Making a Wish...
5 years ago, at this very moment, I was in Italy at the start of an incredible trip to Italy and France. We spent ten days in Italy touring Rome, the Amalfi Coast, Florence, and Venice and then did a three day trip to Paris and Euro-Disney.
If you looked at the outside of Josh and I at that time, you'd think we were at the peak of our existence, having the absolute best time in our life. We were getting established and comfortable in our careers and had both recently completed our masters. I was thin and in shape and tan with a great new short haircut. We'd been traveling and jet setting having gone to Cancun, Las Vegas, California, New York, Boston, Toronto, Disney World, Disneyland over the last couple of years. You would think the world was our oyster and you'd be right...sort of.
Also at that time I'd lost my brother to a drug overdose, lost two pregnancies to miscarriage, were in the height and depth of our fertility treatments with injections and appointments, and blood work and ultrasounds a few times a week, driving back and forth to Grand Rapids or Ann Arbor, having to take sick time or make appointments at 7:00am to try to have any hope at being to work on time, and in the midst of receiving bad news after bad news after bad news.
Right before we went to Europe I endured a second surgery to help clear out my second miscarriage my body would not discard on its own (That sounds so impersonal, scientific and yuck, but that was exactly what was happening). I was at my saddest of saddest, most hopeless of hopeless. Josh and I conceiving a baby and having a pregnancy go to term seemed like a wish I didn't know needed to be a wish in the first place and it was fading away from me, from us.
We took a wonderful break from all that in Europe where there was no medicine to inject, no worrying about schedules and appointments, and no one telling us we'd have to wait yet another month to start this all over again. It was just Josh and me, and the most beautiful places I've ever seen.
It was so hard to take breaks like these at home when there were reminders everywhere of our lack of progress and our lack of children- infertility and adoption books I was reading strewn about our bedroom, a Styrofoam box stuffed with ice packs containing the next potion of medicine I was mixing on our front door, other people's babies all over social media, a pregnant acquaintance complaining to me about how fat she was or how much she wanted a glass of wine. We could not escape our infertile life at home- so we traveled and it was everything.
While in Rome, we met up with two friends, Ashley and Luis, who just happened to be there at the same time as us. Thanks to them and their awesome excitement and bravery, we truly immersed ourselves with the Romans going off of the tourist areas. We caught a festival, fireworks, incredible restaurants. Ashley and Luis enhanced our trip for sure! Before venturing and exploring, we met them at a gelato place right near the Trevi Fountain. We did what everyone does there- made a wish and tossed in some money! Ashley caught this picture:
I am a superstitious Italian (yes, that's totally a thing) and so refused to tell Josh or anyone else my wish. If you tell someone a wish, it might not come true! I let Josh know that someday, if it ever did come true, I would let him know.
I wished for a pregnancy to produce a healthy baby for us.
It had gotten to the point where I couldn't wish just to get pregnant- I had done that two times already! I had to get a little more specific with my wish ;)
About three months later, I was sitting in an ultrasound room, not only having my pregnancy confirmed for a third time (I had already had blood work, and a crap load of positive pregnancy tests), but also being told that we were having twins. Twins that, less than a year from this picture, I would carry to term, twins that I can kiss and hug and hold in my arms.
I can't remember the exact day I shared with Josh what I had wished for that day. A smile, not surprisingly, crept up on his face and he shared that he had, indeed, made basically the same wish as me that day. Maybe that's why we got two babies- we kinda think it is.
This picture hangs in our house, with lots of others, from that Europe trip. I still get teary often when I look at it- remembering exactly what place I was in that moment in my life... exactly how that felt. Remembering the tiny small flicker of hope that was still left as I wished with all my might that day with hundreds of other hopeful tourists. And knowing how things have ended up for us and how overwhelmed I still am with gratitude...
That trip, that break, and the hope for that wish coming true gave me the little push I needed to keep going- to be able to come home from that trip and keep reading all the books, make all the appointments, inject myself with all kinds of potions, and keep my heart and my story open and vulnerable no matter what bad news or good news might have been coming our way.
If you're struggling right now in this insane infertility thing or with something else that hasn't come your way.... yet...
I hope you keep wishing and keep taking breaks, in whatever way you can and want, to take care of yourself so you have the will and the energy to keep wishing and hoping all over again.
