GRATEFUL WEDNESDAYS – Feature 12

As a people, we are very ambitious and this is good, there can however be a downside to this, if we are not careful. We could find that we lose ourselves in pursuing self-advancement; a bigger degree for that bigger salary, a bigger house, a newer car, and find ourselves wondering, why are we not happy, why does our life feel so dull and empty. The thing is, we forget to be thankful for the little things that we already have, without which, our lives would not mean much. Our relationships, our health, our faith, our freedom, I could go on.

There are times in my life when I feel I could have achieved more in certain areas, and as a result I beat upon myself and take on a 'woe is me' attitude. Thankfully, I am soon reminded that less I be accused of being ungrateful, I do have many other things to be thankful for.

In my pursuit to become a more thankful and happier person, in general then, I am urged to add a new posting feature to my blog, a segment dedicated to being thankful, which I have decided to call ‘GRATEFUL WEDNESDAYS', my gratitude journal, if you will, where I will, on Wednesdays of each week, post one thing in my life that I am thankful for, regardless of how small. 

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Today I am grateful for my in-laws.

I have heard time and time again of bad relationships with in-laws, but I am very blessed to not have this experience with mine.

The mothers-in-law are the ones who get mentioned the most as it relates to conflicts. I have had a few situations with my mother-in-law that could have lead to a strain on our relationship, but thank God, forgiveness worked for us.

I just want to use this post to honor my in-laws for who they are to me and my family. Not for one minute do I feel like anything else but family, when I am around them. They adore their grandchildren and seldom pass up any opportunity to help out both physically and financially.

For this I am indeed grateful.

WHEN YOUR MOTHER-IN-LAW WANTS THOSE GRANDBABIES

Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.
Children born to a young man are like sharp arrows in a warrior’s hand
Psalm 127: 3 & 4

I have been meaning to write this post for some time now, but wanted to take the time to think carefully about what I was going to say, so that I do not cause any discomfort to persons mentioned herein.

My struggles with infertility was made much harder because my mother-in-law was yearning for grandchildren. I was married to her eldest son , who was the only one ready enough to take the plunge into marriage and to subsequently start a family and so it is natural that soon enough, she would be looking forward to his off springs.

When my husband and I made the decision to start our family, we did not know that our decision would be met with the challenges of infertility. As a result of this, we made it known to his mother that we had decided to start a family, so much so that when whenever we suspected we might be pregnant, she was told as well and so, like one happy family, we would anxiously wait on the result of a home pregnancy test, only to be disappointed.

Telling my mother-in-law of our plans to start a family turned out to be a big mistake as our dream was now complicated by infertility and my mother-in-law continued to yearn for grandchildren.

I remember when I told her about our problems with infertility, her response was, all you need is some infertility drugs. I wanted so much to believe that, but deep down I knew we were in for a long difficult road.

As the years passed and our struggles with infertility intensified, my mother-in-law’s yearning for grandchildren also intensified. This became more evident because of comments she would make from time to time that left especially me, feeling that she was not concerned with the emotional trauma that we had to be enduring in this regard, she was only concerned with having grandchildren.

As a result of this, I began resenting her so much. My husband and I were doing everything that we could possibly do to beat infertility and instead of supporting and encouraging us, she only seemed to be concerned with the end result of all this, grandchildren.

Things took a turn for the worst as another son, announced his plans to get married. I had mixed feelings about this, I was happy but on the other hand, I was almost sure that this son would soon provide the grandchildren his mother was so yearning for. Sure enough, that is exactly what happened. Shortly after their marriage, they became pregnant.

I saw my world crumbling before me and all the efforts to provide these precious grandchildren, seemed all in vain. My mother-in-law called to give us the news and sadly I could not hide how I was feeling. I made it through the conversation with her, but she sensed something was wrong and later telephoned to find out what was going on with me. I told her exactly how I was feeling and I even went further to tell her that for all the years we have been struggling with infertility (now about 8), I have been expecting some form of support and validation from her because I had been talking to her on occasions about our treatments etc., and she had sometimes asked. She therefore knew much more than my family knew, and so I thought she owed us even some encouragement, instead of her visible yearnings which at times made me really upset and add insult to injury, she was now calling us with news of her impending grandchild and expecting us to be as happy as she was. Her response to this was that she did not know we were hurting so much. I heard her, but it was a hard pill to swallow, because I believe anyone dealing with painful issues like infertility is going to be hurting and moreso for us who had been struggling for so long. Mind you, I did not tell her how much we were hurting, but I thought it would have been easy for her to automatically think that some amount of pain was involved in this struggle.

Let me say that, she deserves to be happy, because finally she was getting a grandchild that she had been yearning for all these years and an event such as this, should be a happy time for a family. I understood this all too well, but I felt like my husband and I had been kicked to the curb and also felt that all our efforts to have children, was in vain.

