laughter.

March 19, 201424 Comments

They say laughter is the best medicine … and I agree! This blog has been more seriously lately and truly, I am not a Debbie Downer serious person. So I decided to spice things up with some things that have made me laugh recently. I have found that in this whole infertility journey, if you don’t learn to laugh at yourself and the situation, then you will drown quite fast. Now, I have a darker sense of humor when it comes to all of this, so if you are sensitive or feel uncomfortable laughing at the awkward, feel free to skip this post. I will post next time more in tune with my typical style of writing. But for tonight, let’s laugh.

You can thank Pinterest for this slew of infertility-related comics. (Anyone not actively TTC, you may not appreciate these as much as those who are.) Josh and I were literally in tears laughing the other day. Some of these are so true that it is nothing short of hysterical. I mean, these are the cards we have been dealt, why not make light of it every now and then? So, without further ado, happy laughing. :)

HAHAH! If you are having a hard day today, I hope this made you smile. If we don’t have the same sense of humor, then I at least hope I didn’t make you cry. <eeeeek>

Have a good night friends!

flappy bird.

March 3, 2014March 3, 201425 Comments

Hi, my name is Chelsea and I play too much Flappy Bird.

I didn’t mean to get addicted. My husband came home from a church high school retreat in January and casually asked if I had ever heard of Flappy Bird. The answer was no and as I watched him lay awake at night trying to dart a bird through some pipes, I thought, Gosh, that game is a waste of time! I didn’t even ask to try it on his phone, I was NOT going to waste my time on that silly game.

A few weeks later I saw something on Twitter about Flappy Bird disappearing the next day. What? As I investigated more, sure enough, the app creator was removing it from the iTunes store after realizing it was becoming too addictive to people.

Huh? It’s going away forever? You mean I won’t have the option to download it later? What if I decide I want to play it? Or what if I am missing out on something? And how could someone allow themselves to become addicted to a game like that? That would never happen to me …

Seconds later it was downloaded on my phone. Just in case it really did go away the next day. (Which it did.)

It started casually. One night after exhausting other mindless things to do I clicked on it. A few gentle taps and my bird dove to the ground.

New game.

Tap, tap, tap, tap tap tap, tap …

2! I made it through 2 pipes!

This was a lot harder than I thought.

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap tap tap, tap ….

Fast forward to a few weeks later. Tap, tap, tap tap tap …

Last week I laid in bed tapping, methodically trying to get my little red bird through as many pipes as possible when I was hit a challenge, I needed to blink, but I couldn’t.

Okay, not couldn’t, but wouldn’t. If I blinked I would have to take my eyes off the screen for a split second and surely would plummet to the ground. 74, 75, 76 – I was flying through the pipes, but I needed to blink! My eyes!

*Blink*

Plummet.

DANG! I knew that I had to somehow work in my ability to blink while playing the game. The next 20 minutes were spent trying to train myself to blink and play at the same time, but whenever I would think about blinking and attempting it, I would dive into a pipe. One game I got my left eye stuck trying to re-open from a blink, but was too afraid that the movement would distract me too much from the game and ended up playing a round of 85 with only my right eye. (It ended because I blinked with my right eye and well, you know the story from here, plummeted.)

I knew I had a serious problem when I sat there tapping and started to refuse to blink.

Mind over matter, keep tapping! Do. Not. Take. Your. Eyes. Off. The. Screen.

Ahhhh, my eyes! So dry! Can. Not. Blink!

Well that game ended because my contact fell out of my eye. I kid you not. Apparently blinking is not something you can just will yourself not to do.

I found my dried, shriveled contact on my blanket, I set my phone down and walked away. I will forever remember that my score of 102 was at the expense of my contact.

(proof)

But all this made me think – I fell into a moment where I could not think of or do anything other than what I was focusing on. It became impossible for me even to blink because I only allowed myself to have one thing that could hold my attention. It reminded me about how easily we can fall into that same routine when we are going through something or worrying about an issue. We can become so focused on the obstacle, the challenge, the trial, that the simplest act of living can be put on hold as we obsess over our circumstances.

