On My Heart: The aftermath

I celebrated my first official Mother's Day last Sunday. 

Matt let me go back to sleep after Brighton nursed and while she napped later that morning, he surprised me with a new bicycle, a gift card, a cute little sundress and donuts for a late breakfast. Later that day, we piled into the car and headed to the local green way, where we rode our bikes, pulling Brighton behind us in one of those amazing kid bike trailers, the sun on our shoulders. We ate a simple picnic under a large tree at my favorite park, pushed our baby in the swings, laid in the sun for a bit, then headed home. After Brighton went to bed for the night, Matt cooked us pork chops and roasted potatoes and brussel sprouts and we just enjoyed each other's company.

So it was a close to perfect day.

And while it was close to perfect, there was something nagging at me the entire time. While I enjoyed the presents and the food and the sun and my husband, and of course, my daughter's company, I kept thinking back to all the Mother's Days before this. Each one leading up to last year, felt worse than the last, and I felt all at once relieved to not be in the same place, but also guilty to not be in the same place.

There is a solidarity that comes with suffering. No one tells you this while you're in it, and it's hard to sense it because suffering is a tricky beast that makes you feel isolated. But when you find another human who has suffered in a similar way, you instantly feel a kinship with them. Infertility, while a horrible, shame-inducing, maddening disease, had it's own blessings - it brought about some of the most amazing connections, relationships and encouragements in my life. I have met so many women with the same diagnosis and to hear their stories was to hear my own heart spoken over and over again. Infertility became a weird sisterhood to me and there were times when I felt more connected with the women I knew through that vehicle than my closest friends.

When I became a mother, I felt like I broke that sisterhood. Everyone wants to be out of the infertility sorority because we all want to be parents, but there is a guilt factor that I didn't expect. I was elated to be pregnant, to have finally beaten my diagnosis, but as I celebrated and rejoiced in my miracle, I was also acutely aware of how hard this would be for my sisterhood. They wanted what I wanted, and they wanted me to have it too, but they also felt envy and jealousy and anger for every one of us who received it. I know because I felt all those things as I watched some of these women overcome the dreaded "I" word through pregnancy and I was left behind.

Let me be clear: I love my daughter. I love her more than I thought it would be possible to love another human being. She brings life to my heart every day, but her presence reminds me, more often that I'd prefer to admit, that I suffered long to have her with me. I would do it all over again if it meant she was to be part of our family, but I cannot forget what it took to bring her here to us. I feel guilty for loving her so much and I feel guilty for delighting in her in such a public way and I feel guilty for the gift of her life when so many women are not mothers and who so desperately want to be.

I know I have lost some of my credibility in the infertility community as I am no longer childless, but I am still haunted by it. Infertility was too long of a part of my life for me to so easily forget. I still look for that woman at every dinner party, at every coffee date, at every girls night out - the one that I can see myself in that cringes ever so slightly or fakes an interested smile when the conversation turns to motherhood, or birth, or breastfeeding or pre-school selection. I look for her and I feel the need to protect her because there is nothing worse than a reminder that hope is deferred and your heart is sick and it seems that everyone around you is totally ignorant as to how hard it is to not burst into tears or throw a plate at a wall every time someone brings up the subject of babies.

I used to be that fragile woman. At times, I still am. And so my burden is this: I loved being celebrated and celebrating the joy of motherhood on a nationally recognized holiday, but I hated that there are so many women out there that for whom this day is an awful reminder of what they do not have and why they do not have it.

No one ever talks about the aftermath of Mother's Day. For those celebrated it brings back sweet memories, but for those who have waited so long for that title of Mother, the day was just another of suffering, this time amplified by a thousand greeting cards, and Facebook updates and flower commercials and Instagram pictures of babies. Every year on Mother's Day while we were struggling through infertility, I lost my shit. I cannot help but remember the deep ache of longing, the self-induced shame and the constant tears. It was inelegant and ugly and I have been trying to come back from days like that ever since.

Mother's Day will most likely have it's difficult moments for me forever. I will enjoy it, I will treasure the appreciation from my husband and daughter, and I will thank God for giving me the chance to be a mama; but I can't forget all the Mother's Days that were filled with grief and I cannot forget that there are still so many, too many, who are struggling for the title of mother.