Infertility, patience, funerals and family

  I am distracted this morning by several events that occurred last week. Infertility was and has been a major sorrow in my life, yet has not been the only one. If only that were true, that infertility would be the only sorrow or challenge that touches my life.

A funeral in New Hampshire, for a lovely, kind woman of 93 was a place of intense emotions last week for my family.  A memorial service, really, an opportunity to be with family and remember Joyce. A mother, wife, grandmother, great grandmother, mother in law. I listened to my beloved brother in law speak with his heart in his throat, remembering his mother, all the way back to when he was a young child, heard the respect, love and most especially joy. We all felt the grief of the adult grandchildren there, who had in some ways been raised by Joyce, most certainly been saved by Joyce from a terrifically difficult childhood. I watched the newest great grandchild sleep on her mother's shoulder, one month old the next day.

A family pulling together to help Joyce spend her final days on earth as she wanted, with her family around her, in a peaceful way. A family that does not necessarily all get along, has serious and important problems between them; still making the decision to put those differences aside and put Joyce and her needs, first. And of course, not perfectly, but lovingly. My heart goes out to my sister, who loved her mother in law intensely and genuinely and to my brother in law and Judy, Joyce's daughter. Don, Joyce's husband is lucky to have had Joyce for so long, as was Joyce lucky to have Don. Don will continue to be cared for by the family; for that is what they do. That is what Joyce taught them to do, by what she always chose to do. To create peace, to have patience, to love no matter what.

I hope it reminds all of us to do the same. To have patience with ourselves, first. Infertility, particularly, we tend to blame on ourselves. Something our bodies are not doing properly; something we ought to be able to do. Be gentle with yourself, be patient with yourself. That loving attention will reap rewards far more reaching than heaping blame on top of disappointment, on top of frustration.