I love how the world looks after a rainstorm. It’s been raining pretty consistently here in the Bay Area the last couple of weeks and a few days ago, Darrin and I were driving back home when I saw the most beautiful, full rainbow. And I felt so…content.
I’m currently 26.5 weeks pregnant and still constantly in awe by my growing belly, the reassuring kicks I feel and can sometimes even SEE, and the fact that I have two different heartbeats inside of me. Isn’t that crazy??
Looking back, it’s almost hard to remember the tears we shed to get to this point — we’re finally seeing the rainbow, God’s promise fulfilled; a bourgeoning, well-nourished California after a tough parched year. It’s hard not to see the parallel here.
Some key moments I remember from our journey:
- Going to my fertility clinic in early June and finding out that there was still some fetal tissue from the first pregnancy (maybe part of the placenta?) that would require another surgery to remove so I could have a “clean slate” for the next embryo transfer
- Finding comfort in Psalm 56:8 — sometimes, the worst DOES happen. We’re not promised a perfect future. But God remembers and treasures our pain. He holds it for us and absorbs it so we can move forward
- Having a huge fight with Darrin over absolutely nothing in late June, which led to a lot of tears and talking, which forced us to “wake up” from being emotionally numb and made us realize that by turning off hope due to our infertility issues, we were turning off joy and love as well. It scared us to try and hope again, but we couldn’t intentionally love each other without feeling the entire spectrum of our emotions
- Going through our second embryo transfer in mid-July and restarting the daily routine of estrogen / progesterone pills and daily shots
- Waiting with bated breath until the clinic called to confirm our second positive pregnancy result
- So much anxiety before each ultrasound
- My first stomach ultrasound at 13 weeks (the ones before that were all vaginal), which would confirm that we were safely out of the first trimester and the risk of miscarriage would be < 1% — and seeing baby literally DANCE on the TV screen. He was kicking his legs, waving his arms, opening his mouth to take in the amniotic fluid around him…it was the most incredible thing I had ever seen and tears just streamed down my face. It felt like he was reassuring us — “don’t worry, I’m still here and completely fine!”
- Walking through the baby section of Target at 18 weeks and crying again because I felt overwhelmed with excitement and gratitude
- Feeling the baby kick for the first time at 19 weeks
- Reading in What No One Tells You: A Guide to Your Emotions from Pregnancy to Motherhood — Genes may make people biologically linked, but they do not make a family
I didn’t realize this until Darrin said it, but we found out we had miscarried in April of this year…and our second will be born in April of next year. I don’t think we’ll ever forget the grief of the first pregnancy, but I feel like this is God’s redemptive way of healing what that month means to us. Even though this wasn’t what I had imagined for our future, looking back I feel like God has actually been preparing my heart for this moment. How? Ever since I was young, I had always wanted:
- To have a boy first
- To have a multi-racial family
- To adopt a child
I feel like he put those desires in my heart as a child because he knew since the beginning that I would have to embark on this journey and His plans would be greater than my plans. He fulfilled all those desires in the craziest of ways. Through IVF, Darrin and I are able to choose the gender (and order) of our children. Through sperm donors, we are able to have multi-racial kids. And finally, I feel like if I were able to have Darrin’s biological kids, I would have been less motivated / inclined to go through a long adoption process.
Maybe this is just me trying to find a purpose / meaning behind our 3 year saga, but I feel content knowing that whatever the future holds for our special family, He is with us.
Coming full circle, the drought is over, we weathered through the stormy darkness and unrelenting barrage of rain, and now we can finally take a step back and enjoy the luscious greenery, new life, and the beautiful rainbow.