For This Child We Prayed
CHAPTER 3
excerpted from: For This Child We Prayed: Living with the Secret Shame of Infertility
Year of Jubilee is the Year of Grief To Me
"Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit..."
Ephesians 5:18a
February 19, 1997
Dear Children:
The other day, after watching our niece and nephew, your father and I asked ourselves,“do we really want kids?” They wanted to play and we wanted to watch a movie. Shoot,we’d pretty much gotten used to doing things when we wanted to do them. Was I really ready to give up myself? Now not only do I believe I can wait on God; I want to wait on Him.
At least that’s what I told myself in January.
I am no longer feeling jubilant. I feel like those saints in despair who have no choice but to fully rely on God. Charles Spurgeon said that great hearts can only be made by great troubles. He further said:“When the night lowers and the tempest is coming on, the Heavenly Captain is always closest to His crews. It is a blessed thing that when we are most cast down, then it is that we are most lifted up by the consolations of the Spirit.”
My tempest started with a light period and I was told this could mean you are pregnant.Convinced by a friend, I drove to a place I’d heard about on the radio that provides counseling and free pregnancy testing. I was nervous and anxious, not about what I thought the test might reveal, but rather by what it wouldn’t reveal, even though the Bible says we should be anxious for nothing.
I walked through the door feeling very much like an 18 year old who’d just been knocked up by her boyfriend, rather than the 30 year old professional that I was. After filling out a short form, I was led into a room by a counselor who asked for my name and address. I wondered what she needed to know all that for. I gave her our old address. She asked me my birthday and I wondered what my birthday has to do with anything? Forgive me Lord, but I lied. Then she wanted to know how I’d heard about the place as well as my views on abortion.
All this for a pregnancy test! I should have just bought one. I know the lady was just
doing her job, and she was really nice, but good grief, if I really were an 18-year-old
hiding from my parents I would have run right out the door. Finally, she gave me the cup and I spilled some pee on the floor while filling it. It was embarrassing !
I cleaned it up, washed my hands, cleaned off the jar, and carried it back. She gave me the test and instructions . When I realized I had to do it myself I looked at her like, “Okay you can leave now.” She didn’t, so I proceeded to administer it. We made
uncomfortable small talk while waiting for the results.
“So…how are you doing?”
“Fine,” I replied, wishing she wouldn’t talk to me.
"What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a Substance Abuse Prevention Specialist.” Stop talking to me!
“Really? That sounds interesting. What exactly do you do?”
“I work with kids and their parents. I design and implement programs to help them stay off drugs.”
“Wow, that’s pretty neat. I imagine that can get pretty wild and stressful?”
“Yeah, it makes for some interesting days.”
“So, is there anything in your life that could be causing you stress?”
“We’re moving.” I answered uncomfortably. Then it hit me; perhaps I could be under stress. I just never thought it was possible, but it could’ve been. Hey, I did live across the street from drug dealers, and next door to a bunch of dope heads. For the past few years I had been dealing with job related issues. No wonder I couldn’t get pregnant. Maybe the stress is interfering with my cycle. It’s not the first time it’s happened!”
After four long minutes the buzzer rang. I acted like I didn’t hear it because I didn’t
want to know what the results were.
“Negative.” She said.
“I can see that.”
“I encourage you to see a doctor anyway.”
“There is no point in that.” I tried not to look at her.
“Well come back anytime.”
She was nice, but I don’t think so.I wanted to cry, but maintained my cool. I wanted to run, but maintained my composure. I politely said goodbye and exited the building as fast as I could. My reaction to the negative pregnancy test confirmed that the words I’d uttered all month never really reached the truth that lied in my heart.
I wanted children more now than I ever did before, and the realization forced me to
confront my motives for wanting them. What was I really basing this desire on?
Initially I think I wanted them because I thought children would solidify our bond of
marriage. But then maybe it was because everyone else expected us to have children? You know, you get married and automatically have children, right?
As an American of African descent, this expectation is magnified. People automatically expect women of color to be fertile. After all, there’s the mythology of the big, black, breeding studs and “studdettes.” We are often led to believe, even by our own people that slave women dropped babies like it was nothing and then went right back to working in the field. The stories I’d heard as a child made me accept the lie that no slave woman ever died during childbirth, or had problems with infertility.
This smacks right in the face of survival of the race. Procreation meant the race would not die despite the horrors of slavery. Reproduction represented the slave’s one hope of a bright future and expected end. We were simply too strong, too fertile to be infertile so to speak. Young, black, and infertile, what an oxymoron!What a lie! The reality is that black women struggle with infertility as much as any other race.
Margaret Marsh and Wanda Ronner, in their book, The Empty Cradle: Infertility in
America from Colonial Times to the Present, provide proof that infertility was roughly
the same among all races and cultures. However, for reasons unknown black women had a higher rate of childlessness than whites in the 1950’s, as they had for decades…and magazines aimed at black Americans focused on the issue.
Tan Confessions, directed at working-and-middle class Americans of African descent,
published several fictional accounts of infertility…and the publisher of one of the more popular books on infertility, Sam Gordon Berkow’s, Childless, advertised the book in Ebony, which also published a number of articles on infertility “clinics, artificial insemination, and adoption. Interest was widespread…” So if I wasn’t trying to prove something to my people, what was I trying to prove?
Over time I convinced myself that I wanted children so that I could raise great men and women of God, like those women in the Bible. I told myself that God wanted that from me, even if God doesn’t want it, then the Christian world sure expects it of you.
“How long have you been a Christian?” They ask accusingly. “Six years? And you still
don’t have kids?” Their silent accusations forced me to believe that raising little gods
was a much more noble reason for wanting kids and I felt it would make me more worthy of being a mother. So like Hannah I made promises to God. “God if You will give me children then I promise I will give them back to You…”
If I really love kids like I say I do, why am I so apprehensive about foster parenting or
adopting? Would doing so mean I am giving up on God; that if I foster parent or adopt I don’t really believe that He will allow me to have a child from my own womb?
I know most of our friends think it would be best for our emotional well being if we
would just admit that our bodies have failed us.
Which leads me back to the original question of why do I want kids? And that only leads me to other questions like, if I just want kids shouldn't anyone’s kids fulfill the maternal instinct? Do I want to have the birthing experience? Do I need to fulfill an expected womanly or cultural role? Do I want to fulfill a lifelong dream? Do I want to be
immortal, have a little image of myself running around, an image connected by blood?
How much do I need this child? My child? My blood child? Would I love an adopted
child as much as you, the child of my dreams? You are my Isaac; would another child be my Ishmael?
So many things I don't know but I question, but one thing I do know–I will never trust my period again. It has lied to me before and I should not have been surprised that it had lied to me again. Still, despite the hurt, I am filled with the hope of God's words — be fruitful and multiply.
Love Mommy
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Lena Arnold is an award winning author and publisher of several books, including “In the Absence of My Father,” “Strong Black Coffee: Poetry and Prose to Enlighten, Encourage, and Entertain Americans of African Descent,” “For This Child We Prayed: Living with the Secret Shame of Infertility;,” dealing with black Christian infertility, and “For This Dream I Prayed: Companion Journal.” She is currently collaborating on a children’s book entitled “Jackie’s’ Way” dealing with childhood anger with nationally renown artist Michael Fields. Lena was endorsed by the late CBS News Correspondent Ed Bradley for “…being a thoughtful writer who goes beyond…”
Books can be purchased at Amazon.com, Barnes & Nobles.com and at your local bookstore. Ask your local library to purchase a copy as well. Ebook is available as well.
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