It's pretty steady throughout the year, but once Autumn comes around, it's like a semi-automatic magazine of pain being emptied in your face daily. Halloween. Thanksgiving. Christmas. All back to back to back. The posts from your family and friends are really just a reminder of weight of your own burden of infertility. So costumed children and pregnant bellies decorated like pumpkins with body paint are no longer giggle-worthy photo opportunities. They are seemingly visual proof of the blessings you prayed for that God hasn't granted you.
You struggle with how you can feel so awful about your own circumstances and yet still be happy for all of those with such joyful blessings at the same time. You wrestle with trying to ignore all of the nasty rotten.e.cards that tell you how "jealous you should be" that their children are so adorable. Throwback Thursday stops seeming like fun at all and you cringe in anticipation of it. You barely even see all the arguing about whether Halloween and All Saints Day are in direct contrast to each other. No amount of theological discussion can distract from the babies anyway...
The truth is that I would give anything to make a Halloween costume for a pudgy little baby this year. But it's not to be. I find myself wondering how to even communicate with family and friends these days because of the great divide between us that is children.
With all of that in mind, I created this photo. Feel free to share it anywhere you like. Maybe 75% of us can show a little love to the 25% of us. Maybe that isn't too much to ask?
