That Word. Infertility.

Like many other things in our lives, we don't know what we have until we don't have it. If I could say one thing to all the fertile women out there. Think really hard about your priorities and what you value most in life. Don't wait until it's too late to try to have your children. Your fertility may be a gift more valuable than you even know, something to be protected, treasured and embraced. To those like myself who didn't get a choice in the matter, it's a hard pill to swallow to have that choice become one that can't be made, whatever the reason. In my case the reason is one word. Endometriosis. It's a dreadful word in so many ways. It will be with me for life but more than that it's taken from me things I never imagined not having; a life free from limiting pain, the choice to have children at my own discretion. It's been decided for me. Maybe God. Maybe fate. Ultimately, a body broken by disease. I wish I could say I'm ok with it, I'm not. I know I will be ok, but I am not ok with it. I can tell myself all the rhetorical cliché things about God and fate. It won't touch the hurt I feel in my soul, or stop the tears that fall. I watch my one child grow up before my eyes and feel guilt that one wasn't "good enough" for me; that I wanted more, that he won't know what it's like to be a big brother, that he won't have siblings to stand with him and share memories with. I will never know what could have been. But in spite of it all, infertility highlights the beauty and wonder of life. It brings me tears when I see mamas with babies in their arms. Tears for my loss, tears for their joy. Where there's regret and sadness there's joy too. If they don't know what they have, I do.