On Being Painfully Aware of Infertility

First off, some disclaimers before I begin this post.
 1. I'm posting from my phone, so auto correct may bite me in the tushy quite a bit.
2. I may be a bit all over the place, and if so, I apologize.

Last week was National Infertility Awareness Week. I waited to post because, honestly, I was hoping to find out today that I was pregnant. I know I blogged through our first IVF experience, but I decided not to blog until after our Frozen Embryo Transfer because I wanted to keep it more private.  I do pave to go make some posts about the process and how it was different than our fresh transfer, but today I want to talk about other things.

Namely, infertility sucks. It never stops sucking. Today I got a call from our doctor telling us that my pregnancy test was negative. We transferred two embryos, two babies, and neither one implanted. This is worse than just a negative home test. It's not just and, "Oh, I didn't get pregnant this month." I KNEW there were two babies in my body. Two babies who I have been praying for for the last two years since they were created. And now they're gone. I'll never get to know them. I was never even actually pregnant with them. We created them and then my body failed them (I know that's a dramatic way of looking at it, but I'm feeling dramatic right now).

We spent over $5000 this time (far less than on Cai, but we make far less now than we did then). Five thousand that we scraped together through selling things and the generosity of some wonderful friends and family as well as our credit card. In fact, bills are still rolling in, and we're pretty broke. Which also means, we can't try again for a while. We have two embryos remaining, and they are even better quality than any of the others were, including Cai, but we're going to have to wait to save all over again.

Now I need to stop and pull back (I warned you that this would be all over the place), because right now I sound whiney and miserable, which I am at the moment, but I'm also still aware of all that I have to be thankful for. When I burst into tears this afternoon, I was met with hugs from my two favorite men; Steve and Cai. And if we never have any more children, that will be okay because I have both of them. And those hugs were followed by many texts and emails from friends and family who were praying for us today.

And I know my God is there. I know that his steadfast love endures forever. I know that He will hold me with His righteous right hand. I know that he has a plan for our family.

So infertility sucks. It's effing awful. And it always will be. But the love we've seen through it, the love we've grown through it, definitely doesn't suck.

And I know that for the next little while I'm going to bounce back and forth between sadness and resignation, anger and fear, longing and contenment. It's going to be hard.

On my way to my blood test this morning, I told the Lord that this time, I didn't feel as selfish as I did wanting Cai. I mean, I had unselfish reasons then too, but it was mostly just that I wanted a baby. But this time, it was more that; we just have more love to share. We love Cai so much, and enjoy loving him, and we just want to share that with more children.

And now this post sounds like I'm fishing for sympathy, but I'm not. I need to process the whole thing, and this helped, but I also want to help others process it, because I know I'm not the only one out there who has gone through this.

Thanks for the love and support, friends. Spoken and unspoken. We feel it. Both of us.