Tag Archives: infertility

learning to embrace beauty

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This post contains affiliate links.

embracing beauty

Over the past 9 ½ years of dealing with the complications of infertility, my body-size has bounced up and down between a size 6 and a size 16. No joke.

It pretty much sucks.

And to be honest, I haven’t dealt well with it. My husband has literally gone so far as to take the scales away from me when I’m struggling. “Your body isn’t functioning properly,” he tells me, “so this isn’t an accurate picture of what you are.” (he’s a good man, eh?) 

At one point in this journey I was eating a diet of no fat, no flour, no sugar, no dairy and no meat. (you’re right, that’s just about everything that tastes even remotely yummy.) I was desperate to lose the weight, partially for the sake of my looks and partially for the distant hope that losing weight would stimulate my reproductive organs enough to allow me to get pregnant.

Amazingly, after being on that strict of a diet for 6 weeks I lost a grand total of one pound.

Dead serious.

(Now, with the knowledge of nutrition that I have gained, I know that I was putting my body in starvation mode and every bite of those vegetables and brown rice, without the proper fats and nutrients, were going directly into storage.)

When it comes to infertility, natural treatments are slow and time consuming. Going the medical route brings its own joys, like hormones being injected into your stomach (i.e. needles into your abdomen) that cause bloating. Or fertility pills that cause weight gain.

The moral of this story? Infertility wrecks havoc on a woman’s body.

When my friend Trina told me she thinking about writing a book on style, I almost rolled my eyes. My sense of style disappeared somewhere around the time that my waist disappeared.

But then God really started to get a hold of me. I wrote a post about my realization that my issues with my weight were directly linked to pride. And then Trina started sending me chapters of her book.

Now, this book was written by a Mom, to moms. She covers topics like dressing when you’re pregnant or when you’re nursing. She’s not infertile so it would seem that her book could hardly apply to someone like me…

Except it does.

Because the majority of the book is about learning to love the way that God made your body. It’s about choosing to embrace the beautiful every day. It’s about learning to dress for the size you are, right now, instead of always dreaming of someday being different than what you are.

And it gets even better than that because she also shares about what God thinks about beauty. 

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still working my butt off (I hope!) to lose weight and keep myself healthy. This isn’t about ignoring the negative impacts that excess weight can have on you. This is about rejoicing in beauty.

And I’ve started to enjoy getting dressed again.

Tomorrow Trina will be joining me with an interview (woohoo!), but in the meantime, I encourage you (no matter where you are in life) to check out her book.  Embracing Beauty is available in PDF version (readable on any computer), Kindle, Nook, and in Paperback.

p.s. She totally quotes me in one of the chapters (isn’t that precious?!) where I describe how I use accessories to make myself feel feminine while still wearing work clothes on the farm. This is the outfit I was talking about (my go-to farming look) and I have to say, put together on here it actually does look stylish. ;)

everyday style for the farmer's wife

why you should read your Bible {even when you’re mad at God}

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Bible

It was spring. The snow was melting and forming puddles in the driveway, curling little trails toward the dip on the edge where it disappeared into the brown grass. Sunlight filtered off the muddied piles of leftover ice and warmed the skin on my face. But I couldn’t feel it.

Icy hardness still reigned in my heart, even after all this time. I was filled up tight with anger and frustration. Mornings would come and I would wake up crying. Afternoons passed and I would curl into a ball on the couch. Evenings would be soft and painful until I could escape to bed, where I lay quiet and fearful, muffling my sobs and letting my tears soak the pillow under my head. Spring held no joy that year.

Days came when I stood alone in the kitchen and spoke loud at the heavens. “God, where are you? I follow, I serve, I give. Yet, still, I hurt and hurt and hurt.”

Silence spun anger into my heart.

She wrote words to me that summer, while the grass grew tall and deep. Purple paper and a calligraphy pen, one torn and the other dipped in black, black ink. She said I was blessed and highly favored.

I laughed at the absurdity.

I knew the words of Scripture. Knew them well. Over and over I had read through the Bible, as a teenager, as a young adult. I had memorized and studied. Greek and Hebrew words were scrawled into the margins of my Bible.

