Don't you just love it when random strangers share their (ahem - interesting) opinions so freely?
After experiencing the most crazy May/June you could ever imagine, we needed a break. What we really needed was a sabbatical, but that wasn't offered. Instead, we took a morning to head to the Heard Museum in McKinney, Texas. We looked forward to observing some nature and heard about a butterfly exhibit so we thought this would be a great place to go - it helped that we had a free membership as a result of our membership to the Museum of Nature & Science. In hindsight, this may not have been the best place to go since you can't really bring strollers, we had a 25 lb baby who didn't walk yet, it was JULY in Dallas, and I was still in the half-leg brace thing for my ankle. Nevertheless it turned out to be a fun trip.
As we entered, a Southern-bred woman in her mid-late 40s was walking in the opposite direction. While walking past we had the following conversation:
She - That doesn't look like fun
Mie - not really having much time to say anything about it - No, not much fun, but it's getting better.
She - almost behind me now It could be worse, you could be pregnant!
In early times of our infertility this may have sent me into an emotional fit and I probably would have ranted about how inconsiderate this woman was. Instead I just smiled and nodded and moved forward. Afterall, I suppose for a woman who was getting past her childbearing years, seeing me push a 10 month old in a biking/jogging stroller with a 3 year old in tow and a broken ankle in the middle of summer, I suppose being pregnant would make things a bit more challenging. There was no way for her to know that we struggled with infertility, or what we had just gone through. And I'm fairly confident if she was made aware of our situation she would have felt really, really stupid for saying what she did - maybe she would have stopped to count her blessings. At the time I could think of a whole lot more worse things than being pregnant - like losing your best friend, or watching your dad recover from a massive brain injury - it was one of those moments where I was reminded that we are all given what we can handle - no more and I hope no less.
If given the choice, when I'm about the same age that woman was, I would much rather be the person who sees pregnancy and children as a blessing, a positive, than the worst thing out there. Because really, there are a whole lot worse things out there than being pregnant. I promise.
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