April Buske

There I was, crying again.

Why? Simply: it was Mother’s day.

I was doing ok, I’ve been off all fertility meds for a while yet and focusing on losing weight so that we could tackle the IVF process (which is both exciting and terrifying).  And that’s been going really well.

Yesterday morning, the Mother’s day bomb didn’t drop until I opened Facebook.  I was laying in bed, opened that little app and became utterly overwhelmed, to say the least, by all the people with perceived picture-perfect lives wishing their mom’s a beautiful and heartfelt “Happy Mother’s Day” or the new moms who are posting pictures of their adorable bundles of joy with pride celebrating their very first Mother’s day as a mom.

Before I knew it, I, again, was filled with sadness for what I haven’t yet achieved and tears began to roll down my cheeks. And then the resentment and frustration boiled to the top and my silent tears turned into straight up ugly crying, so hard that I jumped out of bed as to not wake my sweet, sweet husband. I quickly fled to my crying place – the shower. (If I had my way, I would only cry in the shower so that nobody would know what a hot mess I truly am.) I took a 30+ minute shower just trying to collect myself, to put my proverbial (insert cuss word here) stuff together.

While in the shower, I wrestled with the ugly questions that somehow always seem to find their way to the surface:

• Why doesn’t God love me enough to give me a baby?
• Why am I being punished?
• Why would God give me the desire to be a mother and then not let me have it?
• Why do they (the parents who don’t want their kids or resent them or abuse them, etc) get the blessing I want?
• What did I do to deserve this?
• Doesn’t God love me?
• And all the crappy, hurtful questions that spiral out of control as head down the staircase of throwing myself one heck of a pity-party.

I know logically, that God loves me and you. That we are loved just as we are. I know that none of those questions have an answer that I’ll ever know or understand – at least while I’m swimming through this muck. I’ve been drowning in trying to “be ok” for every one.

I had an epiphany while standing there letting the tears and sobs flow out of me, covered by steam and hot water.  I realized that I have moved beyond the “want to”  for my friends who have gotten pregnant in the last few months. For those who did it naturally, for those who didn’t want it or that got pregnant “accidentally”.  For so long, I have tried to put on a good face for those people.  I wanted to be excited for them. I wanted to. Truly, I did. The trying to be happy for them was so exhausting, but I genuinely tried because I didn’t want to bring them down with my problems.  But I no longer have the “want to” for them. I no longer want to be happy for them. I no longer want to try to hold it together at their baby showers. In fact, I no longer want to go to their baby showers for them.  That epiphany led me to the realization that “its ok to not be ok”.

I think that is quite telling about where I am in this fertility journey.  Maybe that means I’m bitter and cynical now. I’m ok with that. It’s been a long journey and, frankly, I’m glad it took a while to become that.

As I climbed out of the shower, I was struck with another thought: is it ok to not be ok while you’re serving on a church staff? I kind of feel like it’s not allowed to show the cracks in my carefully crafted church facade. Like I’m expected to have it all together all of the time – somewhat like that damn pedestal that church people put their pastors on. I feel like I’m on a lower, but still equally prison-like shelf.

I carefully got dressed, combed my hair and headed off to work. I was barraged with “Happy Mother’s Day!” greetings and did everything in my power to just freaking hold it together. From the caring parishioner who didn’t even know what we’re going through to the one who was trying to be considerate telling me “Happy one-day-you’ll-be-a-mom Mother’s day!” to the nosey people asking me “how are you surviving today?”, it took everything  I could do hold it together.

Long story short, (cause apparently I can ramble about this topic): Mother’s day sucks for me.  Every friend that is pregnant is a reminder of what I can’t have.

So if you got to celebrate Mother’s day, I hope it was joyous for you. But to all of the people out there who were just trying to hold it all together while they survived the  barrage of lovey-dovey crap, I’ve got you. You’re not alone.  We can have a pity-party together.