Faded

By MGAL Expert Lynn Trotta
as published in Discover Your Woman Within: Journey to Wholeness by Char Tosi 

Bracing myself against the bathroom mirror I stared into my blood shot and wet eyes and thought “my life is over.”

I looked again at the pregnancy test, admitted that the line was not faded but in fact a clear dark blue, looked back into mirror and thought “Yes, definitely over.”

It feels all very dramatic now, but at the time it was the scariest and truest thought I’ve ever had. I had not planned on having a baby but I did know one thing. I had a choice in the matter. Just because I was an adult married woman didn’t mean I had to have this baby. This realization of choice saved me in that moment. After the tears stopped and cognition returned, I sat down and made that choice. Yes, I would have this baby and I would do everything in my power to ensure that while this pregnancy was unplanned, It would not be unwanted.

I spent the next 32 weeks mourning the imminent death of “Lynn the child-less woman,” so that “Lynn the Mother” could be born. With the guidance of a great life coach, I sat down and listed all the things I would miss in my current life that would disappear once the baby arrived.  Things like sleeping in late, endless hours in the garden, and spontaneous travel.  I agonized over that list. I wept over that list. Then I realistically looked at it. Everything that I wrote down fell into one of two categories: I wouldn’t really miss it or I could still do it.

No, maybe I couldn’t sleep late every day, but I could arrange for my husband to take the kid a few mornings a week. The same went for time in the garden and I can honestly say that I’ve never spontaneously traveled in my life. In the end, they were all just scary and un-true thoughts.

All of this made me wonder; Were these thoughts what prevented me from wanting a child in the first place?  How often do we hold ourselves back because of unrealistic fears? And how often do our greatest gifts stem from the very thing we feared most?