Hope

Back when I was going through fertility treatments and nothing seemed to be working and I just kept plugging along and congratulating new mothers and throwing showers for friends and family, people would say things like "I don't know how you do it.  I don't know how you have such a good attitude."  Usually I'd just smile and shrug.

But in my mind, I was thinking, "Is there another option"?  Certainly wallowing and throwing perpetual pity parties for myself wasn't an option.  And while, sure, I shed my share of tears, I know those tears weren't going to change anything.  All I had was hope.

Trust me when I tell you it was(and is) far from easy to keep an positive outlook on things in some of the situations in which I've found myself.  Somedays, it felt like I was holding on by a thread.  A whispy thread of spider silk.  That barely visible thread that kept me going was hope.

Hope that there was a reason for the tears I cried.  Hope that one day things would get better.  Hope that not only would things get better, but that I would actually have what I wanted.  Hope that one day I'd get to be the guest of honor at a baby shower, rather than the hostess or attendee.  Hope that things would work out.

They did, you know.  Definitely not in the way I had hoped they would.  But it turned out to be a good thing we didn't have children.  I don't even want to think about the disaster things would have been these last two years if children had been involved. 

Now I find myself facing a different set of challenges.  I'm trying to keep my chin up; I really am.  And obviously, some days are easier than others.  I have no idea how things are going to turn out.  I barely know what tomorrow will bring(FYI, that's a  HUGE stressor for someone like me who likes to plan things).  I'm having to learn, AGAIN I might add, that things are out of my hands.  I'm having to exercise IMMENSE patience in varying situations.  I'm having to find hope in new things.  And I tell you, I feel like that spider silk I cling to has never been so thin and invisible, but I keep holding on.

I hope that things will work out and I can go to the University of Utah in the fall(still waiting on Financial Aid).  I hope that one day someone besides High School boys will hit on me.  I hope that one day the scars left by the choices of others will disappear.  I hope that one day I can feel repaired.  I hope that one day I can have the things I want.  I hope that one day I fully understand why all of this had to happen.

Yep somedays it feels like I'm just holding on to a tiny thread of spider silk, wondering when it will snap.

Did you know that the tensile strength of spider silk is comparable to that of high-grade steel?  True story.  I'm pretty sure I know that from experience(you know, metaphorically speaking...I try to avoid spiders and I frequently clear their cobwebs from my living quarters).