My Flappy Bird experience reminded me that I have to have balance.

It can be so easy to get drawn into our Thing. I can start to focus on infertility and all that surrounds it – the what-ifs, the how-comes, the why-thems, and it’s like I forget to blink. Infertility starts to define my life instead of being a small part of what I’m facing. It was a great reminder to me that it’s okay to want something, but it’s not okay to lose myself in the process. I have to blink.

John 10:10b says “I [Jesus] came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”

Regardless of our situations, we are meant to experience life – all of life, not just one piece of it.

The definition(s) of “abundant” are as follows: richly adequate, occurring in great quantities, generously supplied, abounding.

When we tap into our great resource, our Source of joy, He is able to provide us a life that is richly abounding. It doesn’t mean we won’t have challenges – life is made up of different seasons, the good and bad, but with Him as our focus, not our circumstances, we can recognize that all of our needs are generously supplied.

I have been able to ease up on my Flappy Bird addiction. I still can’t figure out how to blink and play the game at the same time. And because of that, I am not able to enjoy the experience as much. So for the sake of my contact supply, I will cut the ties. It won’t be easy, but a balance is necessary, as is blinking. Today I encourage you, stop being consumed by your Thing. Being focused on anything other than Him will only lead to you plummeting. And, well, we all know plummeting is no fun!!

bookstores.

February 19, 2014February 19, 201422 Comments

Bookstores are one of my favorite places on earth. Every Friday as a child we would hop into our Buick LeSabre and head over to the mall bookstore. Each week I got to pick out a new book, which typically would be a Baby Sitters Club book of some sort. In 1^st grade it was the Little Sister version, of which I would burn through by the end of the night and then would have to patiently wait until the next week to get a new one. As I got older I graduated to the reading less about Karen, Nancy and Hannah and more about Kristy, Claudia and Stacey. I remember just walking the aisles, touching the pretty book bindings and crisp pages, always selecting my book from the back of the shelf, as it was likely more untouched than the others. I remember always asking for a new bookmark too, but being that I already had too many, the request typically got denied. (My go to bookmark was a Little Mermaid one in case you were wondering).

Anyways, I find bookstores to be a place of comfort now. I don’t know if it’s due to the years of hanging out among the shelves or sitting at Borders for hours on end on a Saturday, but regardless, I am convinced healing happens at bookstores. Even now, I typically will ask Josh at least a few times a month if he will just go sit at Barnes and Nobles with me. (Side note: I miss Borders, like a lot.) As I type this now, here I sit, among the cluttered tables of the café, awkwardly staring at the lady across from me on her iPad as she eats a scone. (Hey lady, you have some on your chin.) I am home. I wear headphones but have the Coffee Shop Pandora mix on low enough to still hear the conversations around me. (Airlines are so overpriced …. Hey mom, can I get this book …. What time is it? Oh wait, he is asking me that, one second….)

Books are an escape for me. I throw myself into the story, often judging a book by its cover. (I have an entire shelf of ugly covered books that I have yet to read.) One relatable line is like a balm to the day. There is beauty in the stories, even if they aren’t real. (Who am I kidding, I totally pretend like they are.)

The past month or so I have been praying for God to send me a sign, a tangible sign, that this whole journey will result in a happy ending. That this road will lead somewhere and that we will be one of those couples who looks back in 5 years and tells other couples “It is worth the wait. Hang in there.”

So I keep praying. Lord, a sign! One that even I can’t refute. Preferably one so obvious that I can’t question it. A message written in the sky would be acceptable. An anonymous letter posted marked from Heaven would also be okay. Okay maybe that all is a little extreme, but I just keep begging (literally, you should see my journal, it’s nearly embarrassing) that He would make Himself known without a shadow of a doubt.

