A few weeks ago I asked if anyone would be willing to discuss a topic that isn’t easy and share the story of their fertility journey. (You can read my story HERE.) I’m grateful to the women who chose to respond.
In this series women with different experiences will share the pain and blessings that the gift of fertility carries with it, in the hope of bringing out God’s grace and promise to those couples struggling to welcome this gift when it is not known how it will turn out in a sinful world.
This is Elizabeth’s story.
My family of origin was my father, my mother, and a younger sister. My mother had a hard time with keeping her babies. She lost 9, for various reasons, and growing up we were aware of that. I think this helped to paint children as a gift, not “a given.” I grew up assuming it would also be difficult for me to bear children as well. Difficult, but still possible. I know that by the time my sister was born, my mother was considered “advanced maternal age” and that she’d already lost one ovary due to an ectopic pregnancy. Several of her losses were at the end of the pregnancy (one horrific car accident, several were stillborn, etc.) and she’d undergone many c-sections. The advice of the doctor’s was that her life and health were at risk if she continued to try for more children, so they stopped.
I think we’re constantly being taught something about marriage and children simply from observation. I don’t remember any particular conversations, but I was so proud of the fact that my parents remained married when my friends’ parents were getting divorced. (They just celebrated 35 years of marriage!) Although I don’t recall my parents talking with me about marriage and children directly, they did raise me in a Lutheran home. In our home we read and talked about Scripture often, were encouraged to be in the Word daily, to pray and ask for prayer, to grow in faith. Most of what I learned about marriage and children was from asking other Christians (usually professors at the Concordia I attended or pastors I knew and trusted) as I matured and was becoming closer to actually being married. I read a lot too (both Scripture and Lutheran authors and lots of blogs from confessional Lutherans). Before being married, I would ask and have discussion with my parents about what I was reading and learning.
Before marriage we never put a number out there of how many children we’d have. We enjoyed talking about future children’s names. We knew we wanted children, but how that would happen and how many we’d be given were a complete mystery to us.
When my husband and I became engaged, I was told by a doctor that I had some hormonal issues and to be prepared to not be able to conceive and/or carry a child to term. I was afraid that made me “less” of a woman. I became angry with God for a long time. Ultimately, my future-husband and I were already attending adoption information seminars before we even wed.
My parents encouraged us to wait to have children. Given their difficulties and clear desire for children, I thought that advice was odd. We were married right before my husband’s vicarage and the up-in-the-air nature of our housing and insurance made my mother nervous about our ability to provide for ourselves, much less a newborn.
We did use the Pill the first year we were married. This wasn’t in an effort to avoid having children, but rather to help my body heal from the cysts on my ovaries SO THAT we could have children. Looking back, it sounds very convoluted (this was the medical advise I was given and I followed my doctor’s orders. I wish we hadn’t.)
At that time, I talked a lot with a bioethics professor about this “go on the Pill to heal your body” business. After much discussion, he told me that between my motive (which was to enable my body to have children or at least a chance) and the likelihood of my being able to conceive without this step being very low (I think this was addressing the abortifacient nature of the Pill. If I can’t conceive without doing this step first, then it can’t act as an abortifacient), that it was an ok thing to do. I don’t know his entire thought process and I think he saw how much I hoped for children, so maybe that swayed him to say that to me. But we went with that in mind.
The recommendation was to stay on the Pill for a year to allow my ovaries to heal. It took some time to get the dosage right but we did do the recommended year and two months after stopping, we were pregnant with our oldest daughter.
As soon as our daughter was born, we didn’t want to go back to doing something that, although it may have been helpful in enabling us to get pregnant, also prevented us from receiving more children. After she was born, I think we thought more about the possibility that the doctor’s were wrong and we could conceive just fine without using the Pill. It took time to grow in faith, to let go of some of the anger I carried at the thought of not being able to have children, to relax into the not knowing. I wish there was a helpful something (conversation or book or blog), but I don’t recall specifics. Just time for our heads and hearts to shift.
There is a four year gap between our first two children and I wonder, often, what would be if we hadn’t spent that year under the Pill. That was a long, hard time of waiting, praying for contentment, whatever the circumstances. We started to look into adoption again, and then we were pregnant. I really thought it was a miracle! I thought, “Look at how much God loves me and cares for me, His daughter! He’s blessed me twice; He’s done what doctor’s said were impossible!” When we lost that baby due to miscarriage at 9 weeks, my world was rocked.
I struggled with depression and anxiety in the months following. I struggled to reconcile my feelings about our perceived second miracle and what did it mean that that miracle died?
Especially after our loss did I feel convicted about not using any contraception. It was easy to not use it when we weren’t getting pregnant, but after the miscarriage, we both wanted as many children as our Lord would give us.
Notice in all of this that I keep saying “feel”. We were very experience and emotionally driven, but those things inspired us to investigate further. I started reading lots on other Lutherans who welcomed however many children the Lord gave them.
It took time and a very dear pastor/professor gave quite generously of his time to help me process it all. By the time our middle daughter was born, a lot had changed for my husband and I. We confess, loudly, that the proof of God’s love for us is not in our children, but in Christ alone. Christ, hanging upon the cross, is the clearest, firmest “proof” of God’s love for us and we cling to that.
We may still adopt, we may be given more. I don’t know. As a person who likes to KNOW, I’m learning to be content in this area. I learn daily to trust that what has been given to us is what is supposed to be for our family. I am thankful that we do not use any contraception now; I know that we aren’t missing out on a blessing.
When I was growing up, I never felt as though I was good with children. I never thought I’d want children (mostly because I feel inept as a parent and I still have those insecurities). I never knew what our future would hold and here we are with three children born unto us. I view my children as gift and I am humbled that God has entrusted them to my care.
I would like to add, here, that although a gift, that doesn’t equate a possession. I am prone to thinking of them as “mine” when in truth, it is far greater blessing to know our children as belonging to the Lord. I pray daily for the Lord to sanctify my efforts as a mother, to continue in His steadfast care for them, in body and soul, despite my sin.
I would also add (especially for those who are barren or struggling after a loss) that although children are a blessing, they are not the means by which women perceive God’s love for them. That is known solely through Christ and His great work for us.
My advice to women who are marrying, is to not do something they may later regret. Don’t assume you will be able to conceive. Don’t assume that being open to children means that you’ll receive them and if you are given loads of children, it doesn’t mean that you won’t be able to stand up under it. We accepted a lot of “this could possibly be ok” and we complied in my doctor’s suggestion. But we do regret it. That year spent under the Pill always makes me wonder if we would’ve had more children had we not delayed intentionally.
Life is hard and messy. We live in a broken, fallen creation. Things don’t go as planned or as God designed them to go. Sometimes our bodies work and sometimes they fail us. So often, especially in this day and age of Pinterest and Facebook, our identity gets caught up in how well we can do something, how much we can do and of course this translate to fertility, ultimately. There is a slew of books about how to become pregnant, controlling your fertility, etc. but the truth is that God alone is in charge; we aren’t.
Our identity is bound to Christ in our baptismal waters, not in our ability to bear children or rear them with Mary Poppins-esque skill. Knowing, in all things, to whom we belong helps tremendously.
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Click HERE for more from this series.
I would love to hear your story. If you would like to share that with us please see these posts:
Fertility Stories – Would You Share?
More On Fertility Stories
