The Black Hole, pt 1

I can't say that all my life, I have wanted nothing more than to be a mother.  What kid doesn't have big, if not unrealistic, dreams?  I can say, though, that even through all of my other dreams, I just assumed I would be a mother.  It wasn't just a dream; some dreams come true, some dreams don't.  Motherhood was an expectation, as though my life owed me something or was subordinate to me and this was what I expected of it.  

I was, of course, no fool though.  I had to meet it halfway.  I met and married an incredible man with similar expectations of life who loves me dearly and has the potential to support any family we create.  We got respectable jobs with sufficient income.  We bought a house with *significant* room to grow our family.  We settled into respectable adult bed times and extra curricular activities.  I never worked more than temporary or part-time jobs, leaving plenty of time for housewifery and, eventually, to take care of our children.  We had loving, well-timed, married baby-making sex.  Lots of it.  It was time for life to life to fulfill it's end of the bargain, so we waited.  When we realized there were some fertility issues that needed taken care of, we were nothing if not proactive.  And yet here we wait.  

One could argue that we were being responsible adults, planning and preparing for a future we had no idea might not be ours.  One could also argue that it was foolish of us to build our lives around an assumption.  Either way, it amounts to the same thing: we built our lives around a hole that might never be filled.  

I can't say that's a new realization for me, but I've been thinking about it a lot lately because sometimes it feels more like a black hole, sucking everything else in with it, and I'm just not sure how much longer I can live like that.  As such, we've started  considering our other options.

• We could do nothing.  We could technically keep things exactly like they are.  Keep living around our hole, keep trying desperately to fill it as"naturally" as we are able. 
• We could change the way our life is.  We could quit living around the hole.  Create a life for ourselves that doesn't assume we'll have children.  That doesn't mean we quit trying, but it does mean we quit waiting.  We move on, and we create a more healthy routine.  
• We could adopt or find a surrogate.  We could quit waiting for life or fate or God to hand us what we want ad go get it on our own.  It wouldn't be the same and I'm not sure I'm ready to quit trying yet, but that doesn't mean we have to live with the hole in the mean time.  

More to come on this later...