The Hope That Got Left Out

This morning I went back and read all the posts in my blog. (I may blog about the reason I did this later.) It is kind of odd to look at yourself with different eyes. I felt a little bit like I was visiting another blog and getting to know the author, but at the same time I felt like I was re-living our journey to this point. It was kind of like having an out-of-body experience and a flash back at the same time.

Anyway, toward the end I realized that I haven't told you about the hope I have been feeling lately. About the time we found out I was pg we started praying a novena to St. Jude to help our financial situation. Hubby definitely felt hopeless about this and St. Jude is the patron saint of hopeless causes. Then we m/c'd so we added fertility to the prayer (another hopeless cause). Then, on the 9th day of the novena Hubby was offered a job (he starts training tomorrow)! It felt like a miracle. It didn't feel like a miracle because I thought he wouldn't get a job (I actually think he's very intelligent and capable and I KNEW he would get a job), but it felt miraculous because he got a job so quickly (they offered him the job during the interview) and the suffering was going to ease up (I didn't think it would). It was miraculous that we would finally have a little bit of financial breathing room.

So, since then we have continued to pray to St. Jude for intercession. There is a line in the prayer that says, "Intercede with God for me that He bring visible and speedy help where help is almost despaired of. Come to my assistance in this great need that I may receive the consolation and help of heaven in my necessities, tribulations, and sufferings." I like that the prayer asks for specific help (the visible and speedy kind). With our financial situation we definitely received visible and speedy help. With our fertility the visible and speedy help couldn't come in the form of another pg because we weren't trying (still on the prescribed 2 month wait). So, help had to come another way. I think that help came in the form of hope. I haven't felt hopeless for a few weeks. And, I'm trying to hold on to that hope and not let the cynicism take over. Since St. Jude is the patron of hopeless causes I think he knows what hopelessness can do to people. Hope might be one of the only "visible" ways he can offer me help in the area of fertility.

The other visible sign of fertility improvement is my cycle. Last cycle I O'd on cd 15 (a couple days later than I had been) and had a 27 day cycle (instead of my previous 24-25 days). That is definitely in the officially "normal" category. This cycle I O'd on cd 14 (that's text book). Last cycle I thought the change was because my body was still recovering from the m/c. That may still be true. However, people say that once you have been pg it can "reboot" your body into more normal cycles. I am hoping this is true for me. I guess I will only know for sure in the coming months when we start TTC again (next cycle!!!).

I kind of hate to say the next thing, because I don't want to encourage any kind of assvice or insensitive comments (not from you, my readers, but from the fertile world in general). However, I do feel some hope in the knowledge that I can, in fact, achieve pg'y. (However, I did still cringe when people said to me, "At least you know you can get pg.") For a long time I wasn't sure this was possible. This doesn't take away the grief I feel about the m/c or about the year and a half of IF. It's just that I don't feel hopeless about the future. I still have some worries. The unknown can be scary. But, I don't feel a sense of dread regarding my fertility and the future. It's been kind of nice. The hope has felt like a small bit of relief from the drudgery of pain and mourning. Lately I have been believing that we will be parents sometime in the foreseeable future.

The other thing that I've been thinking about lately is the meaning of gift. That willl be the subject of my next post.