the not so fertile road, part 3

(Read Part 1)
(Read Part 2)

On the day after Christmas, I was saying goodbye to my folks as they headed back to Billings when I got a text. I opened it to see the picture of a stick on which a friend had peed. It was a positive pregnancy test.

The text was from Hannah.

I screamed. I cried. We had an immediate conference call with the three of us. It was a miracle. Just mind-blowing. The statistics that I haven't shared (to protect Hannah's privacy) made this such a miraculous gift from God. This wasn't one of those "relax, stop trying so hard, and you'll have a baby!" moments. God had moved. Hannah was pregnant.

The emails continued in a flurry, because even though the miraculous had happened, Hannah was experiencing the following in full force:

I'm worrying a lot... remember this email from Addie a long time ago? "Just know that the fear and worry do not stop when you get a positive stick. They actually increase, to the point where you might be fearful of sharing with others because that jinxes your pregnancy and you'll lose it (wrestled with that one). Then you're fearful if you don't feel movement as often as you should." I vacillate between panicking every time I feel a sharp twinge when I cough or sneeze (1 of 14 indicators of an ectopic pregnancy; I have no other symptoms of ectopic, but sharp twinge when I cough) or panicking because I don't feel sick or in pain, which of course means that the embryo has died and that I'm going to miscarry. There's no winning with me!

Hannah had the unenviable task of sharing her happy news with other infertile friends, and her wisdom and compassion for both sides of that aisle grew in admirable ways. She knew how her younger sister had felt, sharing her own pregnancy with a still-trying Hannah.

Missy and I demanded a belly shot.

On September 6, a mere two months ago, Charis Alene entered the world. Charis is a Greek word, meaning "grace," because after three years of infertility, God gracious gave my friends a daughter. She is ridiculously cute.

Just borned.

Ridiculously cute.

And while this "not so fertile road" ends in the most unlikely of results, I know that for many, it's still a painful, lonely road. Perhaps by talking more openly about such things will help it be less isolating, will help keep the fertile from smug answers, will help us grieve and love and walk TOGETHER, because we'll have discovered the enormous truth that we're all on the same road, after all.