The bulk of 2013 was really tough for me. I have been having such a difficult time coping with my infertility issues, and with depression clouding all of my thoughts. I have half of my brain telling me I can’t conceive because of bad things I’ve done in my past, that I don’t deserve it. The other half is telling me the science and biology behind it, and on top of that, getting pregnant is a gamble anyway. Every day is a constant battle in my head and in my heart, and well, it’s exhausting. I get days like yesterday where I was just tired of the fighting, tired of the negativity.
And then something magical happened yesterday. I let it go. I got out of my head and chased and tickled my son. I stop paying attention to the fighting and started exchanging dumb jokes with my husband. I have decided, thanks to Elsa from Frozen and my husband, that 2014 is the year of proactivity. 2014 will be the year I choose the way my life will go. I will no longer hide or live in fear. “Conceal, don’t feel,” has been a part of my life for far too long, and now I’m done. My life will now be spent testing the limits and breaking through.
It’s time for me to break through the restrictions and bonds I have latched on myself. That’s right, I said myself. I have let my grief from my miscarriages and the doubts from my struggles with infertilities bind me and lock up my life. I have chosen to let my pain rule me. It’s a horrible way to live life, and I want no part of it. I’ve realized that you have to one day choose to not let the grief win. One day, you need to look your depression and problems in the eye and tell them they’re not welcome anymore.
Testing my limits will be, for me at least, much more difficult. My limits are imposed upon myself by fear and the feeling of worthlessness. I’ve lived a good part of my life feeling like I don’t deserve my dreams, because that just wasn’t written in my story. And if I’m being perfectly honest, a lot of my dreams will never be a part of my story. I understand that point fine, but achieving my wildest dreams isn’t my goal here. My goal is to choose to hope for them. Something I’ve realized lately is that hope is a choice, and a scary and difficult choice at that. Choosing to hope means willing to let your heart get broken. One of my worst fears is the fear of hoping so high, and then getting let down. Personally, I feel like that is one of the worst feelings in the world. And because of this fear, I started to live my life without hope. I didn’t realize that a life without hope would be so bland, so grey. If you don’t have hope, you don’t have anything to look forward to, you don’t have anything to work towards. Instead, you live your life just floating through the abyss, with no real purpose. Why bother really living your life if you have nothing to live for?
That’s where I was for most of the second half 2013. That is where I hope to never be again. Unfortunately, being parents of loss and victims of infertility, we have this great excuse to be grim and negative. After all, life has been more than unfair to us. We go out on the internet in search of other people to be negative with, because we don’t want to feel alone. That’s all well and good to a point, but what happens when you don’t want the negativity anymore? What happens when you wake up and the world seems bright and new? It’s hard to remember what life was before loss. It’s hard to imagine when your loss is new that you’ll ever see the sunny side of life again. The difference is realizing that you can choose to hope. You can choose to open your heart again to the world, and yes, even be broken again, because, well, living your life afraid, isn’t really living at all.
It’s terrifying choosing to hope and not letting pain rule my life, but not as terrifying as the thought of going through life without it. I’m done letting fear and negativity and helplessness rule my life. This year will be filled with moments I capture and hold onto forever. This year will be filled with moments of unimaginable beauty that I will see, because I will no longer be hidden behind my grief. It’s time I pull up my bootstraps and live my life to the fullest. Who’s with me?!
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