Family Pictures

I may get an award for the worst blogger.  Trying to write a book and keep up a blog is for the birds.  I am not a good multi-tasker.  I can either write a book or a blog.  Not both :)  The good news is that I am actually rocking the whole writing a book part.  I have a few marathon writing sessions where I have penned quite a bit in the last few weeks.  I am on target to finish the writing part in the next month!

When I write I usually like to look for a time in my schedule when I can at least get a couple of hours that are uninterrupted.  Not an easy feat for me at all!  I spend some time in prayer to get in the right mind set.  Sometimes I look back through journals or old pictures to help bring my memories to the front of my mind.  My editor, Rachael, says she can tell when I am literally taken back to a moment in time.  My writing will go from past tense to present tense without me even realizing it.  Have I mentioned that I have an awesome editor that works like a dog to turn my ramblings into a masterpiece?  I am sure you can tell because I don't bog her down with blog posts.  This is Steph Unfiltered...Unedited.

Anyway...today I had an entire day while the kids were at school that I could devote to writing.  It was my day off from teaching, no volunteering at the kids' school, no groceries that needed to be bought (thank you very much Eric!)  The house needed to be cleaned, but we have learned to live in filth already anyway.  I had a whole day to focus on finishing up my 7th Chapter of "Full Heart Empty Womb."  Hear the angels sing Hallelujah!  Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

I spent the majority of the day taken back to the hell that was my life last year.  Stress, surgeries, failed cycles, failed fertility treatments all while trying to be a good wife to Eric and a good mother to the three children that I did have.  (What??  You are doing fertility treatments and you have three kids??  Are you crazy????  It's a long story.  Read the book ;)  I finally stopped writing about an hour before I had to go to pick up the kids from school.  I had to have time to pull myself together so I didn't roll up to the school looking all Night of the Living Dead.

When I got the kids home, I pulled up a slide show my sweet friend, Ginger, made for me.  She took family pictures for us on Saturday night.  We were long over due.  The only professional family picture we had was before Matthew was born.  Ethan and Ella weren't even walking yet.  I was going to get Ginger to take family pictures a couple of years ago but decided to wait.   I just knew that 2013 promised a new baby (or 2!) for us.  I didn't want to have a family picture instantly outdated again.

I sat and watched the pictures of my sweet family scroll on my laptop with "Hallelujah" by Johnnyswim playing in the background.  What were once sad tears from a couple of hours before turned to happy grateful tears.  I looked at Ethan's beautiful smile that literally lights up his entire face.  I looked at Ella's beautiful eyes that go straight to my soul.  I melted at Matthew's sweet dimples and saw his little personality shine through.  Then I saw the pictures of Eric and I and felt the love between us.  She even took a couple of head shots of me for the Author's page and a possible shot for my book cover.  Tears openly fell down my cheeks as I looked at the pictures with them.  We had a nice chat about happy tears after that!









The tears transformation was kind of like quick snapshot of the healing that has taken place in my over the last year.  I never lost sight of the blessings that God had given us even during the hard times last year.  Even on the hardest of days, I could hold and snuggle one of my sweet babies and thank God.  But it took me a whole year to understand and accept that although there are blessings there is also pain in life.  Everyone goes through hard times and everything won't go the way we hope, plan or even pray for.  We are imperfect people in an imperfect world.  I can choose to stay in the sadness of last year and be bitter or I can move forward.

Through a lot of prayer I decided this Spring to write a book about the near ten year battle that my husband, Eric, and I have gone through with Infertility.  Infertility is a taboo subject for some reason. Which I find interesting because it affects 1 in 8 couples.  I understand that it is too painful for many who are going through it to talk about it openly.  Here is where I come in.  God has somewhat divinely removed my filter on the subject.  Quite Simply - I DON'T CARE.  I get the approval of my God and my man before I share anything I write and that's all I need.  There are lots of people out there who are hurting and feel alone.  Heck I was one of them this time last year.  I was hurting. I felt like no one understood the unique pain I was going through.  I felt so alone.  Once I got to a place of healing, I vowed to help women who are dealing with Infertility.  No one should feel so alone and misunderstood.

After I watched the video for the umpteenth time, I sent Ginger a text thanking her again.  She replied, "The Lord has kept you and carried you through the lowest of the lows.  Yet as the sun came out and warmed our faces at the end of our session...He shined so brightly on three of your greatest gifts!"  Hallelujah. :)