I thought I knew His words so well, thought it high time He listened to a few of mine.

I left my Bible to gather dust on the corner of the desk and spoke my words into the blackness.

Summer slipped away and fall began. Orange and red leaves covered forest floors and I toughened and bit back my tears. But then as winter once more lifted her icy fingers, I knew I could not survive another season.

I peeled back the pages and began reading again.

The stories danced, the Word deepened. What I thought I knew so well seemed to change shape before my eyes. The book of Genesis, the story of creation and the foundation of Israel, turned into a narrative of heartbreak. Jeremiah, the tale of a weeping prophet, became the journal of a crying God.  Job, that book full of depression and confusion, the one that went on and on and on… It became a window into my heart and God’s words from the heavens shook me to my core.

The Word of God never changes. Ever.
But I do.

My circumstances and experiences draw lines under words. They highlight thoughts and translate ideas.

To think that I could live today on what I knew from yesterday was a foolish and empty thought. Like manna, the Word is new every morning. We can only eat enough for today, this moment. Tomorrow we must return and dig deep again.

Isaiah 55:3 @natashametzler

By the time I watched spring again, I had tasted spring in my heart. I felt the morning sun, bathed in rays of delight. She was right, you know, the one who penned those words on torn paper. Blessed and highly-favored. Me.

I laugh at the beautiful absurdity of it all.

If all my writings put together could do but one thing, I pray that it be this: You will open your Bible and start reading. Even if you’re confused. Even if you’re angry. Even if you don’t understand it. Because the Word builds up and builds up and builds up. And what makes no sense today, will painted pictures of redemption tomorrow. 

Have you experienced this? How has your understanding of Scripture changed with your growth and experiences?

To read about what God spoke to me as I journeyed through Scripture that first time after struggling with depression and infertility, just sign up for my newsletter and receive a free copy of the my ebook, Dying of Thirst at the Side of a Well. {tomorrow the March edition releases, so hurry!}

5 Things To Remember {when you can’t stop crying}

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5 Things To Remember {when you can't stop crying} @natashametzler

I’m sitting there and we’re praying and tears bite into the flesh of my cheeks. They drip off the end of my chin and cause my nose to run. They are quite inconvenient actually. Mostly because I always forget to bring Kleenex with me.

Did you know that the salt is a healer? 

When we lived in Florida, my parent’s owned and operated a lawn care business. Down there in the sunny south, they have these things called fire ants. Horrible little creatures.

There has been, unfortunately, more than one occasion when I have done the “ants in my pants” dance and tore off whatever I’m wearing, right out in public. Trust me, y’all, no matter how modest you are it all disappears when there are ants up to your waist biting you.

Everyone has some type of reaction to fire ant bites but I really react. They swell and itch and take, literally, weeks to heal. Unless I go to the beach.

At the beach, I could wade in the salt water and oh, it would sting. The salt would get right into those wounds and hurt them all over again. But then they healed. Within 24 hours they would be smoothed right over.

There are some wounds in life that just won’t heal without tears. Well, to be honest, there are some wounds that just plain never heal, but tears can help make them bearable. They can dig out the infection and let you breathe again.

Here are five things to remember when you just can’t stop crying:

1. Don’t hide your tears. 

Those first few years, when I was struggling and fighting my way through infertility, I tried so hard to be tough. I didn’t realize that hiding my tears stole the healing power out of them. When I offered excuses like, “I have a headache” or “I don’t feel well” and left my friends to go crumble in the darkness of my bedroom, I was only prolonging the agony.

I’m not saying you need to burst into tears in huge group of people and pull all the attention on you, but when someone asks if you’re okay, don’t shrug your shoulders and then run off to hide. Be honest with them and yourself.

2. Share your tears. 

I don’t have to know your pain personally to share in your pain with you. Not too long ago, I spent quite some time sitting and crying with friends. We all carried different life experiences and I hope and pray that none of us will ever truly know what the other one was experiencing because ugh, that would be a lot of agony, but we can still share. 

God created us to walk through life together. That means we get to share our joy and our tears. 

3. Cry the right kind of tears. 

There are healing tears and there are draining tears.

