I cannot tell you how heavy my heart is as I write today to tell you the bad news that I am not pregnant. We got the call on Tuesday night and I have been in a cloud of despair ever since.  It still feels like a really bad dream, but it is becoming more and more real with each passing hour.  I'm realizing that I'm not going to wake up and be pregnant and celebrating with my husband the fact that this long and painful trial of infertility is finally over for us. That's just not my reality.  My reality is that our prayers for a baby have once again gone unanswered.  I am heartbroken.  I am angry.  I am confused.  I am literally sick. It's not like we didn't know this was a possibility, but we just had so much hope! We felt like God led us down the IVF path at this time and opened doors and kept showing us Himself throughout the process.  There were so many signs and so much peace that seemed to be Him reassuring us that our dreams were finally about to come true.  But then they didn't.  And here we are back in this all too familiar place, trying to pick up the pieces and make sense of it all.  

We decided before starting IVF that this was going to be the end of the "trying to have a baby" road for us right now, no matter what the outcome.  We will not be doing anything to prevent us from getting pregnant, but we also will not be doing all we possibly can to try and achieve pregnancy.  We both feel like we have been prayerful and patient and have also done everything medically possible at this point.  We are so tired of our lives being consumed with appointments, medications, doctor's bills, side effects, etc. etc. etc.  What we can and cannot do is often determined by where I am at in my cycle.  For the past 48 months, there were at least 2 weeks out of each one that I either might be pregnant or I was pregnant.  It was hard to ever plan anything because I had to be at the doctor so often for ultrasounds and procedures.  And I can't tell you how many conversations between Corey and I start like this..."If we get pregnant this month..." It was always on our minds and we were also wondering each month if it would be the turning point from infertility to parenthood. We keep anxiously waiting for this major life change that never comes. So basically, we decided it was time to stop the craziness and at least give ourselves a break from it all if IVF was unsuccessful. We both felt strongly that God had opened the doors to IVF and we knew if He wanted to give us a baby through it, He would.  And if not, we needed to try to move on. 

So now here I am, wondering how in the world I am going to do this and realizing what a hard transition it will be. Trying to become a mother has been my passion and purpose the past 4 years, to a fault.  I'm so ready to be out from under the weight infertility, but so afraid the pain will never go away. I know there is still a possibility I could get pregnant.  But after so many failed attempts, unanswered prayers, disappointments and heartbreak, I cant help but think maybe this is just not what God has for me.  And that is a very hard pill to swallow, because for as long as I can remember, my life's dream has been to be a Mommy.  I mothered my dolls, I mothered my baby brother, I have been fascinated with pregnancy since I was a child. I grew up babysitting as much as I possibly could and my passion has always been to care for people.  My favorite areas of nursing are labor and delivery and pediatrics.  My favorite photo shoots to do are newborn and maternity pictures.  Even with how bad it hurts sometimes to be surrounded by pregnant women and families with children while longing to be in their shoes, that is still what I am drawn to because that is who God made me.  He gave me this intense desire to be a Mom. He gave me an appreciation for the gift of life. He gave me a love for babies.  The question, "why?" is what I continue to ask over and over again.

I have been avoiding God the past few days.  I have refused to pray or listen to christian radio or pick up my Bible. Not only have I been angry at God, but I knew that coming to Him would mean conviction and correction and ultimately a softened heart, and that was the last thing I wanted. I just wanted to be mad.  I wanted to be alone.  I didn't want anyone, not even Him to try and comfort me, because I was certain I could not be comforted. Surprisingly, I still decided to open up the Bible app on my phone last evening and that is when I realized that I have been completely oblivious to the fact that it is "holy week."  So I made up my mind to go ahead and read yesterdays devotion about Maundy Thursday.  As I read, I could feel the stone wall around my heart begin to break down.  Matthew 26:37 says, "He began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed." In the next verse, He goes on to say "My soul is sorrowful, even to death."  This is not the calm, powerful, brave and serene Jesus I am so used to seeing throughout the Gospels. This is deeply distressed Jesus. I am reminded that I have a Savior who has felt everything I could ever feel, and then some. And then a whole lot more actually.  I may feel like I am going to die of this heartache sometimes, but I do not know what it is like to literally have the weight of the world on my shoulders. And yet He empathizes with me, no matter how small my sorrow may be in the light of what He's endured.  As I was thinking about all of this, I remembered there was a chapter about Jesus' agony in Gethsemane in one of my favorite books, called "Living the Cross Centered Life."  So I went and found the book and the chapter and sat down to read it.  Although I thought I was all cried out, tears began to overflow my eyes.  

