Do you have any kids?

Who among us hasn't been asked that question? After our first few losses, I would get a shocked look on my face. Stammer. And eventually land on a no, if someone I was with didn't get there for me first (and believe me, my mom and mother-in-law have both done it). I was always so ashamed of that answer, not because it was true but because it wasn't. I had children. Their death didn't make them any less real, and I worried that I did them a great disservice by denying their existence. I was ashamed that I chose to lie in the interest of keeping a conversation from becoming awkward or revealing too much information to someone I didn't know well.

Elizabeth changed things a little. For one, her passing was more public knowledge than our first trimester losses. For another thing, like it or not (and my vote is definitely not), it feels more socially acceptable to mourn her loss. Those things in mind, I decided a few months ago that my answer would now be "none living". I may not be able to talk as openly about our other babies, but surely no one would begrudge me talking about our Lizzie.

This afternoon, I had just finished an eye exam and picked out new frames and was sitting with the eye-distance measurer/insurance guru (apparently my left eye is closer to my nose than my right) when he asked me an infertile's favorite question. I may have decided on my answer months ago, but this was the first opportunity I had to use it. Apparently, I don't get out and meet new people often. I told him I had no living children and he said "what?" and I repeated myself. Then he looked down and said "Me too. My son died in a car crash last year. Never the same again, are we? How old was your child?".

That is what a pastor I know would call a holy hook-up. We talked for a little bit, but things got a little awkward when all my paperwork was filled out and there was no legitimate reason for me to be sitting there anymore. Before I left, though, he told me he had been thinking about the biblical harvest and how when you plant a seed, you expect a harvest and each variety of seed has a different sow-to-reap time (modern companies even print them on their packets) (in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me when as yet there were none of them psalm 139:16). That we all die, and God being the best of all gardeners picks us from this life when we are at our peak ripeness, at our best. it's an interesting thought for me, something to mull over. I guess I always saw our little ones as barely sprouted... So very far from ripe. To think that, half formed as they seemed in our human estimation, they were just right in god's eyes. I guess it's just as reasonable as people eating bean sprouts.

The Black Hole, pt 2

Tired of living with a gaping hole in our lives, and our options before us, we have decided to at least start looking into adoption.  There are a ton of obstacles in our way, financing, namely... but I kinda feel like things aren't gonna turn around for us if we're just sitting around waiting for things to change, instead of acting to change them.   We're going to an informational meeting tonight.  Here goes nothing...