You know, the ones that come and just won’t stop and you can barely function and you just. want. to. stop. crying.

Yeah. Those tears.

They were the ones that came when I pretended not to cry while I was with people. I would escape from friends and fellow Believers and try to keep busy to stop myself from dissolving into tears. Then I would be all alone and I wouldn’t be able to hold them at bay any longer and I would break down and cry until I couldn’t cry anymore. And it was lonely and fearful and I hated every minute of it.

Those aren’t the healing tears, friends. Those are just the hot scaly ones that leave your eyes red for days on end. And the difference between good tears and unproductive tears? That would be #4.

4. Embrace humility. 

I don’t think I can say this enough. Pride hinders healing. 

You will always struggle and always fight and always, always, always hurt if you cling to the pride of self-image and refuse to humble yourself and admit when you can’t handle life. 

I know. Because I did it.

Friends said things that wounded me deeply (though I would never admit it) or I would be sitting in church and literally could not breathe because I hurt so badly and I stoically refused to admit any struggle or any difficulty. I smiled and acted tough while I was dying inside.

When I did cry I would be embarrassed and try to scrub the tears away and laugh it off.

It ain’t worth it, friends. Trust me.

Tell your stupid pride to just shut up (sometimes you have to talk rough with that sin!) and be real. 

I’ve told my friends, “oh, that hurts!” and humbled myself enough to accept their apologizes and allow it to strengthen our relationship rather than slice it to pieces.

I’ve left church services in tears and been wrapped in hugs and prayers in the women’s bathroom. I’ve had some women (whose names I still don’t know! Our church is  fairly large.) who have prayed with me and for me and allowed their tears to mingle with mine.

I’ve felt the presence of God while I was crying the hardest– but only when I humbled myself enough to see Him.

5. Carry Kleenex. 

Seriously guys. Remember this.

 

 

 

Other 5 Things Posts:
5 Things to Remember {when the doctor says you’ll never be a mom}

p.s. don’t forget to sign up for my newsletter (it’s releases on the 15th!) and you’ll receive a free ecopy of Dying of Thirst at the Side of a Well.  Also, to those who have signed up and are wondering why they haven’t received anything yet, it’s coming! :)  

why telling yourself to “just be happy” doesn’t really work

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She’s the mother of four.

Their ages are her testimonial to the tired, overwhelming days. 4, 3, 1, and 3 months.

I’m the mother of none.

My empty house is the testimonial to my years of tears and empty longings.

We seem so different on the surface.

She can’t know what it’s like to face infertility every. single. day. She’ll never know what it is like to cry blistering tears over the hundredth negative pregnancy test. She’ll never understand the moods that send a usually sane person into there will never be a baby and I’m so tired of waiting for one so I’m going to turn the spare bedroom into an office and pretend that I never wanted a baby anyway rage.

I’ve never born and birthed four children. I’ve never sat in the middle of three screaming little ones to nurse the baby that has been waiting for twenty minutes, crying in hunger. I’ve never locked myself in the bathroom and cried because there are kids banging on the door and I. just. need. one. second. to. breathe. I’ve never sat up night after night after night with a colicky baby and a four year old with insomnia.  I don’t have four children pulling on me every day, every hour, every moment.

The surface is so different. It’s so easy to stand from the place you’ve experienced and think,

I would give anything to have all those kids hanging on me.

or

I would give anything to have a whole evening just to myself.

But here’s the honest to goodness truth:

We’re the same. This friend and I. We’re exactly the same.

She says,

“I tell myself every day that I should just be happy, but it doesn’t work.”

And I’ve said that same thing and felt that same condemnation for failing at just being content with what I have.

And when I stop in my tracks, in my baby-hunger, in my dwelling on my struggles– and I listen past her longings for a night off of mothering, I hear the same heart-beat.

The same struggles.

We’re all just human after all. So I write back and say, feeling the conviction to my bones that this is my answer too:

Oh, I don’t think we can really make ourselves be happy. I think we just have to surrender the stuff that makes us unhappy. And instead of thinking, “What’s wrong with me that I can’t just be happy with what I have?” (which makes us discouraged) just say, “God, thank you for the things I do have.”