This turned into a big conflict and I did not visit or see her for a good couple of months. This was really a difficult time. My family found out about this conflict and I really did not get the support I was looking for from them. In all fairness, they could not have supported me how I really wanted them to, because they did not know that infertility was wreaking havoc on me. I still expected some support though, even for the mere fact that they are my family and they now know about my struggles. Well, Instead my mother told me that it was because of jealousy for my brother-in-law and his wife’s pregnancy, that this conflict was happening. I was saddened to hear this. Sure enough, there was jealousy, because we thought we would have been the ones to give that first grandchild, but this was only a fraction of why I was so upset, I was angry with my mother-in-law because I felt she had not been there for us in our struggles with infertility so far, and now here she was, visibly overjoyed for this pending grandchild and there I was feeling the most barren and empty any woman could ever feel and also feeling like a complete failure.

When I met that family for the first time, I felt like I did not belong because I was from a more simple background . I felt that I was not good enough for their son and struggled with that feeling for a long while. This is why, I felt it was important for me to provide them with grandchildren soon enough, especially in the case of my mother-in-law, ( Grandchildren are a mother-in-law’s pride and joy) so that I could feel a greater sense of belonging.

I am so happy that time took care of this conflict and soon, I was able to visit this precious baby girl and take my place again in this family which has been very good to me. My relationship with my mother-in-law has since been mended and it is better than it has ever been.

This conflict did an amazing thing for our struggles with infertility, because it brought it to our families in a way that we were having difficulties doing and it allowed us to have the support of our families that we so wanted, as they now have a better idea of what it really means to have someone so close to them dealing with so much pain. People whom they love so much but had been cheated out of really being there for them, because they did not share much about what they were really going through, mainly for fear that they would not understand and be capable of dealing with a situation such as this.

My mother-in-law now has two grandchildren, a girl and a boy and she is so happy. I am also happy that at long last, my husband and I were able to give her a grandchild, a boy whom she is so in love with and often says, “now there is someone to carry on the family’s name.” She also had a hand in his care in the first couple weeks of his life, as we sent for her to be a part of this experience that she had yearned for, for so long and she totally enjoyed it. God is so faithful.

This is my story, are there others like this out there. Would you have reacted in the same way I did, when I heard the news of my brother and his wife’s pregnancy and I am wrong to have reacted in this way. Please do not hesitate to give me your comments.

Do remember, if you are currently dealing with a situation such as this, time does heal and if honesty is involved in these conflicts, even though feelings might be hurt initially, a better relationship most times will result, so be encouraged and until next time, keep clinging to hope.

Just a light moment and my intent is only for humor, but did you know that mother-in-law scrambled spells, ‘woman-hitler.’ Bet you it is someone who is having a bad relationship with their mother-in-law that came up with this.

My Infertility Story - My infertility and my family cont'd.

Now for the good part, my infertility and my in-laws, and I will be focusing on my mother-in-law, as she is the one who was visibly yearning for grandchildren.
I was somewhat able to talk to my mother-in-law about my infertility, but ofcourse not the part where she would have known exactly how much pain I was in. Like my mother, my mother-in-law began making her comments about grandchildren here and there, quite harmless comments, but sadly as time passed, I did not see these comments as harmless anymore. They began to cut deep within me and this became worst as my struggle intensified. This was even harder to take because, since I spoke to her on occasions about our struggle with infertility, to the point where she even recommended some of the doctors we saw. I thought that she should have known better than anyone else and be more supportive of us.
I now began to feel very insecure around her as I often wondered if she was thinking that I was not good enough for her son because I was not able to provide her with the grandchildren she wanted so much. As a result of this, our relationship, in my opinion did not develop in a more meaningful way, as the insecurity from my infertility was interfering with this process.
The biggest blow came when one of my husband’s younger brother and his wife announced that they were expecting a child. My mother-in-law called to share the news with us, and sadly I did not take it very well because I thought she could have been a little more empathetic in how she broke the news to us, given our struggle to have children. She was understandably very ecstatic and sadly, try as I may, I could not share in the moment, as I now saw all our efforts to provide the grandchildren proving futile. We were beaten to the chase.
This soon turned ugly as I began to tell her that over all I found she was not empathetic to what we were going through, as I expected her more than anyone else to understand and that some of her comments were now beginning to hurt and she should by now be thinking of stopping and start to support us in this regard.
This did not go over very well with her and my mother and sister got involved, to the point where I was told that I was jealous of my brother-in-law and his wife, I am faithless and weak and have no use for God and that was why I was going through all this, and that I am known to cause hurt on people as I had done it before. I could have easily taken my life at that point, as I thought now that my family knew the degree of hurt that I was going through because of my infertility, albeit, not in the way I wanted it known to them, I would have received their sympathy and the understanding and support I was so yearning for.
I was happy this happened, because after the initial hurt, something new was given birth to. My family now became sympathetic, apologies were given, relationships restored and I now began receiving the love and support which I think I truly deserved from my family.
This was indeed a new day, because as the saying goes, the darkest hour is just before dawn. This was to be the dawn of my triumph over infertility and now I was able to move towards this triumph, my family with me.

In my next post, I will address how I think a family can help and support another family member experiencing infertility, from my perspective of course. You don’t want to miss this either.