Perhaps the sign has come. Perhaps He has answered my prayer and I have been too jaded to see it. There have been moments of quiet and brief reassurance over the last month, including a 41 day cycle for me, another first and shorter than my last one by 22 days. Many would say this was THE SIGN! A tangible response that things were improving, that the lifestyle changes and naturopathic doctor was working, but instead, I dismissed it as less powerful than it actually was.

And since enough isn’t enough, I found myself continuing to pray A sign! Lord, I need more signs! More signs! I need you to help me believe!

And then I came to this verse, in the greatest book of all times, the Bible. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet still believe.” (John 20:29b) It was the sign I had been searching for – the anti sign! The sign where He whispered to STOP LOOKING FOR A SIGN and keep looking at HIM! I had taken my eyes off of HIM and began searching upon Pinterest boards, interactions and puffs of cloud smoke for a sign and in it, lost my way.

Books are powerful. One verse, one line, changed my heart again. The power of His Word is greater than anything else. This journey isn’t about looking for signs but looking to Him. It’s about believing in His character, His goodness, His promises without knowing the future. That’s where the blessings lie. In fact, the whole story of the Bible is filled with people who believed without seeing and still moved forward out of an act of faith. It’s human to want to see what’s going to happen before we move, but we are only holding ourselves back from what He has to offer.

So, in the presence of my dear friends, the books, I pledge to stop obsessively asking for signs. I pledge to have faith without knowing how this story ends. I pledge to embrace the pain, the struggles, the unknowns and never give up. With His help, I can do this!

Oh my goodness, this woman a few tables down just stood up to leave and her purse strap caught under the table and she just flipped it. I can’t stop laughing. My blog concentration has officially just been broken. And I am pretty sure this guy is about to ask out the girl next to me. One more hair flip from her and it’s inevitable. Ahhhh, bookstore dramas ….

(Update: She casually threw into a story that she never wants to get married and isn’t like her friends, who wants a real relationship. This conversation is winding down quickly ….)

awards and randomness.

February 4, 201413 Comments

My thoughts have been scattered recently. I don’t have a full post with direction and after sitting on that fact for over 2 weeks, I realize that my posts don’t have to be perfect, nor do they have to have a lengthy point. So today I simply bring you some randomness and a TTC update – and with it I will hopefully break out of my no posting rut!!

While unintentionally away, I was nominated for 3 blogging awards, so fun! I gotta admit, I felt like dancing around like the dad from Christmas Story shouting “I won, I won, I won!” I mean, blogging love feels like I a warm hug, so thank you to these awesome ladies who thought of me.

My friend over at Tales of a Twin Mombie nominated me for the Liebster Award and instructed me to answer the ten questions she created as part of the nomination. Since I have a few other questions to answer with the other awards, I picked my favorite 5 questions – here you go!

What led you to start your blog and how long have you been blogging?

I started blogging in the spring of 2012 (which seems like yesterday and an eternity ago, all at the same time) simply based on the fact that I felt called to share our story and struggle with others. It took a while, in fact I had the website registered for almost 6 months before taking the plunge, but am so glad I did. It has blessed my life SO much. In fact, in a few more posts, I will be celebrating my 100^th entry! Whoa!

If you could recommend a MUST READ, what would it be and why?

I am a READER. Anyone who knows me can attest to that. My books are well loved, often dressed in crinkled pages as a result of being dropped in the bathtub or tossed into a purse. So to narrow it down to ONE must read!? I can’t image. But one of my favorite books to read is Blue Bistro by Elin Hildebrand. There is something about her writing that I love (her older work especially) and I am a foodie too, so this is a perfect blend of all things great. Another recommendation of a good book that you can laugh and cry (okay, bawl) to is Firefly Lane by Kristin Hannah. Oh and Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers. Actually anything by her is fantastic. For Christian books on infertility I highly recommend Hannah’s Hope by Jennifer Saake.

I better stop now. If you ever need a book recommendation though, just shoot me a message and I would love to make some suggestions.

When you are feeling stressed out, what is something that almost always works to calm you?

