Motherhood and Kentucky Part 1

I have this ache that lives deep inside me. Occasionally it will rise to my throat and sting my eyes. Sometimes it pulses with great intensity, but usually it’s a dull throbbing. I’ve become so used to it that sometimes I forget about it. But then I’ll be in a grocery store, or at the library, or at a park and I will hear a new born cry, and, Bam! There it is again. Sometimes a certain smell triggers it. Most of the time the ache comes when I’m talking to an expectant mother, with her swollen belly, and her “any time now.” I envy her, and the ache flares again. The other day I went to a yearly OBGYN check-up. It had been longer than a year since my last one and I was over-due. I was planning on asking my doctor about some permanent birth control. Although the ache was still there, it had taken me a very long time to come to this decision. Before my doctor arrived I started looking at the birth control pamphlets hung on the wall in the plastic container. I picked up one that had written at the top “When your family is complete choose essure.” It had a picture of an older couple on the front and I thought to myself as I looked at the lady, “I don’t look that old, do I?” When my doctor arrived she saw the pamphlet in my hand and upon my inquiry started telling me about it. She explained that essure was a procedure where small coiled springs were placed in the opening of each fallopian tube and that over three months the body would build a natural scar tissue barrier around the coil, completely blocking off the chance of a sperm or egg reaching each other, thus preventing conception. She then went on to explain how this procedure compared to having your tubes tied, and said that though tying your tubes was just as effective as essure, it was a much more invasive form of birth control. I felt an inner conflict as I listened to her. I just couldn’t wrap my brain around the fact that by choosing one of these two forms of birth control I was ensuring that I would never again feel the joy or happiness I have felt from being pregnant or from nursing. I couldn’t accept the finality of it. The ache started to throb. I went home with these conflicting thoughts and emotions stewing and stirring inside my brain. With the ache more pronounced, I wondered if God was telling me I was supposed to have another baby. But then Catherine needed to be driven to flute, Matthew needed help with his math, Michael needed help with a reading work sheet, and Eliza needed to get ready for ballet, and the confusing ache started to lessen. However, the frustration from my doctor appointment didn’t go away, and when Brock and I got into bed that night I spewed forth my frustrations to him. With very careful wording and tender reminders Brock helped me with my frustrations, and the ache lessoned more ad we reminisced about the year we lived in Corbin, Kentucky.