Yet another lesson in trust. With a little bit of patience on the side.

Before Tim and I were married, we contemplated "not waiting" to start a family.  I'd read enough literature and understood my temple covenants well enough to know that although when one decides to try for children is a personal matter, I wanted to err on the side of not being overly selfish about my time alone with Tim.  Plus, there was always the nagging possibility that children wouldn't come as easily as they do to some.  So, although we decided that a honeymoon baby was probably not our cup of tea, within nine months of being married we "stopped preventing" children.  Anna was born 10 months later.

And so it was with all four of our children.  We'd "stop preventing" at uncomfortably close intervals, allowing for the possibility that pregnancy would not occur within the first month.  But it always did.   We were blessed with fertility, and were abundantly grateful to welcome four children in less than six years.   I'd like to think I did not take that gift for granted.

The postpartum period after having my fourth daughter, Eve, was particularly challenging, for a number of reasons.   In haste, I gave away all of my maternity clothes to a friend who was in need at the time, thinking to myself, there is no way I'm going to put myself and my family through that again (postpartum depression, that is).  But time has a way of healing those wounds, and in their place I discovered a deep and abiding faith, shaped largely by those dark months of despair.  As my children grew, I saw a light at the end of the tunnel, and found a renewed appreciation for the opportunity to bear and raise children.  I realized that the child-bearing years are actually quite short, and that the joys far outweigh the chaos and frustration and sorrow that I'd felt just a few years before.

Tim and I reached this epiphany at just about the same time and decided we weren't ready to throw in the towel yet.  We "stopped preventing" once again.  We're going on nine months now.   I was concerned("baffled" might describe the emotion better) after we didn't get pregnant the first month.  Now I'm pretty sure something is up.  Plus, I happen to be 35, which is apparently some magical age when fertility (statistically speaking) takes a nosedive.  I wasn't planning on being part of that statistic.

So why am I sharing this so publicly?  (I'm sure Tim is cringing inside that I am unabashedly proclaiming that we've been "trying" for number five for the last nine months... let's just draw everyone a picture, why don't we?).

Here's why: I like to document the learning that occurs when I encounter various challenges.  I cannot let this experience pass me by without recording some of the feelings I've had recently.
First, I have more compassion than ever for those who want desperately to have children and cannot.  Having borne four children quite easily, I can't profess to understand completely(okay, really, not even close), but I've now a glimmer of some of the disappointments.  The sting of comments by the fertile (comments I'd probably made in the past) that unintentionally make the less fertile feel inferior or trivialize their pain.  The confusion about why, when both Tim and I felt so strongly about adding to our family, why are we not being blessed for our righteous desires.  The wondering why babies are born to unfit parents every day, when there are willing and able couples who, through no fault of their own cannot conceive.  The false (but underlying) notion that God must not trust me to raise more children, or he would reward us for our willingness.  I could go on and on.  I don't dwell on any of these emotions, but I can't say they haven't crossed my mind.  There's much that seems unfair in the world.

So here's why I don't prescribe to any of those negative thoughts:

First of all, let's be real.  I have four children.  Might I make it perfectly clear that I recognize this as a tremendous blessing? And, in spite of my desires to expand our clan, I can count each child as a precious gift from above.

More importantly, though, I trust my Father in Heaven.  I have been through enough, and seen His hand in my life enough times to know that He has nothing but my best interest in mind.  My trials have been nothing short of defining moments in my life, they've strengthened me to know that God is a rewarder of those who seek Him, and that joy is available to those who are willing to see the big picture.  I don't know if another pregnancy announcement is in my blogging future.  However, whether or not I have four or five or ten children is not the issue.  What matters is who I am becoming in the process.  And I happen to like that person.  So far, anyway.  :)