"In this garden, our Savior is beginning to confront as never before the ultimate and deepest agony of Calvary---an agony that will go infinitely beyond any physical aspects of His suffering.  For Jesus, the cross will bring incomparable and unprecedented suffering or wrath and abandonment.  His downward path into those unspeakable depths begins to plunge steeply in this garden called Gethsemane."  

With his face to the ground and His soul full of sorrow, He pleads with His Heavenly Father to remove this cup from Him.  The cup is a reference to the wrath of God for our sins. 

"That's why there is shuddering and terror and deep distress for Him at this moment. In the crucible of human weakness He's brought face to face with the abhorrent reality of bearing our iniquity and becoming the object of God's full and furious wrath. What Jesus recoils from here is not an anticipation of the physical pain associated with crucifixion.  Rather it's a pain infinitely greater--the agony of being abandoned by His Father."  

Jesus entered the garden to be with His Father before His betrayal, needing His comfort and strength more than ever.  He cried out, pleading for an alternative, but was met with silence.  Again He cried out, but there was no answer.  He was so distressed that drops of blood drip from His body. "Listen to this verse again for the very first time: For God so loved the world...that He is silent to His Son's agonizing appeal."  

And yet somehow Jesus' response is still, "yet not what I will, but what You will."  He is completely innocent, completely abandoned and yet He remains faithful.  

"As we watch Jesus pray in agony in Gethsemane, He has every right to turn His tearful eyes towards you and me and shout, "This is your cup.  You're responsible for this.  It's your sin!  You drink it." This cup should rightfully be thrust into my hand and yours.  Instead, Jesus freely takes it Himself...so that from the cross He can look down at you and me, whisper our names and say, "I drain this cup for you---for you who have lived in defiance of Me, who have hated Me, who have opposed Me.  I drink it all...for you."

I picture Him, hanging on the cross with His head down, looking into my eyes and saying:

For you, Chelsey... the one who continues to fall into the trap of believing what you feel and not what is real.  The one who proclaims how much you love Me and how much I've changed your life and then, like the disciples, when things get hard... you turn on Me.  Time and time again My truth is drown out by the storm you're in. How quickly and easily you forget what I have done for you, precious child.  I took your sin upon My shoulders because I wanted you to have life and have it to the fullest.  I have gone to infinitely greater lengths to make you my child than you will ever go in pursuit of a child. It breaks my heart that You continue to insist that your will would be best.  Don't you know that I have something so much better for you?   I don't want to just give you the desires of your heart, I want to exceed them. Your feelings are unreliable and your heart will fail you, but I never will. I am faithful. I know you you are hurting and that this pain is very real. I want to comfort you. I wish that in your weakest moments you would fall into My arms instead of cross your arms and look away, refusing to let Me in.  When you separate yourself from Me, you only cause yourself more pain.  I did not create you to be a mother, I created you to have a relationship with me, which may or may not ever include you being a mother on this earth.  You're going to have to accept that.  You have to remember that I can see the whole picture and you can only see just little bits and pieces.  Your life, your heart and your desires are precious to Me.  When I say I work all things out for your good, I mean it.  Cling to Me.  

"When He had received the drink, Jesus said, "It is finished." With that He bowed His head and gave up His Spirit."  John 19:30  

In one of my darkest times, You bring me to remembrance of your darkest time. How easily I default into seeing my pain through worldly eyes.  But oh how my perspective changes when I view my circumstance kneeling before the cross, looking up.   My hope is renewed, because thanks to You, Sunday morning is coming both literally and figuratively.  I have spent the past few days blaming you and angry and you, but I repent of my foolishness.  Now I just want to say with all my heart... thank you Lord, for everything!