bigger family. 

Over time, after discussions, in searching my heart, I know, though, that I'm not really asking theological questions anymore. I'm not really asking if having another baby is black-and-white right or wrong for our family. 

I'm asking if this time we will actually have and hold another one. 

I'm asking if a new baby will be in our arms, not just our hearts. 

I'm asking if we take the risk, will there be rich reward. 

Or will we be face to face in another seemingly dead end.

****

We're wandering a corn maze with our boys, our good friends and their boys on a bright, warm October afternoon; we're discussing such matters of the heart and such matters of theology as we keep running right into dead ends of thick corn stalks -- so many times that I joke they might have to come in with a search team and flashlights to find us. 

And that's when it stares me right in the face, bright and golden like the towering cornfields beneath soft autumn light. 

There's not really any such thing as a dead end if you can turn around. It's more a side-road detour. 

And

we didn't enter the maze just to effortlessly walk through. We went in knowing it could be a trial. We could get lost. We could be wandering aimlessly until the sun set over the fields. 

But, too, we went in trusting that we would be rescued if rescue was needed. No theological discussions about whether we should turn at this corner or that or if it's right for us to walk a path before us that we're unsure of where it leads. No desperate prayers for an answer before we even come to the fork in the road. 

We find our way through after a few long roads that led to nowhere, after lots of discussion and giggles, tears and tiredness, triumph and trial, conversation and sun soaked onto faces. 

I grab John's hand and catch his eye, our boys running off into the clear open space of prairie outside of the maze. 

And I think to myself, maybe we shall.


Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, Lord, have never forsaken those who seek you." 
Psalm 9:10

Bigger Picture Moments: I Wonder

I wonder to myself -- especially mornings when we sleep in long and restful tucked together in the same king sized bed long after daddy leaves for work -- if this is it.

If we're full.

If we're happy to accept that these two little bodies who sneak in beneath our covers during the early morning and snuggle themselves next to our own are the only fruit that will come of our vine.

In the moment, I say yes.

I can say yes -- there in the bed -- because I'm absolutely bursting with gratitude that these little toes and little legs, little minds and little souls are fabulous gifts that just keep growing and we just get to keep unwrapping.

In that moment there's fullness in my heart and in my bed and in my arms.

Fullness.

I love being mom to two.

I love the the way our family operates. The way I sleep solid now without children waking me most nights. The way John and I are able to send the boys on overnight with their grandparents while we spend time together. The way I have one hand for each as we walk through parks and parking lots, one parent for each on family dates.

I love two. On days like this, I rest in the fullness, the functionality of two and call it complete.

***

We rehome a kitchen island from another family after years of talking about how our kitchen needs more storage, more counter top, more seating in order to make cooking and communing and conversing at the same time enjoyable.

We set it up perfectly, and we marvel about how it makes the kitchen not just functional and full but also complete.

Our boys are perched on the stools, leaning elbows on the countertop as I slice and dice zucchini and John unloads plates from the dishwasher for dinner.

In the midst of the chatter and food preparations, I smile and catch a glimpse of two little sets of feet dangling next to the legs of the stools.



My heart instantly, unexpectedly groans for a third pair to swing from the third stool.

With two little boys, my heart says we are functional and full. So very functional. So very, very deeply full.

But that third stool -- it somehow screams the definition of complete to a heart that hears.


Each Thursday we come together to share the harvest of intentional living through sharing a piece of life gleaned: a picture, words, creation or list; just come to the table with the beauty in the simple moments of the week. Link up your gleaned moment this week at Melissa's!

Link your moment at Melissa's this week!

Bigger Picture Moment: On Being Ready

I fully expected the test to display one line.

Negative.

No Baby.

Just a late period.

Fully expected.

But I had to confirm, what with not having taken a vow of abstinence while simultaneously taking herbal supplements that could be dangerous during pregnancy, when the days easily slipped past 30, 31, 32.

I'm not ready, I've shared with my husband at least a dozen times per month since we last sent a baby from the the womb and into heaven.

I'm not ready, I've declared and ensured we'd taken precautions so as to not find ourselves as surprised and with-child.

I'm not ready, I cried out to God as I looked at the end results of a positive pregnancy test.

I stared at the double lines before calling John into the bathroom to examine the test for himself.

He confirmed the reading, and we stared at each other incredulously.

No hugging.

No tears of joy.

No wide grins.

We just sat there staring at each other like two high school kids, air thick with shock and disbelief.

