Justine Brooks Froelker over at Ever Upward, approached me to review a chapter of her upcoming book Ever Upward: Overcoming the Lifelong Losses of Infertility to Own a Childfree Life. I’m really looking forward to reading her entire book, so of course I agreed without hesitation because how could I turn down a sneak peak?
Before I jump into my review, I would like to acknowledge that Justine and I have and are living very different infertility journey’s, yet we are bound together in our shared grief as we have both lost our babies much too soon. Losing a baby, or babies, to miscarriage is an unfortunate ‘club’ to belong to, but I am thankful I have fellow bloggers like Justine in my life as we traverse the ongoing rapids of grief, hope and recovery.
When Justine approached me, I instantly selected her chapter on the topic of Adoption. I chose this chapter because it’s near and dear to my heart as we are currently working to determine if adoption is a route for us when/if we decide to stop trying for a biological child.
So, what were my thoughts when I read this chapter??
Reading this chapter was the first time I’ve read anything about Justine and her husband’s adoption journey. She goes to great length to explain what the adoption journey looked like for her. How the journey affected her, her husband and even members of her extended family. How others viewed there decision and how others attempted to “help” them, even when the help actually caused more pain and suffering for Justine. In this chapter, Justine also shares how, when they decided not to pursue adoption, her family still grew in unexpected ways.
In my read of this chapter, one of the first things that stuck me is that I saw a new side of Justine. This side is one of living the vulnerability and the pain, not one of recovery. I’ve gotten to know Justine through her blog, where she usually writes about her recovery and provides encouragement to others. So, it was especially interesting to me to read about her life before reaching recovery. Through this chapter I felt really understood one of her key turning points, and how she was able to lift herself up, and move from a life consumed by sorrow, to a life of recovery. This chapter showed a very human side of Justine, not as a counselor or a person living recovery or as someone trying to breakdown the infertility silence, but as a person in the throws of the infertility struggle, who is hurting and quite possibly even lost.
Maybe most importantly, from a literary perspective, Justine shares her story with grace and elegance that I’m grown to expect from her writing.
After reading one short chapter, I was left with a few questions, and ultimately wanting more. Needless to say, I am hooked. I can assure you, I will be one of the first people purchasing her book when it is available on October 1, 2014 at www.everupward.org.
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After yesterday’s post, where I shared my not so perfect breakdown (thanks to everyone for their amazing support!) I thought I’d share something a bit happier today. Today, I will share my happiness wish, but first let me give you some perspective on where I’m coming from.
Today is day 33 of my #100happydays. Participating in the #100happydays project has forced me to look for small happy moments in regular, day-to-day life. Some days it’s very easy to take a photograph of something happy, other days not so much. For the majority of days, it is relatively easy to see happy in simple things like watering my garden, seeing beautiful views of the world around me, or making something nice for dinner. Then, there have been the more difficult days, where my mood is not one of happy, days like day 25, where my photo was of a DQ blizzard (thanks to my amazing husband for being sweet enough to try to cheer me up with one of my favourite treats). So, on the whole the project has been effective in forcing me to see the simple happy moments.
The downside of this, is that this project has also forced me to realize that I’m looking for happy moments. So I am completely aware that nothing significantly happy has been happening lately. In fact, nothing significantly happy has happened to me today, or yesterday, or the day before for that matter. By no means do I mean that life has been miserable, on the whole I’m a decently happy person with a pretty healthy outlook on life, but what I’m trying to say is that my happy moments are not necessarily obvious or taking up the majority of my time.
So, what I want to share today is my happiness wish. I want to put it down on paper (or a word document and blog post to be more accurate) and I want to share it with the world.
This wish, it is completely selfish. I’m not talking about wishing the entire world a day of happiness and peace on earth. Nope, my wish today is completely self-serving and has absolutely nothing to do with altruism. This is all about me – a moment of pure selfishness if you will. So here it is:
I wish to have something happen which smack me across the face with pure happiness.
Something that I don’t have to search for.
Something that is just pure bliss.
I have no expectations on what exactly this happy thing should be (if it were a healthy baby I’d absolutely be okay with that, but honestly, right now I’m looking for something more immediate, not 10+ months from now). I’d be okay with a bright and sunshiny day where I’m not looking for happy, it just happens. I want to feel like all the happy in the world just seems to fall on my shoulders, and there is nothing to do but bask in the enjoyment because nothing can stop the moment. Maybe the best way to describe what I’m looking for in this pure happiness, is the very fact that I don’t have to look for it – I want it to happen without any effort.
With the last few years that we’ve had, I think I deserve some happy, and yet, I’m smart enough to know that that’s not how life works. I know, I have to make the most of my circumstance to be able to enjoy happy moments. My attitude is critical to the success of any happy moments. My attitude is critical to the duration of any possible happy events. My outlook will dictate how I see happiness. I know all of this, yet my wish is that something so unbelievably happy will happen in my life that I have no choice but to be happy.
Anyways, this is my wish.
Simple, obvious, ecstatic, pure happiness.
Is that too much to ask for?
And, if I’m going to ask for it for me, I’m also going to ask for it for all the other wonderful ladies and couples suffering with infertility in any form, and all of you who are currently pregnant with their rainbow babies. (Yup, I’m just not very good at being selfish, so that sounds more like me – sharing my wish with all of you amazing bloggers who inspire me and lift me up on a daily basis).
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My Perfect Breakdown 