Saying Congratulations and meaning it!

Jealousy.

It starts earlier than we can actually remember. I am sure all parents could tell their kids countless stories about crying over toys when you were two or pulling toys away from other kids because you wanted it, even if you don’t recall any of it. 

My first actual moment of jealous was when my best friend got a toy for Christmas that I wanted and didn’t get. (Ignore everything else that I got that I wanted…) But I actually remember it. I was probably about six and I hated going to her house for a few weeks because that toy… wasn’t mine.

Then you are a teen and some chick that always has the most in style clothes walks the halls. You secretly want all of the clothes and shoes she has. It is irritating when you hear her complain about her clothes or treat them like they are garbage OR act like she doesn’t really like the clothes she has.

I have this extreme desire to travel. I have dreams of traveling all across Europe. My Great Grandpa came over from England and we never really knew much about him. So my mom and I did research on ancestry.com to find out the town he was from and we found relatives! England is on my must visit places, along with Italy, France and Germany. (WWII history buff) I want to travel… everywhere.

 Josh and I went on a cruise for our honeymoon. We LOVED traveling to 3 different locations. Our plan was to take a cruise this summer together as our “last trip before we have a baby”. We had the money saved up and were just looking for the prices to come down enough to book. Right in the middle of price watching, we found out our 1 year old American Bulldog/Pit mix needed knee surgery. Now I am not one for spending stupid amounts of money on a dog, but we did have the money set aside AND she is only one. Plus, you shouldn’t have a pet if you aren’t going to take care of it the way it needs to be. She was literally hobbling along on 3 legs. :( So our little getaway was cancelled. No more than 2 weeks later, a friend and her husband made an impromptu decision to take a 12 day cruise… in Europe and I got to scan through all their wonderful pictures on Facebook. It actually hurt my heart. Not because I was mad at them for taking it, but because I didn’t get to take it too.

(this is Tobin and her knee is now healing wonderfully!)

There are so many moments in life to look at what someone else has and to be mad, hurt and angry that you don’t have the same thing. For every woman reading this these moments tend to creep up on us as other women are getting engaged, married or having kids. It never seems to end. If you are engaged, you are irritated with pictures of people getting married. If you married, the countless pictures of people’s kids can easily get under your skin. Or if you’re single, all of those things could make you want to delete friends off Facebook.

It’s a common feeling that everyone deals with at some point. But for me, the hardest I have ever dealt with was having a miscarriage and seeing someone post pictures of their newborn baby. It was a pain that I felt deep in my heart that I have never experienced before and pray that you never have to experience.  Mad that someone had a baby and posted pictures? No.  Mad that someone was a proud parent of a tiny little baby? No. I was mad that I didn’t have my own tiny baby to post pictures of proudly.

 I was mourning the loss of the baby that I never held or got to kiss its fat cheeks at the same time someone was celebrating the life of their new child. That’s a hard pill for anyone to swallow. (Speaking of pills, why do they make prenatal vitamins like horse pills…? I have such a hard time swallowing them!) It took me a few weeks to be able to look at pictures of newborn babies without feeling that pit in my stomach. I know for some women it is a lot longer than that or you are still going through this process.

Even if I don’t want to admit it, this is jealousy. There is really no way around it. I am frustrated that someone has something that I want. But this isn’t just a car, house or money. This is a living breathing child, someone that will call me mommy. THAT is what I want. I have had to dedicate a lot of time to prayer to ask God to take the jealously that sits in my heart away. It doesn’t matter what I am jealous over, allowing jealously to call my heart home is going to cause more harm than good. I say this as genuine as I can, this isn’t easy and is still something that I struggle with sometimes.

We have all been told that you don’t understand the value of something until it’s gone. My first pregnancy I had heartburn for the first 7 weeks. It was terrible. I have never had heartburn in my life until I was pregnant. (And it’s still that way; as soon as I’m pregnant I experience it again) I complained for those few weeks because I think Tums are the equivalent to chewing on chalk and I hated (hate) taking them. As soon as I knew the baby had stopped growing my symptoms started going away and I actually said a prayer that the heartburn would come back. I WANTED HEARTBURN!

If you have experienced a miscarriage, to go through a grieving process and have a hard time looking at other peoples newborns is ok. But allowing it to sink in and fester in your heart to a point of jealously (and I have seen some people to the point of rage) is not ok. It is not their fault they had a baby around the same time you had a miscarriage. If the roles were reversed… wouldn’t you be posting an obscene amount of photos of your new baby as well? I know I would! We need to grieve, but we need to allow others to fully enjoy the experience they were blessed with. The same experience we so badly want to go through. You never know, maybe they SILENTLY went through multiple miscarriages and are now having the baby they prayed for! I would never want to develop jealously and anger towards that person, how excited I would be for them!

If you haven’t experienced a miscarriage or are going through a pregnancy after you have experienced one (or 3!), remember that there are people who are hurting and praying for those pregnancy symptoms. Embrace them! You will probably only go through this experience a few times in life, we shouldn’t complain the whole way through it. There are women out there who would kill to be in the spot you are now. If you truly believe each child is a blessing, than each craving, moment of heartburn, moment where you can’t keep your eyes open from exhaustion, and moment where raw chicken makes you want to vomit  (ok that last one may just be me…) is also a blessing!

The fact is, we don’t know everyone’s past. I have two good friends who both experienced two back to back miscarriages. They got married to their husbands within a month of when josh and I did. We are all very much at the same part of life. When I was pregnant for the 2^nd time, they were both pregnant for the 3^rd time. I miscarried and they both went on to have BEAUTIFUL baby boys within a month of each other. I looked through pictures and more pictures of their precious babies. I realized that my heart was not sad. It was not angry or JEALOUS! I had hope in my heart. Hope that I was going to experience what my friends were my third time around. They both in the midst of their celebrations sent me messages asking how I was feeling and to let me know that they were praying for me. (Yes, I am crying as I type this…) My heart would hurt more if I was jealous of them. They have equally been through so much! Praise the Lord for those chubby baby boys! Aunt Cortney loves them so much!

I have found a peace in this area of my life. Sometimes the jealousy will try and creep up, and I attempt to smack it back down. But I can see someone celebrating the birth of their child and say “congratulations!” and mean it.

It isn’t easy. Sometimes I have to force it out. But healing after a miscarriage is a process.

Start taking some steps and go slow! And if you don’t understand this, support the people going through it. We aren’t trying to hurt you, we are just hurting.