I'm reminded, daily, of the plaque I have hanging in our entryway- a quote from Cinderella's Fairy Godmother to Cinderella- "Even miracles take a little time."
<3
If you looked at the outside of Josh and I at that time, you'd think we were at the peak of our existence, having the absolute best time in our life. We were getting established and comfortable in our careers and had both recently completed our masters. I was thin and in shape and tan with a great new short haircut. We'd been traveling and jet setting having gone to Cancun, Las Vegas, California, New York, Boston, Toronto, Disney World, Disneyland over the last couple of years. You would think the world was our oyster and you'd be right...sort of.
Also at that time I'd lost my brother to a drug overdose, lost two pregnancies to miscarriage, were in the height and depth of our fertility treatments with injections and appointments, and blood work and ultrasounds a few times a week, driving back and forth to Grand Rapids or Ann Arbor, having to take sick time or make appointments at 7:00am to try to have any hope at being to work on time, and in the midst of receiving bad news after bad news after bad news.
Right before we went to Europe I endured a second surgery to help clear out my second miscarriage my body would not discard on its own (That sounds so impersonal, scientific and yuck, but that was exactly what was happening). I was at my saddest of saddest, most hopeless of hopeless. Josh and I conceiving a baby and having a pregnancy go to term seemed like a wish I didn't know needed to be a wish in the first place and it was fading away from me, from us.
We took a wonderful break from all that in Europe where there was no medicine to inject, no worrying about schedules and appointments, and no one telling us we'd have to wait yet another month to start this all over again. It was just Josh and me, and the most beautiful places I've ever seen.
It was so hard to take breaks like these at home when there were reminders everywhere of our lack of progress and our lack of children- infertility and adoption books I was reading strewn about our bedroom, a Styrofoam box stuffed with ice packs containing the next potion of medicine I was mixing on our front door, other people's babies all over social media, a pregnant acquaintance complaining to me about how fat she was or how much she wanted a glass of wine. We could not escape our infertile life at home- so we traveled and it was everything.
While in Rome, we met up with two friends, Ashley and Luis, who just happened to be there at the same time as us. Thanks to them and their awesome excitement and bravery, we truly immersed ourselves with the Romans going off of the tourist areas. We caught a festival, fireworks, incredible restaurants. Ashley and Luis enhanced our trip for sure! Before venturing and exploring, we met them at a gelato place right near the Trevi Fountain. We did what everyone does there- made a wish and tossed in some money! Ashley caught this picture:
I am a superstitious Italian (yes, that's totally a thing) and so refused to tell Josh or anyone else my wish. If you tell someone a wish, it might not come true! I let Josh know that someday, if it ever did come true, I would let him know.
I wished for a pregnancy to produce a healthy baby for us.
It had gotten to the point where I couldn't wish just to get pregnant- I had done that two times already! I had to get a little more specific with my wish ;)
About three months later, I was sitting in an ultrasound room, not only having my pregnancy confirmed for a third time (I had already had blood work, and a crap load of positive pregnancy tests), but also being told that we were having twins. Twins that, less than a year from this picture, I would carry to term, twins that I can kiss and hug and hold in my arms.
I can't remember the exact day I shared with Josh what I had wished for that day. A smile, not surprisingly, crept up on his face and he shared that he had, indeed, made basically the same wish as me that day. Maybe that's why we got two babies- we kinda think it is.
This picture hangs in our house, with lots of others, from that Europe trip. I still get teary often when I look at it- remembering exactly what place I was in that moment in my life... exactly how that felt. Remembering the tiny small flicker of hope that was still left as I wished with all my might that day with hundreds of other hopeful tourists. And knowing how things have ended up for us and how overwhelmed I still am with gratitude...
That trip, that break, and the hope for that wish coming true gave me the little push I needed to keep going- to be able to come home from that trip and keep reading all the books, make all the appointments, inject myself with all kinds of potions, and keep my heart and my story open and vulnerable no matter what bad news or good news might have been coming our way.
If you're struggling right now in this insane infertility thing or with something else that hasn't come your way.... yet...
I hope you keep wishing and keep taking breaks, in whatever way you can and want, to take care of yourself so you have the will and the energy to keep wishing and hoping all over again.
I'm reminded, daily, of the plaque I have hanging in our entryway- a quote from Cinderella's Fairy Godmother to Cinderella- "Even miracles take a little time."
<3
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