As I inch closer to the 30 week mark of my second pregnancy, I want to take some time to share our story, our testimony of overcoming Secondary Infertility. While this is certainly a story dealing directly with one of the many facets of infertility, I think it’s a story for anyone who has had to wait for a promise to be fulfilled. It’s my journey of learning to rest in the waiting, of having my eyes opened to see the beauty and embrace the transformation that only comes with patient endurance. This first post does contain more of the medical details of our story because I know they are relevant to women who have walked through infertility. However, as our story goes on, I aim to focus on the spiritual truths the Lord showed me along the way about resting, waiting and receiving.
I had no idea Secondary Infertility was even a “thing” until I realized I had far exceeded the normal amount of time it should take to get pregnant a 2nd time. We got pregnant with our first child, Holiday, the first month we “tried.” I didn’t do anything special, I wasn’t even accustomed to tracking my cycle. I spent 5 minutes on Google and quickly gleaned that days 12-14 were our best chance for conceiving. Using only that info and the span of one month we were both shocked to see double pink lines so easily.
Backing up a few years, I had already had several abdominal surgeries, emergency surgery to fix ovarian torsion, received a diagnosis of endometriosis, was told I had chronically low progesterone that didn’t respond to treatment, though absolutely crucial to conceiving a child. Even more, the surgeon told me that I’d likely have a very difficult time conceiving. This was around 2007, I was still single, but I knew God had put marriage and children in my heart and I knew His Word and promises weren’t impacted by this diagnosis. The doctor prescribed nonstop birth control pills (to stop ovulation, conserve eggs, and keep endometriosis from being able to reproduce each month) and hormone therapy in hopes of “protecting my fertility” for when I was ready to have children.
I remained on the medication over the next year, but started having negative side effects like fatigue, hair loss, headaches and just not feeling well. I had been put on birth control at a very young age as it is a very common remedy to help manage difficult monthly cycles— even with not being used as a contraceptive. My doctor confirmed that the negative side effects were likely due to having been on birth control for too long and years of accumulated synthetic hormones could be hard on the body. However, she considered staying on the medications as the “lesser of two evils” when it came to trying to get pregnant down the road. I continued to take the medication until I really felt the Lord tell me I didn’t need it anymore. In the summer of 2008, He had been talking to me so much about the healing that Jesus provided at the cross (Isaiah 53:4-6). It started to become so real to me that, finally, one day, I felt the Lord tell me, “You know, you don’t need those anymore.” I immediately threw away the medication and never looked back. Within just a few weeks of going off the medication, I met my husband David. We we were first introduced in August, got engaged in October, married in March and were expecting by the following January! It was a whirlwind 15 months to say the least! [I want to pause and add a caveat here, I am very aware that I was not in a health crisis that was a life or death situation. While I certainly do believe the Lord is able to heal aside from medical intervention, I also believe it is Him who has given the good gift of medicine to us. It’s absolutely imperative that you seek wisdom in deciding what type of medical intervention to pursue with whatever health situation you might be facing].
My first pregnancy was uncomplicated and we had a healthy, beautiful baby girl. Close to her first birthday, we decided maybe it was time to start trying for baby #2. We had gotten pregnant so easily the first time, the thought of it being difficult after that never occurred to either of us. We kept “trying” but not putting pressure on ourselves or each other. After the first year with no results, I started to learn more about tracking my cycles, checking my temperature, using ovulation predictor kits, but two more years of trying all those things proved unsuccessful. I had mentally prepared myself that, at the 3 year mark, I would consult a doctor and that’s what we did.
I started with an OBGYN who was recommended by a friend. He supposedly had a good record of helping women conceive. We did all the basic, introductory fertility tests and labs. My body still wasn’t producing progesterone, but this particular doctor didn’t really see an issue with that. Ultrasounds looked good, my fallopian tubes weren’t blocked, there wasn’t any diagnosable reason as to why I wasn’t conceiving. The doctor decided to put me on 3 months of Femara which is an oral fertility medication (much like Clomid). In addition, I did injections of Ovidrel close to ovulation to give us a better chance of strong ovulation and, hopefully, conception. Just these very low level fertility methods were fairly time consuming and involved weekly, and sometimes bi-weekly, trips to the doctor. The doctor was extremely confident this would work for us because my body seemed to be responding so well. I was producing many large follicles on each ovary to the point that the doctor kept confirming with us that we were okay with potentially conceiving multiples. And yet, when I would have my 21 day labs drawn to confirm ovulation, it was clear I wasn’t ovulating and my body wasn’t producing a strong enough LH surge to initiate ovulation— even with being on fertility medications and injections. If you’ve been around the bend with fertility for any length of time, you know these can be very intangible things. No one really knows for sure why LH (Luteinizing Hormone) doesn’t surge when it should or how to motivate it to do so, but it’s impossible to conceive if this mechanism isn’t functioning. We kept doing these treatments for the next three months. I found myself getting increasingly frustrated and emotional. Each month, the conditions looked perfect for conception, but it just never happened. Before we had gone down the road of trying to medically address the fertility issues, I felt like I was peaceful and confident it would eventually happen. At this point, however, I felt like I was on a roller coaster of emotions and I knew this wasn’t where I wanted to be.