Quick to read my face, John gathered his mind and quickly shuffled the boys outside, left me and my positive pregnancy test in the bathroom alone to wrestle with each other ...

alone to wrestle with God.

I fully expected for my chest to tighten and my heart to thump wildly beneath my breastbone in a state of panic, my breathing to morph from deep breathes to short whisps of air sucked in through a straw, my mind to race in panic.

But I stood there

test in hand

Word in heart:

"Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, Lord, have never forsaken those who seek you."
Psalm 9:10

Nothing takes the Designer by surprise, and with plans to retest with first morning urine, I fell soundly into hard, deep, fast sleep later that evening knowing that if He wanted this baby to be here, even if I weren't ready, I would be ready when he or she arrived.

****

Again, in the morning two blue lines displayed across the test, this time smudged and faded and running from a line into a u-shape, alerting my mind to the possibility of faulty tests.

I cursed the invention of the early-detection pregnancy test as I fed the boys breakfast, preparing to make our way through the Target aisles for another box of tests. 

Irritated, I thought to God

What are you trying to do to me?


Haven't we had enough of the ping-pong emotions?


Could something just be or not be?


You know I've ached to stretch and swell again ...


my arms have longing to be heavy with drunken-nursing child dozing against my skin. 


You know, I whispered in my mind.

And then ... the question turned

on my own heart,

but did I know?


Am I really ready?

Had I really realized the depth of that ache, the lingering longing as I prayed and wondered what He'd have for our family


if we should grow in number or remain four.


Am I?


Ready?

****

The early summer fields spread out before us, I watched two birds flutter and twist in the sky side by side while driving home from the store.

Gracefully, in confidence, they swooped and fluttered and dove and lifted higher and higher, like mirrors of each other.

My heart beat in time with their early-morning dance, knowing too well the fell swoops of low and the ecstasy of high-bright sky horizons.

****

Three more tests, all negative.

Relief and calm whitewash my mind,

only to be tinged with the color of disappointment.

My mind races to the birds and their early morning dance.

No turns have taken you by surprise, Oh Lord.

Not one.

You've been following along with each turn of my heart's wing.

You've been listening to my cries for guidance.

Am I ready?

I find answered prayers in the aftermath of two faulty pregnancy tests coupled with three negative ones.

And I know He's answered.

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Bigger Picture Moment: Confirmation

A swift current of yearning flows like electricity through my body at the thought of welcoming another tiny person into our family.

I've struggled with this deep-seeded desire, questioning if I'll forever ache to smell the sweetness of a newborn freshly birthed, if I'll always want to bring a babe against my skin, welcoming another round of nursin, if I'll ever pine for the view of tiny hands resting against John's chest.

Will that ache persist regardless of how many little ones we have?

And, samely, I've contemplated, questioned if this is the time we should venture into adoption, welcome a child from another mother's womb into our home, blend ourselves into the perfect brew of family beyond bloodlines.

Do I have to bear another child to fully satisfy this feeling of feeling like we've yet to meet another child?

I've been wrestling.

Then the whole three-negative-pregnancy-tests-amid-surges-of-nausea-and-days-and-days-sans-period thing happened, and I thought with an almost-certainty that my body was again home to another little life ... only for a period to emerge so late in the game, I could nearly keep the look of shock off my face upon its arrival.

That same week, we suffered a hard loss at church, and those feelings of grief overshadowed the sadness and dissappointment and almost betrayl I felt, so much so that I never dealt with this emotions that were so deeply seeded embedded into my heart.

Until -- during an unplanned, impromtu Skype converation -- a friend asked about it all, going to places sometimes we don't go -- into the depths of the heart, the soul.

At first, I was taken aback; I'd already dismissed the non-pregnancy ordeal as not being in God's time. But she took me to a place I never bothered to tread when she asked:

"Do you think maybe that was God's way of whispering to your heart that maybe you really honestly desire to be pregnant again? Maybe this is clarification about adopting versus bearing another child naturally?"

As her words soaked into ears that could hear, I realized a confirmation embed itself into my heart: there's a deeply rooted desire to swell again with the fullness of another baby, to grow another baby, to birth and nurse another baby -- one I cannot explain, as it mightily overpower all of doubts.

Sometimes I hear God speak to my heart in small whispers -- through the soft beauty of a flower that weathers a brutal storm and still is standing tall the next day.

Sometimes I hear His voice through the burning bushes of life - the unexplained sheer forces of power and the amazing events that unfold surrounding them.

