For everyone who has stopped by and prayed for me this month as a part of Adopt-a-Blogger hosted by Conceiving Hope, thank you. You have been in my thoughts and prayers. Before the honor goes on to another blogger, I just wanted to wrap this month up with thanks and a little bit of a recap.
On the medical front, we started the month near the end of a cycle that I was sure was anovulatory, and that meant we would have some tough decisions to make. Amazingly, the cycle was not only ovulatory, but I ovulated from both ovaries, craziness. Even though that cycle ended without pregnancy, the ovulation success gave us some much needed hope that we aren't quite at the end of the road yet. As we reach the end of this month, I'm at the end of another cycle. It was, of course, another wonky cycle full of plenty of weird symptoms that I don't know the meaning of. We'll find out on Monday what happened, so I'll be updating then.
So what does that mean for our discernment? Well, right now we're sticking with the medical route. As long as the medical route is the easier and more affordable, we'll probably keep with it, though we do take each month one at a time, just in case it looks like a break might be needed. We do however want to start looking into adoption, and have been talking about it quite a bit. Right now, finances are our biggest barrier. After we bought our condo last year, we learned that owning would cost quite a bit more than we thought it would, and that, along with financial emergencies like having to buy a car and having surgery, have set us and our savings back quite a bit. It looks like we're finally getting them under control though (I hope I'm not jinxing myself), and are starting to build savings again. Our goal is to get a couple bigger bills paid for, then move on to saving up for a home study, and then figure out how we would move forward from there. Then plan is to get there in 6 months, but you know what happens when you make plans...
As for fruitfulness, well, one minor effort was infertility awareness week. I don't know if it did any good, but I did quite a bit of writing, and hope what I put out there filled some sort of need. On our bigger efforts, I'm happy to let you know that our infertility ministry for our parish (and eventually the diocese, I hope) got approved! Now the hard part starts, we have to actually get it off the ground. We're in the process of getting our first meeting set, getting all the advertising materials together, and trying to figure out where to advertise for maximum exposure. I'm a little worried it'll flop and no one will show, but if God has brought us this far, I think He'll take us where we need to go.
Also, I didn't really talk about this on the Adopt-A-Blogger post, but it has been the subject of a number of my posts this month, the employment front. I don't want to go into too much detail, but things have been looking up a bit.
So, a lot has happened this month! I know your prayers have been there and helped us through a lot. There have been many difficult moments this month, but with each difficulty I also found grace and peace, and I think that is a direct effect of those praying. As part of that, I've been becoming more and more open about my infertility journey in my life away from here, which has been a little terrifying. But almost every time I put myself out there, I'm met with kindness and love, which greatly outweigh the small annoyances like the unhelpful things and platitudes people say.
So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. I hope you stick around to follow our story. But most of all, I hope you join me tomorrow in praying for whoever the next adopt-a-blogger may be!
I don't know if she could be of any help and she doesn't post often anymore, but the blogger Matching Moonheads (https://matchingmoonheads.wordpress.com) used to head up an infertility/subfertility ministry at her local parish. She might have ideas or suggestions for you?
ReplyDeleteThank you! I'll have to look into contacting her. I've been tracking down and bugging all the current/former infertility ministry leaders that I can find, lol.
DeleteBeautiful post! I'm still going to be praying for you here, regardless of what month it is, friend. And I'll definitely keep your IF ministry at your parish in special prayer. I hope God continues to light that path for you! Thank you for sharing so openly about your journey through marriage and infertility. I think it makes a big difference when we're honest and open about the difficult stuff. And you do it so elegantly... <3
ReplyDeleteAw thank you! I'll keep you in my thoughts and prayers too! Thank you so much for hosting Adopt-a-Blogger, and for all you do!
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