I started to have an inner battle that I was attempting to sort through. I felt confident in my understanding of the Word that children were a blessing and an inheritance (without qualification) bestowed on the earth (Pslam 127:3). I knew there was a healing provision already given to me for any insufficiency in my body (1 Peter 2:24). I was, and am, assured that it was the Lord’s will for us to be able to have children (I’ll share more of this understanding and specific Scriptures in an upcoming post). The Lord had also been showing me, over the course of several years, that understanding Jesus’ sacrifice at the cross, His free gift of righteousness given to us, was the key to walking in the manifestation of every blessing promised in Scripture. Children are a blessing from the Lord and Jesus alone qualified us with His sacrifice so that we might be partakers and co-heirs with Him of the blessings of the righteous (Romans 8:17). I knew our answer was tied up in learning how to rest in the finished work of the cross. I felt convinced of these things, but felt myself wondering if our journey should and would include more fertility treatments. The bottom line I was struggling with was this: How much do I do while I’m resting? How much is too much? How much is not enough? Can I just leave it in His hands and walk away?
After the three months of unsuccessful low level fertility interventions, my OBGYN referred us to one of the nation’s leading Reproductive Endocrinologists. My husband and I went in for the initial consultation. For some reason, even though my other doctor’s office had sent over my medical records, he didn’t receive them in time for my appointment. He talked to us about different fertility options and about halfway though the appointment, a nurse finally walked in with my medical records. He sat there and looked over everything. He saw the reports of the surgeries, the previous diagnoses, endometriosis and more. He closed the file folder, pushed the file across the desk and said, “Statistically, you have a 13% chance on conceiving outside of IVF.” He walked us through what that would look like. He shared how it’s important to only implant a single, genetically perfect embryo, how we could even choose gender if we wanted to get that specific. We listened, but both my husband and I had all the red flags and inner alarm bells going off shouting that this wasn’t the Lord’s plan for us.
I want to pause right here and say that I wasn’t opposed to fertility treatments or IVF. The point of my post is not to condemn anyone who made the decision to pursue those options or to assert that what we did was better. I just knew it wasn’t God’s plan for us. I had an immediate, complete absence of peace and have learned to recognize that as the Holy Spirit closing a door. With any decision in life, the MOST IMPORTANT THING is that you learn how to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit who is always leading and guiding us into all truth! He alone knows the end from the beginning and knows the right path for each of us to take. I have a friend who was able to conceive through IVF and give birth even after she had her uterus removed! The fact that this is even a possibility in our day and age is absolutely astounding and I don’t doubt for a second that the knowledge on how to do this came from the Lord Himself. When I think of her and her precious little boy, I am constantly overwhelmed with God’s goodness and lovingkindness. I am, by no means, here to discount someone else’s journey. What I do know, though, is IVF wasn’t the only way for me to have a second child. What I hope to share is what it looks like to decide to only pursue the Lord, His Word and resting in him to receive. In our current day and age of medical advancements, it has often felt to me like the road less traveled. Many times I wished I had someone to talk to who had already been on this journey of resting to receive. At the same time, I’m thankful for the growth that occurred because I had no other option, but to fully lean into the Lord. We left the appointment, got in the car, and both knew we were on the same page. IVF wasn’t going to be our story.
Driving away from that appointment, I had no idea I would be embarking on a 6 year journey of learning what it really means to trust and rest in the Lord in an area of such great desire. I had no idea how I would mature or how complete dependence on Him would pull me up to a level of intimacy with Him I had never known. All I knew was that the Lord was calling me to rest in His wisdom and to stop relying on the wisdom of man. I didn’t know I was going to become a prisoner of hope and that this would eventually give way to a a flood of joyful, confident expectation and unshakeable assurance in Him. So many good things were ahead of me and I had no idea that God had so much more than a baby in store for me. “He Who did not spare His Own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not, with Him, also freely give us all things?”(Romans 8:32). I thought the baby was the “all things,” turns out, He thinks bigger.