Quiet time. This most typically can be fulfilled in a coffee shop, bookstore, or bathtub. Introverted time to myself, preferably with a tea or latte, a journal and a Bible, refills my bucket and calms me down.

What do you admire the most about your husband?

I could go on and on! But simply put, I admire his cheerful attitude and his ability to see the glass even more half full than me. He rarely has a down day, is someone who just wakes up chipper and ready to embrace the day and will never let himself sulk into negativity. He reminds me of the positives and blessings on tough days and has such an optimistic spirit. He is the BEST. (Plus he is a stud, so win win!)

What is your guilty pleasure? Something you shouldn’t indulge but just have to sometimes?

French fries and real sugar lattes. Both of which don’t go with my eating habit changes so it’s been a little tough.

The other award I was nominated for is the Sunshine Award which is an award granted by fellow bloggers to whom they feel bring sunshine to their lives. How sweet and special! These ladies at Team Ricci and Waiting for Baby Bird gave me this award and with it, several more questions to answer – here are a few!

What is one of your favorite quotes?

I have been finding myself scribbling down quotes and reminders lately and posting them around my kitchen. While I have many favorite quotes, here are two are my scribbles from last week!

Where is your favorite vacation spot?

Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Every spring Josh and I are blessed to be able to vacation with his family and have fallen in love with our home away from home each year. This year will be our 10^th year down there together (more for Josh) and its one of my favorite, relaxing spots! Plus they have a STARBUCKS so it’s pretty much perfection.

Provide 5 RANDOM facts about yourself. (Is it sad that I had to recruit Josh to help me with this? My mind drew a complete blank.)

I am becoming an awful text and email responder. I typically don’t love phone calls. The older I get, the more I value one-on-one, face to face time with people (preferably over a caffeinated beverage) and less and less the technology version of them.
I love coffee mugs. Each one tells a story of where you got it or who gave it to you. Josh on the other hand doesn’t love all my coffee mugs since our cabinet is out of room and he has had more than one come crashing down on him.
I am an introverted morning person. I don’t like to talk for at least an hour after waking up. In fact, Cali and I typically don’t acknowledge each other until we have both been awake for quite a while. I will wake up an hour earlier than Josh on the weekends simply to have my quiet time before his energy explodes.
I don’t like to be spooked or startled intentionally and when scared, I will immediately begin crying. Josh has learned this the hard way as he loves a good “BOO!”. Please do not see this as an invitation to scare me either. It does not go over well.
Having fresh flowers in my house is a must. I love flowers.

Now I would love to pass along the love and nominate 3 girls whose blogs I just love and whom are creative and beautiful authors! Check them out!

Girls, all you have to do is mention who nominated you and answer these 5 questions to help your bloggers get to know you better!

Do you have any furbabies? If so, share a picture and tell us about them!
What is your favorite warm beverage to drink? Do you have a favorite coffee shop spot?
What is your favorite Bible verse?
Tell us about how you met your spouse.
What would your perfect day look like?

I also wanted to say thanks to all those who remembered our should-have-been due date last Monday. I was so blessed by the amazing kindness of those who checked in. And thanks to a sweet somebody, we even received these beautiful flowers from our babies.

I also received some beautiful jewelry handcrafted by my friend Martha. One of my favorite things are these tokens she designed. They are filled with some of my favorite verses, words of encouragement and symbols of hope. She has an Etsy shop filled with gorgeous work and is currently saving towards her 5^th IVF cycle, all while dealing with being the wife of a deployed husband and mother of a heaven-held daughter who left this world too soon. Here is the link to her shop – I urge you to check her out and support a great cause!