I think it is time that we face this lie head-on. It’s really not about us being happy. It’s not about being tough enough to stuff down how much we struggle and pretend that everything is good.

It’s about surrender.

It always has been.

It’s about me, standing right here in my empty house with barrenness marking my journey, and saying:

God, I thank you.
I thank you for beauty.
For the fellowship of Believers.
For a husband who loves.
For snowflakes plastered against my windows.
For the barn full of animals.
For the friend who stops in for coffee.
For the teenage girl who asks to be discipled.

I thank you for grace, upon grace, upon grace.

Dear ones, there will always be things that make us unhappy. There will always be trials that drag the hope right out of us.  You can walk out of this desert tomorrow, but I guarantee that you’ll stumble into a new one soon after. It’s life. 

I can’t make myself be happy. I can’t even make myself be content. But I can make myself surrender the things that discourage me and thank God for the things that bless me.

contentment @natashametzler

things i love about my husband {27} calm

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28 days of intentionally honoring my spouse

My hands were shaking a little bit and my foot wouldn’t stop tapping. It wasn’t a phone call that I wanted to make and I literally felt my stomach rolling. I knew what the answer would be but everything in me longed for something different than reality.

I dialed the number and cried my way through the conversation.

He stood behind me rubbing my shoulders the whole time. When I hung up he calmly and gently led me through my grief. Never once did he flinch at my emotional messiness. Never once did he get frustrated or angry when it took me weeks to come to grips with the truth.

He has been my calm in the middle of the storm of infertility and I love him for it. 

When life strains my energy and my hope and my joy– he carefully, gently holds my hand and provides a place of safety.

The Challenge:

Are there times that life rocks your boat a bit? How does your husband help you cope?

 

 

p.s. Are you into eating “real food”? I’ve mentioned several times that changes in my diet did the most for me in regards to hormonal balance/fighting depression. This ebook bundle is on sale this week for just $7.40 (for all five books!) and it includes Real {fast} Food, one of my favorite cookbooks.  The other books contained in this bundle are: Real Food on a Real Budget, Real Food…Real Easy, Sourdough A to Z, and Treat Yourself. Just click here to learn more about them.
BundleoftheWeek.com, 5 eBooks for $7.40!

things i love about my husband {16} trials

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28 days of intentionally honoring my spouse

He didn’t know if he’d ever get married and it caused him bitterness for years. Then slowly, piece by piece, God broke down the bits of pride and fear and hurt and brought him to a place of surrender.

Just a few years later, I arrived in his life. We were introduced at a Christmas concert and before the next Christmas, we were married.

Almost immediately I began struggling with the reality of infertility.

I wandered through depression. Struggled with weight gain. Cried over the oddest things.

And he stood there, strong and unmovable at my side. Sometimes his strength made me angry. I would cry over not having babies and he would say, all matter a fact, “Well, I thought I’d never have a wife and I do. So we’re going to keep surrendering this.”

Later he would say, “I wondered what I had gotten myself into. I married this capable stable woman and ended up with a crying mess.” Oh, my poor husband. 

But when I lifted my head from depression and finally was able to take a deep cleansing breath, he was still there.

As time passed, we started trading our moments of weakness back and forth. Sometimes, I’m strong and preaching surrender while he struggles with the reality that he may never have a son. Then I’ll crumble and he’ll hold me tight.

Just a few weeks ago we came home from Bible Study, where he had snuggled a little baby boy for most of the evening, and he broke down. “I leaned down to pick the baby up,” he told me, his voice scratchy with tears, “and I just wanted to say, ‘God! What are you thinking?! It’s not fair. It’s just not fair that my wife may never give me a child of my own.’”

And we talk and cry and this horrible trial that breaks us and wounds us and hurts so. stinking. bad. is also the thing that binds us tight together.

I love that my husband is, really, the only person in the whole world that understands my worst heartache. 

Many people understand infertility but my husband understands my personal journey through it. 

The Challenge:

Have you walked through hardship? Is your spouse still beside you? That is something worth loving. 

