Hope, Gratitude, Joy.
When you let life teach you a lesson, it hurts. When you fight it, go against its teaching, it’s unbearably painful. But isn’t pain the only means through which we, human beings (and animals for that matter) can truly learn? We learn not to play with fire by burning ourselves, we learn to be careful with knives by cutting ourselves. And we learn how to be stronger emotionally by feeling all sorts of uncomfortable feelings.
My life has been pretty easy. I honestly cannot complain. I was brought up with love, I was showered with attention. So, imagine my surprise when Life decided to show me the shadowy side of itself. The “dark” side where there is no protection from feeling too much or “feeling in the wrong way”.
My family and friends all know that I’ve been struggling with infertility for years. It is something deeply personal that I don’t like to share with others, yet crave to tell the world in the hopes that I can find a kindred spirit, someone to commiserate with.
My husband and I tried every possible treatment short of IVF (and that is only because we haven’t gotten there yet). After almost three years of (not even) baby steps, we decided to ask for a second opinion, to find another doctor who might know more than the one that wasted so much of our time.
I don’t really believe in God but when I think of how I got to hear about this amazing person and doctor, I am reminded of the story of the drowning man who refuses every help he is offered by his fellow men, telling them that God will save him. When he dies, he asks God why he didn’t help him. Naturally, the answer goes something like this: I sent you all the help I possibly could but you refused every single one. As much as I don’t like these religious teachings, this one hits home. So, I (we) wasn’t going to be the one to refuse the help I was offered, the help that is out there: SCIENCE. (Side thought: I think this is why religion is so dangerous. One cannot expect for God to come and fix everything. We need to act, to use the resources at our disposal to better our lives.)
I kept hearing this name from different people, different women who were also struggling with infertility. But at the beginning I was content with going to my old doctor, paying her a crapload of money (basically for nothing). Finally, she said she is out of ideas and sent us to and IVF clinic in another country. And then Covid hit. Our appointment had to be cancelled because we couldn’t travel (also, the doctor we were referred to died, how ironic is that?!). A couple of months later I said I can’t wait any longer. That is when I remembered this name, D. R. I asked for an appointment, and as they say, the rest is history. She discovered most of the issues behind my infertility within two months. I was pregnant within four. Hope was beginning to take root again. Unfortunately, I had to have two miscarriages to discover the last (and most emotionally painful) reason why we weren’t able to have a baby: immunological incompatibility. But D. R., being the kind of person and doctor that she is, told us about an experimental treatment that she actually tried about four times with great success. Guess what, people? It worked for us too! I won’t go into too much detail about this treatment because that is not the point of this post (hit me with a message if you want to learn more about it). The point I am trying to make here is that this kind, professional lady showed us the care and attention (alongside her medical expertise, of course) that we needed to have our dearest dream fulfilled. For that we can never thank her enough.
The illustration that you see here was made specially for her, to show her a little bit of gratitude. She has helped (and continues to help!) so many women become mothers, so many people become parents that I’m sure even double the amount of balloons with baby names wouldn’t be enough.
We are eternally grateful to her for our Miracle Rainbow Baby who wouldn’t exist without her.
Check out some of my other Projects and Illustrations as well!
