One of those days

It’s Monday. It’s cloudy outside, which makes me feel lethargic and sad. And I’ve got a bad case of the baby blues…sometimes it just hits you, you know? Those days when it seems like every woman on the entire planet is pregnant or a mother, except for you?

 

This weekend we attended a wedding, which was beautiful. I sang in the choir and had a birds-eye view of the ceremony from the choir loft. The bride had the most gorgeous lacey train. So beautiful.

 

I love weddings, especially when I know both the bride and groom and know they’re prepared (as prepared as you can be!), in love, and the beauty of the sacrament is just there. But man, all the mention of children…I got teary-eyed several times. “Will you accept children lovingly from the Lord…?” I remember saying that at our wedding just filled with so much hope and excitement and anticipation for the children that God would give us. And here we are, still childless 2+ years later. Coming to the end of my 3rd Creighton chart (after a year of sympto-thermal charting). It stings a little bit.

 

Okay, a lot. I have a hard time watching our wedding video now, seeing the nervous exhilaration on our faces, knowing the dreams that were – are – so precious in my heart, for our love to be concretized in a new little person. I can’t watch the footage from our rehearsal dinner where our friends are teasing us about honeymoon babies (so pleasant at the time – now I can’t bear it – most of those friends are on to their second child by now).

 

And in so many of the prayers at the wedding: “Lord, please bless your servants with children…May they see their children’s children…” and so on. So beautiful. Because marriage is ordered toward children! It just is. Our bodies are ordered toward physical fruitfulness – and it really, really hurts when they don’t reach that destination. It hurts because it’s such a great good.

 

And of course now with weddings, it’s hard not to think, “One more person who got married after us and could get pregnant / have a baby before us…” I tried so hard to keep focusing on the bride and groom, praying for them, and yes, praying for them to be blessed with children and be spared the heartache of infertility. How could I wish that on anyone? And yet I know I’ll feel hurt and sad if I hear “news” from the happy couple soon…

 

So many mixed emotions.

 

So today, it just stings. Childlessness stings. My heart feels tender and vulnerable. I’m not up for pregnancy announcements or birth announcements. I deleted an email from a friend about her new baby nephew, without opening the picture…just can’t take it. (I did say congratulations to her, btw.) Because children are so good, and adorable, and everything wonderful, and sometimes it just stings.

 

+EcceFiat+