People ask me how we got through it all and still seem to smile. It seems like a simple question but when I really think about it, there are so many different ways to answer. I could be very vague and just say our love got us through it. Everyone starts out loving each other when they first attempt to create a life, yet so many couples end their journey to parenthood with separation and divorce. The answer is, it takes more than just love to get you through infertility. It takes determination to not only reach your goal, but to resign yourself to this journey and take on anything it throws at you, strong and bound together. It’s like being on a roller coaster without a seat belt and knowingly getting on the ride with an awareness that the odds are against you. You have to be determined to get to the end somehow without throwing in the towel. That is what we were. That is what we are. Failure was not an option. We would not fail each other and we would not fail our babies. We knew they existed somewhere out there and we would not fail to bring them to us, no matter how they arrived.
thejourneytoparenthood
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thejourneytoparenthood 
Hell and Rebirth After Three Failed IVFs
My marriage has been at an all time low. Not many people can say that of their marriage or their relationship; that they’ve hit rock bottom, and they survived. In fact, most people never get to that point in their relationship. The ones that work, have some trials and tackle some issues along the way, but to say they have hit the bottom, the depths of hell, not many relationships ever get there. Mine did. It came to the point where I was begging him to leave. Not because I hated him or because he had done anything wrong, but because I loved him more than anything in the world and he had done nothing wrong. We were in this mess because of me and I could not bear to watch him burn in this hell that I created for us. To save himself, to save his life, to ever find real happiness, I begged him to leave me. That was as low as we had ever gotten. That was pure hell. The thing about hell is that once you’ve resigned yourself there you forget how to get out; you forget that it’s even possible to leave; you forget that it was you who put yourself there to begin with. When everyone else you love is looking down the rabbit hole at you, begging and pleading you to climb out of there, you can’t reach them. You can’t reach them and they can’t reach you and all around you is hell, fire, and brimstone. The only thing that brought me back was Hubby’s willingness to sit down there with me. Because the only way to get close to me was to be in hell with me, and he’d rather burn and be next to me, then save himself and be away from me. That sacrifice brought me back. I looked at him, he looked at me, I begged him to leave, but he refused. He stayed and I could not bear to watch him in that place, in that dark place I had created for myself. He couldn’t pull me out of that funk so he joined me in it. Because of that, I got up, and I saved him. In the process I saved myself. From that moment on, we were different. We still bickered and nagged at each other as married people do. We still argued and became annoyed with each other. But we had been to that very real, very dark place. Just the two of us. No one else was there with us and no one else knew what that was like. None of the subsequent arguments mattered. No amount of bickering or arguing or nagging each other made any difference anymore. There was this thing between us now, this unspoken thing. We cremated 6 of our babies that winter. They were microscopic, only a few cells, but we loved them and when they died we mourned them. All we had of their existence was their pictures and the newly strengthened relationship we shared as a result of having made them.
What dreams may come ❤ makes sense now.
Exactly
Motherhood is an Animal Instinct
I ask mothers, what is it that makes them love their children so much that they would die for them? What is that thing that propels you forward to protect your child no matter what danger lay ahead? Animals have this same instinct in the wild. It’s what makes the mother elk protect her fawn in the meadow surrounded by mountain lions. She is alone and out-numbered but she will fight with every molecule of her being to keep danger from her young, she would knowingly sacrifice herself to lions. It is not a choice she makes. It is part of her just like her legs are a part of her. To lose her young would be like an amputation, a piece of her severed, an irreplaceable part of her. It is the same with humans. It is instinctual, to willingly lay down your life for your child; to do anything to protect them. What I have found through this journey is that it makes no difference whether your child is living or not. My children are not yet living, they have not yet been brought to this Earth, but I am their mother nonetheless. My instinct to do anything to protect them is alive in me, and is strong. No amount of torture, needles, poking, or proding would stop me from protecting their little lives and helping them to find their way to me. That is what it’s like being an infertile. You’re a mother without children. You know these children because you have seen them in your mind, you can smell them, you can see them, and you can feel their presence. Your only goal is to help them find their way to you, no matter how they arrive. They may arrive in the typical fashion, mommy and daddy enjoy a night together and nine months later there is a birth. They may arrive through endless Dr.’s appointments, ultrasounds, blood work, IVF. They may arrive through a genetic link to another person, an angel willing to give the ultimate gift. They may arrive through the bravery and strength of another couple, knowing a better life could be provided. The way to my arms doesn’t matter, as long as I can guide them toward me. I am a mother without children, fighting with every molecule of my being to protect them and guide them to my loving arms.