Lastly, a small TTC update – I have been experiencing some weird pains and symptoms since stopping IVF and have been trying to track that and determine what may be normal, what may be from PCOS, what may be from my body working to try to heal itself, and what isn’t right. The other day I decided it would be best to check in with my OB just to check things out. We don’t have many answers yet but I was able to get in and have things looked at. We were able to, for the most part, rule out really scary things like cancer, fibroids, tumors and polyps and I was thankful that my labs and ultrasounds didn’t show anything of immediate concern. She did express a little unease that one of my ovaries was swollen up about 30% larger than it should be and that there’s a cyst that’s just a bit larger than normal. While we don’t know for sure if it’s what’s causing the pain, we will keep an eye on it for the next 4 weeks and rerun some tests then. It has all been placed it in His hands and we are feeling comfortable with the game plan. We haven’t really talked about it with anyone simply because we really don’t know much and it’s just a small web of unknowns. I share this with you simply to ask for prayers for healing and wisdom and still, would prefer not to talk about it.

Well, for not having a lot to say, I certainly filled up the page! How about I don’t wait 2 and a half weeks to post again. Mkay, I’ll work on that. Until next time!

scabs.

January 22, 201427 Comments

When I was younger my mom always told me not to pick my scabs. “They are going to scar if you pick them. Then you will have them your whole life.” I remember always looking at my scrapped knee or my skinned elbow and wondered if that was really true. Would I have a permanent scar? Why couldn’t I just pick them a little? The only thing I knew about scars was from my chicken pox marks dabbled around my legs, because apparently I couldn’t keep my little fingers away from them. But the unknowns about this for the rest of your life scar threat would be enough to hold me off from picking the scab, at least for a few days.

But I could never resist. I never would pick the whole scab at once. First it would just start with a little corner. A small chunk stuck under my fingernail and of course, I would start bleeding. I was always nervous I would be caught. But I would only pick that one tiny spot. No one would notice. I actually remember having the words “It just fell off” ready to go if I was asked.

But I never could stop with just one part of the scab. Once I started, I had an invitation to start picking more of it. Before I knew it, the whole scab was ripped off, my knee was all bloody and I was frantically trying to hide it as to avoid another scarring lecture.

My willpower to resist was never really good. I didn’t want to want to pick the scab, but when tempted with its crusty covering, I rarely said no. I know some of you are cringing right now and you were probably the kid who didn’t find immense satisfaction in picking their scabs. I salute you.

You may be wondering why I am talking about this. Well, I had a bad day the other day. It was the end of the week, one of those weeks that had far too many pregnancy announcements smushed within a short period of time. They flew in like hot cakes, one on top of the other, stacking higher and higher. A phone call, a facebook message, a newsfeed announcement, a text … each one caught me off guard. Don’t get me wrong, I am genuinely happy for each one of them. They have to opportunity to start or expand their family, have made it through the scary first trimester and are able to begin celebrating with others. As someone on this side of things, I am grateful for the pain they don’t have to endure as a result of wanting to be pregnant and not being able to be. But with every announcement and joy filled response, I allowed self pity to seep into my spirit. The recipe for my poor attitude is as follows:

Mix 1 part complaining pregnant friends with 2 parts of poor sleep. Add in 1 caffeine headache and combine with another pregnancy announcement. Add a dash of gray skies and take away any signs of sunshine. Top it off with a sprinkle of feeling sorry for yourself and you have the perfect recipe for a blah day!

I laid in bed the other night, fully acknowledging my funk. I was a little mad that Josh wasn’t validating my cranky attitude and followed up my miserable comments with reminders about contentment and gratitude. The hard part was that I knew he was right. It isn’t like me to get so down and I truthfully am blaming some of it on the depressing Minnesota winter. (I need sunshine!!!). But here’s what happened. I started to pick the scab on my heart.

As soon as I started with the “woe is me, it will never be me” thoughts, I picked the corner of the scab that was covering my heart. I actually remember thinking “Don’t do this. Don’t go there. Don’t sit in this funk. You know better. You are stronger than this. Stop! Stop! Stop!” But the devil on my shoulder, the one that knew to attack me at 11:00 pm after a long week whispered the words “Go big or go home. Pick it. Pick the scab.”

And I hate to say it, but I picked.

