Infertility was an answer to my prayers

No.  I am not kidding or being sarcastic.  This last week I have realized that the I-monster has been more of a blessing than a curse.

When we were first married we both agreed that we weren't ready for kids and we wanted to make sure we were ready before we started down that road.  The other night I was holding Charlee while she was sleeping and studying her beautiful face and her hands.  She is getting so big every day and I can't stop it or slow it down, I was sad when I realized she was already over 6 months old and those newborn days would never be back.  I know it is too soon to be saying that and I am only at the beginning.  

But before I got really sad, I thought about how much I had treasured the days.  I thought about; the too many pictures I took, all the times I spent holding her the first six months, when I would wake up just to watch her sleep,  and I was relieved to see I did not have any regrets about how we had spent the first 6 months of being parents.

This was a great comfort to me, about 5 years ago when we started talking about having a family,  I was terrified.  The thought of being responsible for another life,  the realization of the responsibility was overwhelming.  Of course babies are fun and cute, but babies grow to be children and children grow to be teenagers and teenagers grow to be adults.  And that seems like a lot.  Honestly, I was terrified.

I was scared that I would not be able to deal with all the stress.  The last thing I ever wanted to do was to cause them unnecessary hurt.  These feelings were very real to me, and Karst was trying to be helpful and understanding, but he didn't have the answers.  So intense was this fear of being a parent that I went into therapy to deal with it.  ( This was before we really started "trying", when we were just talking about it.)

I am so grateful that I took that step,  Karst was skeptical at first but once he realized I was talking someone's ear off about this and dealing with it, he was relieved.  Of course we continued to talk to each other about this.  But having that outside voice of reason was what I needed.  It wasn't anything drastic or earth moving, I just dealt with the reasons for the fears and the issues and slowly I realized I really wanted the opportunity to be a parent.

Then if you fast forward to two years ago, when we got the official word that having biological children would not be possible and we were looking at our decisions.  It would have been easy at that point to just say okay, well it's a sign we shouldn't be parents.  If I still had those fears, it could have happened, but by that time I had a strong desire to be a mother to children to take on all that responsibility.

That times we went through; the trying, deciding, waiting and finding, that desire just grew.  I talked to a lot of moms, old and young I asked them every question I could think of.  I read books and both of us did what we could to prepare.  Those days were harder, they were darker, not all of them, but enough that the pain of the  I-monster was there.  Unknowns, and lack of control are not easy things to deal with.

Back to the other night, when I was marveling at how amazing Charlee is, and what an honor it is to be her mom, to be chosen to be her mom.  Tears over took me and I knew that if I didn't have the trial of infertility I would not treasure these moments the same.  I would have taken being a mother for granted, I would be a different mother,  I probably wouldn't be out of control with the camera.

I am not saying that infertile mothers are better or worse, I don't know how you could compare the two.  These are my feelings, about my experience. I am saying for me I needed more time to really prepare, I needed to fight and work hard to get my family so it wasn't something I took lightly.  My infertility forced me work through my fears and doubts about being a parent, and without it, I do not know if I would have realized how much I wanted to be a mother.

Another great blessing of infertility is it made me turn to my Heavenly Father more.  It made me lean on him and to exercise my faith.  It allowed me to see his hand in my life and to feel of his unconditional love for our family and Charlee's birth family.   

The bitterness of infertility is horrible, sometimes almost unbearable.  And now at the same time that has made the sweetness of being a mother better then I could have dreamed.

"The Lord compensates the faithful for every loss. That which is taken away from those who love the Lord will be added unto them in His own way. While it may not come at the time we desire, the faithful will know that every tear today will eventually be returned a hundredfold with tears of rejoicing and gratitude."

Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

We are so blessed, beyond our comprehension.