The Card : Where God Stretched Out His Hand pt. 1

Eight years ago I was living in Arizona, married to another teacher.  At first, the kids in our classrooms were enough, but after a few years we felt drawn to starting our own family.  In typical planner form,  I drafted out a careful schedule for the venture that would match maternity leave to the school year calendar for the most time off over summer break.  Years of preventing pregnancy had instilled the mindset that all we would need to do to have a baby is stop preventing it, and when the schedule said it was time,  our journey to parenthood would begin.

Or so we thought.  The time on that schedule came and went with no signs of a baby on the way. I checked out every pregnancy book available at the local library and spent every non-work moment preparing.   A few months later, we had a positive pregnancy test and were elated.  I drove across town to a baby shower after seeing that little line with an awareness that I was, for the first time, responsible for another life.  A little girl, I thought.    A week later, on Veteran's Day, that pregnancy ended.   We were sad, and filled with questions:  Were we parents?  Was it really a baby?  Did it have a soul? We rationalized that we could try again and that the next time would be successful.

At this point, God was not a conscious part of our lives.  While I had been raised in church, my time in college and as a young adult had been lived apart from God, and while I would have still identified myself as Christian (because I wasn't actively anything else), there was no outward evidence of this.  My husband was not Christian, and had almost no exposure to any religion outside of what appeared in the media and common culture.  I sent up a few frantic prayers during this first miscarriage, but then ignored God again when it was done.

Several more months passed, and again, another positive test.  This time it was a darker line, and we were optimistic that this would be the one.  By this point I was occasionally reading my Bible again, and my journal contains some awkward prayers Yet once again, the pregnancy ended, on St. Patrick's Day.  Why?  And twice?  We knew almost no one who had experienced a miscarriage, much less more than one.  Was God punishing me? Surely the third time would be the charm. 

Many long months passed.  Impatience had become a constant companion.   By that point, the carefully constructed schedule had been thrown out the window. We would be happy with a baby at ANY time.   We became good friends with a couple who had never been able to have children and were content with life, and began to wonder if that would be us in a few years.

Just when we'd begun to give up hope, I became pregnant again, right before Thanksgiving.


(to be continued)