Half Empty, Half Full
I feel like half a woman, because the whole of me does not work.
Eat wholefoods they say, exercise 3 times a week, do 30 minutes a day, vitamin, supplements,
And Youtube videos on ‘How to get pregnant quick’ tricks.
Visits to the GP, Gynaecologist and fertility clinics,
All to get you here.
In the meantime, I’ve got to deal with their silent glares and awkward shots of outbursts,
‘When are you going to have children?’.
In their innocent and reflexive assumptions is the ammunition to exhaust my robotic response to a frazzled,
‘When the time is right!’.
While I hold back tears, in an attempt to somewhat resemble a juxtaposed salty grin, slowly dying within.
When are you going to have children? Yet I may have no man to have them with.
When are you going to have children? Struggling with my reproductive health, because it’s driving the expectation of conception to a destination far from my reality.
Perhaps I discover that I am infertile or my partner is sterile,
My pregnancy was ectopic and I’ve just had a miscarriage.
So No, I don’t really fancy seeing another pregnant woman parading her bump or being invited to another baby shower/gender reveal to celebrate her becoming a new mum,
Or hearing another woman talking about secondary infertility, when I’m in my primary,
I haven’t even had the first one!
Or listening to advice about fertility treatments, popping pills and how to kick start my menstrual cycle and ovulation,
Or questions like ‘Have you considered Adoption?’
No. I just want to be a Mum.
I feel like half a woman, because the whole of me does not work,
My body plagued like the Black Death, during the unprecedented fertile years of my life,
Ring a ring of Roses, a pocket full of Posies,
A tissue, a tissue, my dreams fall down.
And now I have to pick up the Daisies, the fallen petals of my womanhood,
Reminding myself that I still have not conceived, yet alone given birth to a child, to read this Nursery Rhyme.
Nor do I want to hear comments about how I’ve put on weight, got acne, oily skin or hair on my face,
Or asked whether I am pregnant, just because I look it, when in actual fact my hormones are out of whack, and my body is inflammed.
The diagnosis could be fibroids, PCOS, Blocked Tubes, Pre-Menopause and Endometriosis.
So pardon me, if I behave in a certain way, while I walk through the process of:
Depression, Anxiety, Anger, Resentment,
Unforgiveness, Shame, Blame, Feeling Offended,
Jealousy, Comparison, Guilt, Discontentment,
Numbness, Loneliness, Helplessness and Rejection.
A wise man put it this way,
“Those areas and times in which the death of a dream or vision seems to stalk your every move,
Are nothing more than entrances into the next realm of your life, to becoming the new you.
Do not run from them, embrace them.
God is not burying you, he wants you to bear more fruit and he is planting you for richer soil”.
So I need you to know, that the presence of a child, does not make you whole.
As a baby is formed in utter seclusion and woven together in the dark of the womb, so it is with the seed of your faith.
Through this trial, God has the ability and willingness to not only open his hand, but to hide you in the cleft of his grace.
You are a whole woman, even it looks like the whole of you does not work.
Your glass is not half empty. Your glass is half full.
Written by La’Neshia Hinds
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