Every Month I Am Not Pregnant

**I wrote this blog about a week and a half ago when I started my period again. I was so hopeful that this would be the month. A big date was coming up, and when it was planned I said to myself, “oh, I will be pregnant then.” That date is this weekend and my belly is empty of anything but my dinner. I wrote this when I was sad, and disappointed. I’m doing better now. My husband and I had a moment where we allowed these feelings. Now we are moving forward. The way my menstrual cycles work, I’ve already entered into my fertile window. We try again. And we are also taking some next steps to see if we do need some outside help. I appreciate the thoughts and prayers. I never thought I would be on this side, 7 months of trying. But here we are. I don’t know if I’m doing this right, but writing and sharing definitely helps.

So, read below knowing that I wrote this in a vulnerable place. With a warning that if you’re also trying to conceive or have experienced loss or maybe are just in a vulnerable place yourself that this may or may not serve you. Regardless, know that I am with you. I will always work to serve mamas, my heart is a servants heart for you.**

Every Month I Am Not Pregnant

Every month I am not pregnant, I mourn the loss of a baby not yet created out of cells and tissue but only known to my good and gracious God.

Every month I am not pregnant, I can feel my heart clinging to memories of wrapping my love around a soft, squishy, baby. Wishing to do it again. Begging for another turn. Begging to hold chunky thighs and chubby sticky hands against my chest.

Every month I am not pregnant, I hold my hand on my empty stomach. Remembering what it feels like to carry a baby inside it that only I and God know. I feel my warm hand on skin that once was stretched over a secret life I knew but didn’t know, that I couldn’t wait to meet but yet knew intimately. My hand on my flat stomach only feels my own pulse. I only feel the desire to feel the jagged raw movement inside of a baby. 

Every month I am not pregnant, I look at my beautiful, healthy growing children. I pray to give them a brother or a sister to love and hold and kiss and hug. I feel guilty for wanting more when I have so much. I long for the days when they were infants who needed me differently. Who were nourished from my milk and nestled their soft heads into the crook between my chin and my chest when they were too tired to lift their heads but too awake to allow me to set them down. I want it, I want it again. 

Every month I am not pregnant I try to bargain with God. If this is the right month for you God, I’ll be more patient. I’ll not get frustrated with my husband. I will treasure every day, I’ll never not cherish these moments with my kids, I won’t get agitated by my toddler doing it all, “all by herself.” I’ll never again wish away the sleepless nights of infancy. I will never take for granted the labor pains that brought me my babies. I’ll never sigh at dirty diapers or long for the “easier days ahead.” I will take better care of me. I’ll never curse the mountains of laundry that pile up waiting to be folded again, if only he would allow me to add burp cloths and teeny tiny socks to the pile. A long slew of irrational and incoherent bargains to a God that hears me, but doesn’t work that way. 

Every month I am not pregnant I think of my friend who mourns the death of her stillborn baby, who aches for the heartbeat of her baby in her womb, and wonder why I dare wish for a heartbeat in my own when at least I am blessed to have two heartbeats alive and well outside of my body. I think of my other friend also wishing for a baby, but with no other children to be grateful for. How she longs for motherhood without fully knowing all it entails. And I wonder if I should even long for a baby at all. 

Every month I am not pregnant I become more afraid. I’m afraid that this journey to this baby may have to look different. That perhaps I need medicine or medical intervention and I’m scared. I know others, my own sister, have gone this route and they survived it but I watched their struggle and I don’t know if I can do it. I don’t know if I’m strong enough or brave enough or trusting enough. 

I used to be afraid of birth. Of the pain, of the mess, of the vulnerability. But now I am afraid that I won’t be able to do it again. I tell God I won’t be afraid, I won’t yell out in pain, I won’t cry if only I can be allowed to do it again to hear the sweet sound of my baby’s cry. 

Every month I am not pregnant, I mourn for a baby known by God but not yet to me.