Saying Goodbye to the Past
Let this little ceremony serve as our way of letting go of the past and fully accepting with open minds and open hearts the new path that lay before us. We are a loving couple with a strong and unbreakable marriage bond that has and will continue to see us through difficult challenges. Burning these pictures of the embryos we created will be our way of honoring their spirits. We recognize that we did and will forever love them, and we set them free so that they can give us the strength to move forward in our quest to make a family, no matter how or by what vessel our children will come to us. As their mother and father, we are open and willing, fully accepting, and ready to receive our children however God has planned for them to come to us. We love them, we love each other, and we look forward with great joy and anticipation to being parents to our children. The past is gone, and now we will embrace the journey that lies ahead without looking back, and without regret, sadness, or guilt. May God guide us to our greatest happiness and joy.
My Note to Our Donor
Dearest You
It takes a very special kind of person to put themselves through such a rigorous physical trial to give an anonymous gift such as you have done. No matter what happens from this point I want you to know how much I’ve prayed for you, thought about you, and sent you feelings of gratitude from the bottom of my heart. You are truly an angel to give of yourself in this way. I appreciate you immeasurably. I wish you all the very best things in life, in business, and in love. My husband and I cannot think of any adequate words to express our thankfulness to you, but we are hoping that you can feel all the well wishes, gratitude, and love we send you.
Thank you with all our hearts
Gratefully yours
Us
Understanding a Carriers Choice
Close your eyes. Bring into your minds focus, your eldest child. Picture their face, their hair, the color of their eyes. Really picture them with every detail of who they are. See them smiling, laughing, looking at you adoringly. Picture them saying mommy or daddy and holding their arms out to you as they have done so many times before. Now picture an enormous stone wall, an eternity high, and endlessly long, placed between you and your child. Their image disappeared, gone. Try to forget what they look like. Imagine, if you can, not knowing what color their hair or eyes are, the shape of their nose, the curve of their chin, the roundness of their cheeks. Try to forget them. Imagine the desperation you would feel from the separateness that is now between you. You may even hear them crying for you from behind the wall, faintly and in the distance. Imagine your desperation mounting, the panic that would set in as you realize they are merely a few feet from you but so unreachable.
Now imagine there is a person, only one person that can pass through the wall from one side to the other, effortlessly. As if the wall didn’t exist this person can miraculously float between you and your child. Tears streaming down your face as the realization sets in that you may never get to see your child yet know they exist, a few feet away, on the other side of an insurmountable and impassable wall. Yet this one person offers you help. “I can bring your child from one side of the wall to the other and safely into your arms, but I will have to hold them very close to me, and feed them, and keep them warm while we pass through. It may take a long time but when we get to the other side, I will hand your child over to you, with a smile on my face and without fear or hesitation. Without any expectation that my journey with your child gives me any right to them, and without any reason for wanting to keep them away from you. With a full understanding and knowing, as you know, that this is your child.” Of course.
This is what a gestational carrier does. This is what they are thinking and feeling as they go through the process of bringing your child to you. Now tell me, what is so wrong about that? What is weird, or gross, or disgusting about that? What part of that scenario is difficult to “wrap your head around”?
Is it not what you would want someone to choose to offer you, if you were separated from your child?