Our marriage

Gary and I are very blessed to have a strong relationship built on our common faith in God and our open communication as well as our love that grew from a deep friendship. With that being said, that strong bond did shake some when we began to face infertility. Infertility takes a toll on your marriage for sure. You want answers, you don't want to blame each other. No matter how much love you have for each other, though, the devil brings those horrible thoughts to your mind. Thoughts such as, "Would we have been better off had we married other people?" "Have we done something against God that we are being punished for?" "Did we not follow His perfect will for our life by being together?"

Then come the other thoughts about infertility directly. You go to visit after visit to the doctor and both of you take tons of tests. After each test you find youself thinking, "I hope it's not me." You also find yourself thinking,"I hope it's not him." You don't want the problem to be with yourself because you don't want to face the pain that you will possibly never be a mother. That is after all what we are put on earth for, right? You don't want it to be your spouse either because guys are supposed to be tough and supposed to fix things. If he can't fix it, I might lose the husband I married because of his bitterness with the situation.

These are thoughts you never speak out loud unless it is a really tough day and you say things you regret and end up having to apologize to each other and just cry together.

A whole new set of issues arises when the doctors can't find anything wrong at all. Nothing that can be fixed, nothing you can take a magic pill for.

Gary and I found ourself distancing from each other. I cried - a lot. He had moments where he wouldn't talk about our issues and was distant from me. We went through these stages at different times. He would read his Bible and pray every morning while sitting on the floor in what would eventually be our nursury. He pleaded with me to read my Bible and trust God. That was the only way we would get through this. I was angry at God- how could I talk to Him? He was in charge. He could FIX this situation anytime He was ready. The problem was that I wasn't ready for Him to fix anything. Then, when I refused to trust God, Gary began to go down too. We quit going to church because it was too painful. I cried uncontrollably during every service because I knew God was calling out to me to come back to Him and trust Him and I wasn't ready. I didn't want people to see me in a vulnerable state. Gary didn't want to go to church because he felt he was trusting God and God wasn't doing anything. He prayed and read his Bible every morning after all. We also NEVER went to church on Mother's Day. That was the most difficult day of the entire year. Having to stay seated when other mother's stood for recognition.

Then came the fertility treatments. In the beginning, you want to do anything to get pregnant. The hormones made me CRAZY and Gary and I were always arguing. Any little thing would set me off and he didn't know how to handle my mood swings. But, after a failed treatment, we would discuss it and keep going. It got to the point where I wasn't willing to keep going. I was so emotionally and physically drained and I was getting depressed. But, becasue I wanted to please Gary and he wanted to keep going - I kept going. For the sake of our future family, of course I'll keep going if you want to. But, finally Gary saw what was happening to me. He agreed to stop treatments as well. This was our turning point.

We came together for healing and to get back to where our marriage began. We had broken down over the years and everything and every single decision had been based on whether or not we would get pregnant. We were way too focused on growing our family instead of being focused on each other. That is when we finally came to the realization that even if we never had children, we had each other. That was already the best thing God had done in our lives- we loved each other so much and weren't willing to lose that.

Some of the things that helped us through this journey included friends, God and songs. God brought to me the story of Hannah from the Bible who waited and waited on God. She came to God and cried out loudly in her pain to God because she yearned for a child so much. God heard her cry and her pain and gave her a son. Songs such as "Hold my Heart" by Tenth Avenue North and "What Faith Can Do" by Kutless became our theme songs. It seemed that everytime I turned on the radio those songs were there to remind me that God was in control.

We have since become more focused on listening to God's calling in our lives. Our marriage is stronger than ever and our happiness is returning. I now feel I can move forward and not make every decision based on the "IFS" in our life. It is a freeing feeling to just let go of the control and let God handle EVERYTHING". We can't wait to see where He leads.