28 days of intentionally honoring your spouse

 

Pain Redeemed and Grace Learned

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Children were denied me and my soul cried in agony. I beat the door of heaven until my hands were raw and bleeding. And silence echoed.

And there, with my head bowed low and my hands dripping blood, I finally broke. I blinked away tears as I poured through Scripture, searching for hope.

I’m over at frugalgranola.com today sharing about why I wrote Pain Redeemed. Michele also offers a mini-review of the book. Do click here and come visit?

There are certain principles that are wise and prudent to live by, but they are not “cure all” answers to life’s problems. Everything must be approached with grace. Mounds of it. So much that it spills out onto every word, every thought, every action. By all means, we should learn to handle our finances and we should aspire to help others do the same, but only with humble grace.

I’m also over at KindredGrace.com sharing about how I learned to approach the area of finances with grace. (Yeah, ouch.) Read more by clicking here .

unmasking infertility

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Unmasking Infertility

She had twins. Beautiful little girls with tiny fingers and velvety skin. There was a time when she thought motherhood was forever lost to her and now daughters number 3 and 4 have joined the family.

I ache with the glory of it. God redeems and here is proof. Shimmering, exploding evidence of grace.

unmasking infertilityHolding the tiny bundles, I couldn’t help but remember almost eight years ago now, when news of another set of twins twisted my stomach. I sat alone and ached in pain at my sister-in-law’s ultrasound pictures. I cried at the feet of my God and said, Why does she receive the things I long for? 

His answer shook me to the core. I stared at the water and shivers danced my spine. The words were gentle, like a soft wave on the sand, and they reshaped me fully. “Would you rather I take her gift and give it to you?”

I recoiled at the picture of my selfish heart painted plain.

Never. I whispered and let the rocks fall from my hands. Ripples spread out to sea and something deep in me began to heal.

I will not yearn and reach for other’s stories. My brother’s twins were part of his redemption, not mine.

Then in Haiti. It was twin babies that were tossed into my arms. Malnourished, dirty babies. The mother, young and flippant, said to me, “Take them, I don’t need them.” I wanted to pull them tight to myself. I wanted to shake her silly. Instead, I gently washed and kissed seven-month -babies who were the size of newborns.

I wanted them to be the redemption of my pain. These beautiful children with brown eyes that lost their glaze and began to sparkle as their faces stretched into smiles over warm bottles of formula. But then I looked up at their father, standing there, now without a wife, offering his children not because he did not love them but because he did.

Before we left, when he offered them one last time, I turned the little boy in my arms to face him. “Look,” I said quietly, still aching but sure, “he knows you. He loves you. You are his papa.” As if on cue, the baby clapped his hands and smiled. “I could take him away but he would miss you. He needs you to be his father.”

The young man dripped tears and wrapped his son tight in his arms. He reached for his daughter and my husband let her go.

unmasking infertilityI will not reach and yearn for other’s stories. The babies were part of their father’s redemption, not mine. They were the means to make him stand tall and work hard. God was using them to mold and shape him into a father worth having.

I ache with the glory of it. For my brother. For this Haitian man. And now for my friend as well.

These twins are part of her story. And I will not long for her redemption– but I will delight in it with her. She bore and birthed two babies and I kiss them and squeeze their soft little toes and rejoice in a God who redeems every taste of sorrow.

And me? Can you not look back and see? God is still reshaping me. Unmasking the lies of infertility. Giving me glimpses of glory. And that, in itself, is redemption. 

I am in awe. And I wait in anticipation. God paints glorious masterpieces. The scarlet cord of redemption runs straight through history. And I trust that it will forever run through my life. 

_______________________________________________________________________

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infertility {week of thanks}

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Every year I wonder if it will be the last. There is always that stirring hope, that longing. Perhaps this will be my last year of childlessness. Perhaps by next Christmas I will have a baby. Perhaps… 

And yet, Thanksgiving is here and this “thorn”, as the Apostle Paul would say, is still in my side. My breath is still stolen away in sorrow and the blood of dead dreams still stains the path behind me. Infertility is no matter how much I wish that it was not. 