I realize how stupid this sounds, but I intentionally laid there thinking about everything I was sad about.

My January 27^th due date. Next week. I should be 39 weeks pregnant right now. I should be getting ready to go into labor.

My last due date – September 2. I should have a 4 and a half month old.

How grateful I would be to have any baby I was blessed enough to carry.

Words said that were not meant to be hurtful, but hurt. Stewing over the pain the words caused.

(I won’t continue because I don’t need to go there again – you get the picture.)

So I laid there, miserable and of course crying, and I kept thinking STOP PICKING THE SCAB. One side of my brain begin to list all the blessings I had, which are an enormous amount, and the bully side said “Do that tomorrow. Let’s keep thinking of things we are sad about.”

Our scabs are meant to be protective coverings over wounds. Coverings created so that our body can heal. But on this night, I didn’t want to be healing. I wanted to sit and stare at my bloody heart and recall the pain I was in.

It was so stupid. No one should ever intentionally try to inflict pain on themselves. I look back now and regret it, because it set my heart backwards. My heart now is trying to rebuild the scab and the words of pain, discouragement and frustration will now find it easier to penetrate as that protective covering is thinner.

Here’s the lesson I learned though – we have to let the scab heal. We can’t pick it daily. We can’t fill our day with negative thoughts, replaying hurtful comments, and spend time feeling sorry for ourselves. Because if we do that, we will never get to the point where our scab heals and our wounds are strong enough to resist picking. If we continue to pick away at our hearts, they will scar. We will turn into bitter people, people who can only see the glass as half empty and spend far too much time feeling sorry for ourselves.

We were never created to live life like that.

We are called to be people filled with joy. Filled with kindness. We are called to be thankful to our Father for everything He has blessed us with and stop looking at everything we want differently. What an insult it is to our Creator when we constantly tell Him the plan that He artfully created for our life isn’t good enough. We want THEIR plan!!! Wahhh! And little do we know, but those people are crying Wahhh, we want THEIR plan! It’s a domino effect of wanting when we lose contentment with what we have. Sure, we may have suffered losses – the loss of a job, the loss of a marriage, the loss of a child, the loss of a dream or reality we wished for – but I think we far too often equate contentment with happiness. Because the truth is, we will never be fulfilled with the earthly things we desire. A baby ISN’T going to make my life more joyfilled. Sure, I may feel it will fill a hole of longing, but I know with it will come more needs, wants, worries …. The secret to life is being content in HIM.

I think true contentment is the bandaid to the heart. It is what will stop the temptation from picking the scab and it’s what will allow us to heal.

I love the Message translation of Philippians 4:11-13. It says:

“I’ve learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little. I’ve found the recipe for being happy whether full or hungry, hands full or hands empty. Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am.”

What powerful words! The incredible thing about this passage is that Paul was writing this letter from prison. Midst the many trials in his life, many so extreme that we will never face, he knew that he could be content only with Christ.

As my heart scab begins to mend, I am thankful to be reminded that the source of my satisfaction, my strength, my hope, and my joy is in Him alone. All the things we desire may be good things, but only Jesus can satisfy.

Don’t pick your scab today. I wish I had been strong enough that night to resist the temptation to rip it off. Sitting in misery does NOTHING for your joy and will only set yourself backwards. Next time I am tempted, I will pick up my phone and scroll through the verses I have bookmarked in my YouVersion Bible app and find strength in HIM.

There you go. That’s enough scab talk for the day. Just be thankful I didn’t include any scab visuals. Ewwwwww.

Now the time you have all been waiting for …. The winner of my first Blog Giveaway! I loved how many people participated – we had over a few hundred entries! But without further ado, congratulations to my dear friend and follower Amie F. on being the randomly selected winner! I will contact you shortly to finalize the mailing.

Now, let’s get out there and have a good day! Stop right now and think of 5 things you are thankful for. If you need accountability to do this, list them in the comment section. Five things. Let’s stew in gratitude today. We are so blessed.