Did You Ever?

Did you ever want something so bad that you felt like your heart was going to burst if you didn't get it? Maybe you want a certain job or you dream of moving to a certain city. Me? I've always wanted to be a mom. Nothing else has ever been more important to me. Ever since I was a little girl I've dreamt of the day that I would become a mom. I think this partly drives my passion to become a teacher. Teachers can be like a third parent to their students and can carry a great deal of influence in their lives. I love children and the thought of being able to be the good and loving example in even just a few of their lives fills my heart with joy. But my passion for teaching has never overshadowed my ultimate dream of having a family one day.

As a woman, we are told that speaking out about our periods is unladylike and something that we should almost be ashamed of and if I'm being honest, it has kept me from writing about this for the past few months, but today I am sharing my story. I was 9 the first time that I had my period. It was irregular and traumatizing to say the least. I was 12 whenever I started birth control because I was on Accutane to combat my cystic acne. This kept my periods regular but the side effects of the Accutane was hard for a junior high girl to navigate. I did 2 rounds of Accutane and by the time I was 14, I had decided that I did not want to continue Accutane for a third time if my acne came back again. I stayed on birth control even after the Accutane because it kept my periods regular, something that my body had still not figured out yet. My mom and I had always chalked the irregularity of my periods up to the fact that I was in sports and my activity plus the stress of school prevented my body from having a period naturally. When I was 16, my pediatrician told me that I had PCOS and so along with some weight loss medicine, she continued to prescribe me birth control so that I could have a consistent period. My acne had calmed down with the continued use of birth control and with the use of a face wash that did not irritate my skin.

I eventually moved to college and struggled with bouts of anxiety and depression, although I did everything that I could to keep these insecurities to myself. Shortly after finishing my freshman year of college, I decided that I wanted to help fix my body, not just continue to slap a bandaid on the problem so I quit birth control after being on it for all of my teenage years. I was curious to see how my body was going to react. Would it finally be able to regulate itself now that I was an adult? Would my acne flair? Would I feel less moody? After stopping the birth control, my period came and went, my acne flared, but I felt 10x better mentally, so I decided that if having acne was the cost I paid to feeling more mentally secure, then that was a cost I was willing to pay. But the next several months after stopping birth control also came and went, except there was one thing missing, my period. Each month, I had the acne flairs, the moodiness, the bloating, the cramps, but just no physical period. I quickly became aware what this would mean for my dream of becoming a mother because no period could possibly mean no ovulation. Now, I know that there are plenty of women out there with PCOS who have babies but I also know that there are plenty of women with PCOS who struggle and some who just don't. Even with this knowledge, I had a gut feeling that something was wrong with me so I began to pray about the situation and I began asking God to take away my desire to be a mother if it was not in His will for me. And you know what He did? He intensified my desire. So I talked to my mom and I began taking note of when I was suppose to have a period, when I was cramping from what I can only assume is an ovarian cyst, and how bad my acne was. I found an OB near me and in December I expressed my concerns to her and she immediately gave me some medicine to force my body to have a period because not having one for so long is unhealthy and she told me to schedule an ultrasound so that we could see what is going on inside of me.

Well the Spring semester came and was busier than ever between school and work and I just kept forgetting to schedule the ultrasound. Finally, my mom asked me a hard question. Was I not scheduling the appointment because I was forgetting or was I not scheduling it because I was scared of what I might find out? That really forced me to evaluate things and I came to the conclusion that I was going to have to have this ultrasound sooner or later so it might as well be now. So in May, I called and scheduled it. Over the past 2 months, I have stressed, cried, prayed, and impatiently waited for what seemed like an eternity for this appointment to arrive and now that it is almost here, I cannot wait for it to be over. If you've read my previous posts then you know that I am a planner, down to the smallest detail and so during this season, I have really had to relinquish control of my future to God. I have been praying that the doctor tells me that everything is ok and that there is a simple solution, but I have also been praying a harder prayer, that He would be glorified in the situation and that His will would be done.

So I know that this was a heavier post but I wanted to be real and right now, this is what is real for me. It has been the thing that has been on my heart and mind all Summer, the thing that keeps me up at night, and the thing that has pushed me to rely on God more. And even though I am no where near ready to have a baby right now, I am wanting to make sure that everything is in order for when that time comes. And as an old mentor has said to me, "tough times don't last, tough people do," and boy, do I serve a tough God. So I know that these fears will not have reign over my life and that gives me hope for tomorrow.