bump #36: another negative

IUI #2 did not work.

Against my better judgement {the last string of sanity that says I sound like an emotional train-wreck and should have grabbed the bowl of Halloween candy instead of the laptop to cope with the devastation} I am publishing this post that is raw and ugly and as negative as every single pregnancy test I have ever taken. Count your fingers and toes and then double it. That's the amount of negativity I'm talking about.  Oh the joys of infertility math!

Suffice it to say that this cycle, this second failed cycle, sent me into a funk that I'm still trying to get out of.

I took all the medicines, went to all the appointments, prayed everyday for a miracle, paid everday for a miracle, and it was all for nothing.

I'm left with nothing.

Well, not nothing... the estrogen patch left a rash on my stomach and turned me into a weepy mess for a solid 2 days. Count your blessings?

I got my hopes up.

I hate fertility treatments because for a split second it seems like the problem is under control, like it's not a losing battle anymore. But it is.

I'm losing it.

Last night in the fifteen minutes I was at Target to pick out my consolation candy bags I passed by 8 pregnant women. The reasonable part of my brain that should have remembered 1 in 8 women experiences some form of infertility and considered that one of them might have had to go through what I'm going through wasn't working. So 8 times I had to fight back tears, take a deep breath, and move on.

I've had to fight back tears, take many deep breaths, and try to move on for a while now.

It's wearing me down.

I usually can see the humor in things, even tougher things, but the only thing remotely humorous about this journey so far is that:
I have pregnacy brain, but without the pregnancy part, meaning I am in a fog most of the time and can't think clearly.
I have gained 12 pounds a lot of weight since beiginning fertility treatments and am still infertile, but am carrying around the extra weight of a hefty baby as a constant reminder of what should be there but isn't.
I experience habitual headaches due to stress about what all these "shot in the dark" treatments and hormones are doing to my body in the long run and, at the same time,
I feel nauseous when trying to calculate how many years it would take to pay off the extensive treatments that are still ahead of me. That nausea, which I can only imagine to be similar to morning sickness, is as close as I am ever going to get to feeling pregnant.

Some consolation prize: If you can't get pregnant, you might as well get crazy, fat, and uncomfortable like a pregnant person. Oh and my moodswings have got to be at least on par with the pregos.
So there's that.

And there's a plan. I know God has a plan for our lives and for some reason it includes all these bumps in this baby-making battle. (Wow, this is bump 36 and not one of those bumps has been a baby. Ouch.) I didn't plan for that.

So what do we do now?

We pray.

We pray that the desires of our hearts would line up with God's will for our lives. I've been praying that same prayer my whole life, and everything always worked out. I mean I always got what I wanted... eventually. But now that simple prayer has taken on a whole new meaning. I might not get what I want, what my heart desires. And I wonder if I ever really meant those words all along. Did I know what I was saying? Can I change my mind and take it back?

No. And if I really thought about it, I wouldn't want to take it back. His plan is greater.

But it still hurts.

Maybe I didn't know that as I prayed that prayer I was actually saying that it's ok with me if God's will is not for me to get pregnant or even to have a baby at all. Maybe instead I was being manipulative and thought that if I just reminded God, ever so lovingly, that I really want to be a mommy more than anything else in the world, that he would alter his will for my life to include that desire.  Maybe this onslaught of negativity on my part is the beginning of me processing that I can't alter his will at all. God is unchanging. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. I praise Him for that. That yesterday, when I was still hopeful and in a way better mood, He loved me the same as He does today when I'm down in the dumps and the worst possible version of myself.  I'm so thankful that His love is the same always.

And today, though incredibly disappointed by our present circumstances, I am still grateful for His gentle reminder that no matter what battles we are facing, the real battle is already won.