I have been absent from my blog for far too long for various and sundry reasons, but I have returned and I want to speak about something that a lot of women may or may not go through, but it has been on my mind. This is just an overview of my own journey of expectancy:
1.Expecting to Expect.
My husband and I waited a long time before we decided that we even wanted to try to get pregnant. We were young when we met and dated for 7 years before we were married. We wanted to enjoy our married life for a long time before committing to the possibility of a child.
I imagine that I am like many women when they decide they are "ready" to try to become pregnant. Although I knew that there was always a chance that it could take some long time to get pregnant...deep down, I expected to be expecting right away. It's crazy how even that very first month somehow you have the expectation that you will miss good old Aunt Flo the next month and everything will begin to fall into place. Well, for some women this is definitely the case. Some women want to have a baby, they try, they succeed immediately and they are on their way through the journey of motherhood.
2. Not Expecting
Every journey is different. You always think you're ready and that your plan is the best one. Wrongo!! God has everything in hand...and for a very good reason whether you can see it at the time or not. I personally began my journey with an amazing mindset. One that I would highly recommend to all women who are thinking of becoming pregnant. First you need to ask yourself something: If you NEVER get pregnant, will you still be perfectly happy with yourself and your husband for the rest of your life? If the answer is yes, you will still be happy then you're in a good spot! If the answer is no and you feel that you MUST have a child to fill an emptiness in your life, then I would encourage you to go to God with your desires and search your heart and your life before trying to get pregnant. Here's why...you may want to become a mother will ALL of your heart. You might have dreamed of being a mother all of your life and have the die hard dream of a certain number of children and so on. And while being a mother is one of the most rewarding jobs in the world, the Lord knows you better than you know yourself. He knows your circumstances, your strengths and your weaknesses and he will provide you with what you can handle, when you can handle it. I personally decided to put all of my trust in God from the get go and I am SO glad that I did. I know that it was a joy and a strength from the Lord and allowed me to see pregnant mother after mother and newborn baby after baby in my photography career without ever feeling jealous or upset or anything other than happiness for them...not once! THAT my friends...is what I call a God thing! He gave me strength and joy while month after month after month after month and so on...we continued not to be pregnant.
3. Expecting to NOT be Expecting.
Then came disappointment and "Debbie Downer Disease". As a woman you can't help (after a while) to start wondering what the problem is, or if you're doing something wrong or worse...if you are the problem. After about 6 or 7 months of nothing, I spiraled downwards. What is something physically wrong with me? My husband? Both of us? Were we just not meant to be parents? Was it something I was doing? Eating? Etc????? I went through this extreme disappointment for about 3 months before I was already emotionally exhausted. What could I do? Well, dear friends...for me personally, I could either keep being disappointed and feel like a drag every day or I could pull up my boot straps and go back to the beginning mindset I had and start fresh (so to speak). I went back. I told myself mentally and out loud, "If I never have kids, I am totally and perfectly fine with my husband and the wonderful life that we have." The bible says, ..."you have not because you ask not." Well, I asked too. I told the Lord my desires out loud...that I wanted a baby, but that I knew that he had a plan beyond what I could see and that whatever his will was...I was good with it. I can't tell you how many times I said this, thought it and prayed it. An amazing this happened...no, I didn't get pregnant, but I was okay again. Genuinely okay. Once I gave it up to God again, I knew that he was in control and I was just along for the ride. Let's fast forward to a long time later (November 2012). We had been "trying" for almost three years. Let me just be honest here. After that long, we pretty much stopped actually "trying" and quite frankly, just assumed we weren't meant to be parents. After having the basics check out just dandy for both my hubs and I...yep, we just figured it wasn't in the cards for us and we were getting on with our lives officially if we weren't somehow pregnant by January 2013.
4. Finally...Expecting!
Seriously? THAT month? Less than two months before we were just gonna get on with our lives officially the Lord had other plans. We weren't trying, all odds happened to be against us (we thought) that month with loads of sickness we had previously, antibiotics and other things. But nope! I could go on and on about the little details of how the Lord had perfectly designed those three years. We couldn't see it then, but in retrospect we saw how even if we had gotten pregnant months before...it would have been a very difficult journey. There were too many things to ignore that fact that God has truly timed our pregnancy perfectly...mapping out every little thing for it to be exactly the way it needed to be. Oh how thankful I am for his timing and not my own!
I want to encourage you dear friends, dear mamas, dear women who desire to be mothers. You know the desires of your heart, but have you voiced them to the Lord? Do you trust him enough to know that he has a plan for your life whether it involves children or not? Whatever journey you are about to begin, are in the middle of or so on...know this...you are a woman. And that means that your body is designed to do amazing things. Sometimes our bodies have road blocks. There can be tissue blockages and other physical reasons. If this is the case then I HIGHLY encourage you to seek the advice of an acupuncturist, an herbalist and a mid-wife before you decide to have medical treatments. I personally hold NO judgement on how a mother decides to make her way through her journey, but I would at least encourage you to see what non-invasive things might be done to help you before you do anything else. Also, if you are in the Lynchburg,Va area you're lucky because there is an amazing organization called The Motherhood Collective that is the mecca of educating and nurturing every level of woman. You can also go to www.themotherhoodcollective.org to find out more!!
So dear friends, I leave you with this...be strong and search deeply.
xoxo,
Sara
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