I shared quite a bit in my book about things that I have learned while journeying through infertility. But today I want to share a glimpse into the raw truth of how I have changed from walking this road.

At seventeen I was adventurous and full of excitement for life. I really wanted to serve God. I thought that I really loved Him. Yet, I can remember whispering to my best friend one night, “I want Jesus to come back but I kind of hope that He waits until after I get married…” 

I knew that heaven would be better than anything I had ever dreamed but… well, there isn’t marriage in heaven. Not like here on earth. And I really wanted to experience marriage here on earth. 

I did. I got married to a wonderful man. And then dipped forward into a deeper, darker trial than I had ever experienced before. And something began to change in me. I saw life for what it is: fallen. 

This world is full of darkness and pain. It is. People die. Dreams crumble. Hope withers. Sorrows build and crest and even though I long to hold a baby of my own– I can’t. 

Suddenly, heaven takes on a different meaning. The return of Christ is not the end of the good things in this world but the end of the sorrow. And I ache for the end of sorrows. I long for Him to return.  I am desperate for the absolution of my pain. I want to see Him and touch Him and have my tears wiped away.

I don’t care about experiencing life anymore. I’d like to. I’d like to carry a child or to walk through a successful adoption. I’d like to travel more or publish the novel that I’ve been working on for years.  There are lots of things that I would like.

But there is only one thing I long for.

And I would gladly sacrifice all the experiences in the world for the glory of being safe in my Father’s arms. I thought that I was in-love with my Savior before but my love was shallow, filled with self-pleasing hopes and dreams.

I’ve changed. My desires are no longer for the things of this world. They stretch beyond and I am thankful. I’m thankful for this harsh, blistering word infertility and for the awakening in my heart of  “a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy”. 

Sorrow bites deep but it also transforms. And I’m thankful for its transformation. 

How is God transforming you through your pain? Can you thank Him for that? Perhaps your sorrow is still too raw. I understand. But I encourage you to draw closer and cry harder and seek deeper. He’s there. 

This year I'm giving thanks for the hard things:
limited finances
failed adoptions
farming

when songs deepen

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In my book I mention several times that there are hundreds of ways that pain can rip through our lives. Since the book’s release, I have heard story after story of heart-wrenching sorrow and I have been touched and blessed by the incredible women who bear their burdens with such grace. There is just something that happens when pain is shared.

My heart connects immediately with the woman who has spent nights screaming and crying and praying that God would take her pain away. The one who has watched dreams burn. The one who stands knee-deep in heartache and says, “Though he slay me, yet I will hope in him…” (Job 13:15)

My heart connects because I have been there. I have screamed and cried. I have prayed and watched dreams burn. I’m still standing in the heartache.

In my story, it is the word infertility that defines my pain. But it doesn’t really matter what word. Pain is pain. It bears the stench of death and ashes. It alters life. And most of all it deepens songs.

In the book of Psalms we get a glimpse into the song of a man named David. Some parts are light and happy and full of praise. They’re pretty. But what is the best known Psalm? Twenty-three. Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.

In pain our songs get deeper. They go from a simple pretty plucked out melody line into a full orchestra. And no matter what part you sing—be it soprano, alto, tenor, bass—you’ll hear notes that you connect with.

We must not fear the deepening.

I want my life to be a song that people hear and understand. The main stanza of the song says, “Jesus Christ is the way, the truth and the life.” But if it is not understandable then what is the point of singing?

God allows the pain; to deepen the song; to turn my life into something people can comprehend.

I’m learning to be okay with that.

I serve a God who does not fear pain. A God who created a world knowing it would hurt him. A God who doesn’t stop heartache but will never leave me nor forsake me in it.

My song can be a pretty melody line or my song can become breathtakingly beautiful— spilling out of the concert halls into the darkest corners of the world.

In not being able to have children—I may get the chance to share Jesus Christ in a way someone understands and help them become a child of God.

If the heart of my song is truly Jesus then is this not the ultimate use of my life? To lead others to him?

Oh, God, let my heart bleed. Let the pain deepen me. Let my life be a song that others understand. Let every part of me echo the name of Jesus. And help me share it. There is no point in deepening if I do not open my mouth and sing.