Bringing Home Emmanuel Part 12: My Sister's Mid-Winter Wedding

That January my little sister was getting married.  I had never met her fiance, but I was traveling to Northern Michigan from Central New York to be part of the wedding.  I hadn't really seen my sister in a year, and, for many reasons, I was very nervous.  My sister and I were very close, but had fallen out of touch over that year.  The whole story is for another blog post entirely, but, all that to say, I had been afraid that our relationship was never going to be what it was.  Some arguments between family members never recover.  Thankfully ours did, and we are just as close as we were, if not closer.  But I had been dealing with so much on my own that I was very nervous about how I would handle the whole wedding week.

It didn't take long for Necole (my sister) and I to pick up right where we had left off.  We discovered long ago that we just can't stay mad at each other.  Preparing for the wedding was fun.  I enjoyed spending all the time with my family and making decorations and getting to know my new brother-in-law, Dan.  It was nice to almost take my mind off of everything for a time.  I was able to not just "put on a good face," but actually enjoy myself and be happy.

I know it may seem ridiculous that I was so depressed, but there are so many factors that played into how I felt.  It wasn't just a matter of "infertility," but years of suppressed feelings that had built up.  But again, another blog post (or series of posts) entirely.

I remember that week, I saw a lot of family and friends who I hadn't seen in a long time. I cannot count the amount of people who said things like, "Char, you look so thin" or "Are you eating? You're so skinny." I knew I had lost weight, but I didn't want to talk about my depression or the circumstances around it. My most typical response was, "I have been sick." Which was actually true. I actually read Proverbs 13: 12 this past week, which says, "Hope deferred makes the heart sick."  Reading that reminded me of this time of my life. Over those past few months I had been so emotionally sick that it affected me physically. I had no appetite and I had a hard time keeping food down. I remember my parents even suggesting that maybe low body fat had contributed to my infertility. They said, "well, Char, you are really very thin..."

It was around that time that I had done some reading on the grieving process. Among the many emotions I tried to pinpoint, was the feeling of "grief." I had a hard time understanding how I could be "grieving," though. I had written in a journal entry:

        Some days, more lately, I feel like I’m in a "grieving," or a "mourning" period.  That is the best way I can explain it.  I looked up the words “grieve” and “mourn” in the dictionary and found words like, "to distress mentally" and "to feel great sorrow."  Yes, that explains my feelings.  But, there were also things like, "to lament for the dead" and "feelings of misfortune, loss, or anything regretted."  I haven’t lost anything.  But if that is true, why do I feel like I have?
        I have been grieving a loss.  Or, at least that is what it feels like.  But how can you grieve the loss of something you never had?  I don’t know how, but I do know the feeling.  It’s the feeling of missing a person that you have never met.  But how does that make any sense either?  Again, it doesn’t, but I understand the feeling.
        Especially lately, I feel like I am mourning the loss of a baby that never has existed.  I really don’t like feeling sad, and most times I’m fine.  Usually I cry a little, or sometimes not at all, and then I face the day, week, next month and keep on trying.  But not lately.

I can see myself suppressing so many feelings in this part of the entry.  I feel like I expressed an emotion, then told myself it was wrong.  I couldn't make rational sense of my feelings, so they seemed pointless and meaningless.  Also, I think because my pain didn't seem like a big deal to others, I did all I could to convince myself that it wasn't a big deal to me either... even internally. 

I got tired of opening up to people about how emotionally difficult infertility was, and being told that I lacked faith.  Being told that my pain was a direct result of my lack of love and trust in the Lord.  I couldn't agree with that.  I did trust God... but by present circumstance hurt.  I knew God would one day wipe away every tear and remove every sorrow, but not now.  People didn't seem to understand that or be empathetic to it.  So I buried it.  I put on the best face I could and made myself stone so no one could hurt me with their words.  I know now that I did more harm than good, but I just didn't know any other way to protect myself.