24 Hours to Live

Imagine that today you were told that you had a terminal illness and that you only had a short time to live.  How would you live?  What would you do?  Would you spend your days depressed and regretting the past or would you live each day with gusto and full of life?  Recently I was sitting back and thinking about a young friend of ours who is fighting a battle with cancer that certainly will take his life.  Even though he has fought infections and bee knocking at deaths door recently, he continues to fight and willing each day so that he can enjoy the day.  A request for a sip of beer with his meds one recent evening showed that he still had his sense of humor and his gusto for life.  When the time comes and he passes and he meets St. Peter at the Pearlie gates and is asked how he lived his life, I am sure that he will look at St. Peter in the eyes and say, "I lived my life till the end with gusto!"

While infertility isn't exactly a terminal illness many of us go about our lives living each day depressed and thinking that our life is over.  What is instead of living this way we lived each day as if it was our last.  Would we stand by and sulk about not having a child?  Or would we go out and look at life as if each thing we saw was the potential of happiness for us?  A year ago I would have said that everything that I saw each day triggered a memory to me that I was infertile.  Simple commercials for baby shampoo or diapers brought me to tears, reminding me that I would never have one of my own.

Knowing that I most likely won't ever be able to have a child of my own will always sit in my heart and there will always be mourning over that loss, much like a person with an illness will always mourn the future that they will never see.  But unlike with a terminal illness, I can always maintain hope.  I have hope that I will be a mom someday, whether adopted or naturally. Today I think about my friend, who in such a young life of 26, will not live to have children of his own. Unless diagnosed with a terminal illness tomorrow, I know that I will still have that opportunity to be a mom.

Before you give up in life, regardless of the issue, take a step back.  Look at the big picture. It's ok to grieve and mourn for the loss you experience, but don't dwell in that sadness else you lose out on seeing the possibilities of the future.  Don't ever give up.  Fight till the end.  Believe in miracles.  A miracle isn't a single dream and wish you desire coming true.  Rather, a miracle is ANY amazing or wonderful event.  Start seeing all events in your life as a miracle.

It was a miracle when my husband said "yes" to adoption.  It was a miracle when I ovulated on my own for the first time in a long time.  It is a miracle that I am not curled up in a ball anymore, crying and every commercial.  To live, I mean really live, is the rarest thing in the world.  Most people just exist, that is all.  I plan to live.  I plan on applying all my efforts till I am the highest mountain and then straining my potential until it cries for mercy.  I am not giving up. 

Believe in Miracles.