{"id":799,"date":"2017-03-17T15:40:11","date_gmt":"2017-03-17T15:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/?p=799"},"modified":"2017-03-17T15:50:38","modified_gmt":"2017-03-17T15:50:38","slug":"the-lucky-ones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/2017\/03\/17\/the-lucky-ones\/","title":{"rendered":"the lucky ones"},"content":{"rendered":"

I used to refer to\u00a0those who conceived easily\u00a0as “the LUCKY ones.” \u00a0I can’t even begin to count how many friends I know of who “just tried once” or “weren’t even trying” who went on to have a pregnancy without complications. \u00a0Couples who never had to know the fear that something might be wrong. \u00a0Couples who didn’t hesitate to post a big announcement on social media, because why would they? Positive pregnancy test = automatic baby 9 months later, right? \u00a0Couples who didn’t have to deal with monthly disappointment after giving it their all yet again. \u00a0Couples who didn’t have to plan their month around the “fertile window.” \u00a0I used to automatically think of those people as being \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 “the \u00a0LUCKY ones.”<\/p>\n

When we first conceived after only 3 months of trying, I used that word. \u00a0Tony was excited, but surprised. \u00a0We both knew that it could take a while, and three months of TTC was not bad at all. \u00a0I remember feeling LUCKY that our journey to parenthood was taking off\u00a0in the right direction. \u00a0And he did too. But then the spotting began, followed by the heartache. \u00a0And by the end of that month, I was feeling anything but lucky.<\/p>\n

Fast forward to\u00a0mid March\u00a0of the following year, and we find ourselves seeming to be no closer to parenthood than we were when we first started. \u00a0We still don’t have answers- \u00a0only a myriad of speculations. \u00a0And we are tired of letting this control our lives. \u00a0To say that it has caused strain in our marriage is a vast understatement. \u00a0Do we have to put in hard work every day to be able to cope with this? Absolutely. \u00a0Are there days when we feel\u00a0incredibly frustrated with each other, and with this “journey?” Absolutely. \u00a0Are there moments still where we feel defeated? Yes. \u00a0 But in this period of 16 months, I know that we have grown in faith. \u00a0We have grown in our understanding of each other. \u00a0We have grown in empathy. \u00a0I believe that we have a deeper connection to each other than we would have had if we had been one of the LUCKY ones.<\/p>\n

\"\"
St. Patrick’s Day 2012: When Tony proposed<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With all of the change coming up in our lives, I’ve started to adopt a new mantra: \u00a0“I’m living someone else’s dream.” Somewhere there are couples who dream about weeding through their possessions, packing up their lives and moving across the country. \u00a0 Somewhere there are couples who conceived “easily” who might feel cheated from having more time to grow in their relationship before their baby arrived. \u00a0Somewhere there are moms who might resent their current daily routine because it is so much harder than they ever could have imagined. \u00a0They long for “crafternoons,” hot morning coffee, the relief of a long, warm\u00a0shower, the ability to dress up for “date night” without having to worry about who is watching their children while they are gone, the luxury of a solo shopping trip to the store, the ability to be able to get on a plane and go anywhere, leaving responsibility behind. \u00a0 Somewhere there are couples\u00a0struggling with infertility who have never being able to conceive. They might call me LUCKY in that I have been able to get pregnant. \u00a0 Somewhere there are partners who have lost their loved one- someone who they dreamed of spending their entire lives with, who are longing to have their companionship back above all else. \u00a0 Somewhere there are single people looking for “the one” so they can begin their “journey to parenthood.”<\/p>\n

\"\"
3.17.2012 Engagement Day<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What does all of this mean? Heaven only knows. \u00a0But maybe in each of our own individual circumstances, there is a bit of luck peeking through the grit. \u00a0Someone, somewhere thinks that YOU are one of the LUCKY ones. \u00a0It’s easy to get buried under our own individual\u00a0struggles, our vision tunneling and focusing on what we do not have. \u00a0But how LUCKY are we to be living the life that others dream of?<\/p>\n

That- is L U C K Y.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I used to refer to\u00a0those who conceived easily\u00a0as “the LUCKY ones.” \u00a0I can’t even begin to count how many friends I know of who “just tried once” or “weren’t even trying” who went on to have a pregnancy without complications. \u00a0Couples who never had to know the fear that something might be wrong. \u00a0Couples who didn’t hesitate to post a big announcement on social media, because why would they? Positive pregnancy test = automatic baby 9 months later, right? \u00a0Couples who didn’t have to deal with monthly disappointment after giving it their all yet again. \u00a0Couples who didn’t have to plan their month around the “fertile window.” \u00a0I used to automatically think of those people as being \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 “the \u00a0LUCKY ones.” When we first conceived after only 3 months of trying, I used that word. \u00a0Tony was excited, but surprised. \u00a0We both knew that it could take a while, and three months of TTC was not bad at all. \u00a0I remember feeling LUCKY that our journey to parenthood was taking off\u00a0in the right direction. \u00a0And he did too. But then the spotting began, followed by the heartache. \u00a0And by the end of that month, I was feeling anything but lucky. Fast forward to\u00a0mid March\u00a0of the following year, and we find ourselves seeming to be no closer to parenthood than we were when we first started. \u00a0We still don’t have answers- \u00a0only a myriad of speculations. \u00a0And we are tired of letting this control our lives. \u00a0To say that it has caused strain in our marriage is a vast understatement. \u00a0Do we have to put in hard work every day to be able to cope with this? Absolutely. \u00a0Are there days when we feel\u00a0incredibly frustrated with each other, and with this “journey?” Absolutely. \u00a0Are there moments still where we feel defeated? Yes. \u00a0 But in this period of 16 months, I know that we have grown in faith. \u00a0We have grown in our understanding of each other. \u00a0We have grown in empathy. \u00a0I believe that we have a deeper connection to each other than we would have had if we had been one of the LUCKY ones. With all of the change coming up in our lives, I’ve started to adopt a new mantra: \u00a0“I’m living someone else’s dream.” Somewhere there are couples who dream about weeding through their possessions, packing up their lives and moving across the country. \u00a0 Somewhere there are couples who conceived “easily” who might feel cheated from having more time to grow in their relationship before their baby arrived. \u00a0Somewhere there are moms who might resent their current daily routine because it is so much harder than they ever could have imagined. \u00a0They long for “crafternoons,” hot morning coffee, the relief of a long, warm\u00a0shower, the ability to dress up for “date night” without having to worry about who is watching their children while they are gone, the luxury of a solo shopping trip to the store, the ability to be able to get on a plane and go anywhere, leaving responsibility behind. \u00a0 Somewhere there are couples\u00a0struggling with infertility who have never being able to conceive. They might call me LUCKY in that I have been able to get pregnant. \u00a0 Somewhere there are partners who have lost their loved one- someone who they dreamed of spending their entire lives with, who are longing to have their companionship back above all else. \u00a0 Somewhere there are single people looking for “the one” so they can begin their “journey to parenthood.” What does all of this mean? Heaven only knows. \u00a0But maybe in each of our own individual circumstances, there is a bit of luck peeking through the grit. \u00a0Someone, somewhere thinks that YOU are one of the LUCKY ones. \u00a0It’s easy to get buried under our own individual\u00a0struggles, our vision tunneling and focusing on what we do not have. \u00a0But how LUCKY are we to be living the life that others dream of? That- is L U C K Y.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":807,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-journey-to-parenthood"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/IMG_2430.jpg?fit=4032%2C3024&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8oEBX-cT","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=799"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":842,"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799\/revisions\/842"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hopemeetsjoy.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}