Finding Peace

(Please share with us how you have found peace with your infertility and joys you have experienced along the adoption journey. I'll start the conversation with my feelings.)

Doctrine and Covenants 88: 33 

"For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift."

Today in church this passage of scripture was read. I felt a profound manifestation of the spirit. I received a moment of personal clarity in which I finally felt complete peace with all that has happen to me in the past eleven years. It encompassed the vast abyss of infertility, miscarriage and agony of the death of two children. The humiliating, degrading and risky lows of the adoption process as well. All of it, even the parts that sent me into therapy. All of it, even the parts that haunted my dreams. All of it , even the Post Traumatic Stress like symptoms. All of it is a gift. The gift of mortality. The gift of understanding. The gift of experiencing the tangible humanness of the fall. The gift of spiritual awakening. The understanding of God and his eternal plan.  The gift of excepting what is. The gift of not only blooming where you are planting but turning a spiritual desert into a sanctuary.  The understanding that getting what you need is far better then getting what you want. The gift of loving what is. In addition it is learning to relove the God you came close to hating. The acknowledging that He was there all along the way. That He really did feel the pain and hurt with me but knew it was for the best. Dear God, I thank you for the gift. I thank you for my infertility. I truly do. Not in some abstract, "oh I am going to be a Job and feel better eventually so right now grin and endure it." No, it actually felt more like Joy. I had been looking at it the wrong way. For so long it has always been something I had to accept or something that needed to be endured. Today though, it actually felt like a blessing. I looked up bestowed and it mentioned conferring an honor. I feel HONORED to be infertile. I feel so HONORED to have chosen and been chosen in adoption.  I feel a need to rejoice. To rejoice means to find joy in or great delight. I was pleasantly surprised by this unexpected awakening. Does it mean it still won't ever hurt? I don't think so. Some wounds won't heal until the Resurrection. I am a work in process. I just feel like I am no longer fighting against God's will. I not only accept the inevitableness of His will but I am beginning to understand it and deeply appreciate it.


Happy National Adoption Month


Elizabeth Ouellette