And sometimes I hear Him speak through those who love Him and seek to find the Bigger Picture in the everydayness of life.

In the flicker of conversation between friends, often in my life I've found phenomenal truth and insight shared either in passing or embedded in the depth of heavy conversation that I might otherwise have missed altogether had someone not been brave enough to venture into the depths ... had I been too busy to have the conversation.

{So I realize there are, like, several bigger picture moments in this one post ... but sometimes revelation comes in bursts.}



Join us at Sarah's to share the harvest of your intentional living this past week!

Bigger Picture Moment: Clarity

As two giggling boys wrestle under spring sun in the grass just a few feet away from my own feet, I swallow the hardest question I've asked myself in quite some time.

Could I love another him?

And that question -- it sits unsettled in my stomach like I've eaten rocks for breakfast, and my body is trying its hardest to digest, make some sense of what's been swallowed.

Heavy with discomfort, acceptance comes as I whisper aloud what's been circling in my mind, sitting in the pit of my gut, weighing me down:

Would I, instead of soaking up a moment like the very one I'm watching unfold, be disappointed if three years from now a third boy was rumbling around in the grass with his brothers?

Would I welcome watching my stomach stretch and swell if I knew for sure I'd be housing another baby boy?

Would I, complete with joy and thanksgiving, welcome the sounds of a tiny baby boy seeking a mid-night nursing session in the same way I would that of a baby girl?

Because my fingers long to sweep through the thick, long dark hair of a daughter.

And my eyes can almost see two big brothers learning to be the very men God created them to be through engaging daily with a sister.

Because my heart so very much wants to tether its strings to that of my very own little girl's.

And my ears can almost hear my husband's gentle but strong voice whispering in her ear that she's a prize for which to be fought.

So with thoughts of a daughter, a sister for my boys, so deeply embedded in my mind, so rooted in the garden of my wildly tangled heart, I cannot neglect to really swallow such a hard, solid question and examine the why behind the third-baby dreams before we make them reality.

But there's no clarity in that moment.

Though I want desperately to say that I'd be just as happy to discover another baby boy blooming inside my own body and that health was the most important thing, I can't.

It stings my heart that I could be so ... I don't even know.

But it stings, nonetheless.
****

There are weeks of wondering, wrestling myself, crying out to God to search my heart and know it, to give me peace about moving into the journey of adding another little life into our family if my heart wouldn't suddenly drop at the news of a third little boy.

I want to know, like I knew with both of my other boys before I ever knew they were boys, that my heart won't sink, even a tiny millimeter, should a daughter not be part of our family picture through what will likely be our last pregnancy.

I know I need to make peace, and I don't know where to begin.

****
Another wrestling session is unfolding before my eyes, this time of the living room floor with John as the referee.

Pretend swords and battle axes become part of the play, and before I know it, my oldest is talking about making my youngest, who is playing the unjust king, walk the plank among facing other punishments.

I love, love, love my boys with all of my heart, but when they start talking about pooping on faces as part of the consequences the testosterone in our confined corridors elevates beyond my preferred-exposure level.

I bid them goodbye and for two seconds they turn their lips toward my own offering the sweetest kisses and showering my with a bit of affection before I fly out the front door seeking silence and a bit of time to clear my head.

I walk through chilly air with warm sunshine bathing my face and ponder the ways of these boys of mine.

I recall their poop talk, their delight in conversing about the grossest of gross things.

Their wildness streaked with small moments of gentle grace.

Their warrior hearts laced with desire for justice and righteousness.

Their quests for battlegrounds that are worthy of their time and efforts, a fight worth fighting, never settling on chasing windmills.

Their efforts to comfort the unjustly wounded, rescue the princess and capture the bad guy.

All things I don't totally understand, but all things, when unfolded and laid out on the table, I love and respect and need.

All things that have drawn me to John, beckoned me to fall into his strong arms and trust his leading.

I ponder it all in my heart.

And I know almost instantly that I've given a chance to help make a mark on these boys for a reason: because I know a strong and loving and firm and compassionate and just King.

And I can introduce my little warriors to a King worthy of their service.

This mothering gig is not simply for my enjoyment; it's for gifting the world with men who serve in their leadership, for preparing them to serve the Prince of Peace and even for helping develop them into men who will love and respect and protect daughters of mothers I may not yet even know ...

Finally, they are digested fully, those rocks.

And I can honestly say that should we decide to add to our family my heart won't dip even a bit upon welcoming a third baby boy someday because it will be too busy soaring with hope for the man I pray he would become.



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