| Struggling to Conceive series |
My Gift
On Mother’s Day, we shared about our first miscarriage as we said Happy Mother’s Day to those who’ve struggled to conceive or had a loss. My Father’s Day gift this year represents something of a milestone for this story. Little Evie came in time for Father’s Day. Our journey in bringing her into this world was bumpy, to say the least, but it gave us a new perspective on life and a renewed, heartfelt desire to comfort and help those who are on a similar journey. Because of this, I’ve been working to pull together a Father’s Day gift for you should you (or anyone you know) find yourself on this journey, trying to conceive. But, before giving you that gift, I’d like to share more of the story behind it.
Our Fertility Scare
Whenever we were first married in 2015, Monica’s physician told her that she might have PCOS, a hormone disorder that causes reduced fertility. For a newly married couple with a desire to have a big family, this news was overwhelming. Being a new husband, I wanted to give hope to Monica. So, even though it was only a possibility, I went to work researching all the various treatments, medications, and procedures to address fertility issues. In doing this research, we found that the process of aiding conception was a complicated road that also carried several risks to the children conceived in the process. Like all dads, I wanted to protect my wife and children and make sure that each decision we made along the way was reflective of that desire. So, we made it our mission to understand and navigate the process to protect each child along the way.
Before we had the chance to put any of this into practice, we found out that Monica was pregnant with our daughter. Nevertheless, the experience left us with a desire to help couples struggling with infertility. So, we continued our research and tried to find ways to help couples in this situation. Three years and two children later, we had our first miscarriage and only a few months after that we lost another child to miscarriage. It took us several months to work up the courage to try again. Once we saw that positive pregnancy test, we were on pins and needles for the first three months. After some time passed, it slowly became more real that our new little girl was healthy and that she would be with us soon.
When we started thinking about names, we reflected on our journey. Once again, we were moved by the desire to help couples who have struggled to conceive. We wanted to offer couples the information they need to make informed choices and protect life along the way. We chose our daughter’s name to reflect this desire. Her first name, Evelyn, means life, and her middle name, Elizabeth, refers to John the Baptist’s mother who struggled with infertility.
A Gift for You
In honor of Evie being born, we wanted to publish the first release of a guide for Christian couples who are trying to conceive as a Father’s Day gift for you. Our goal in this guide is to give you what you need to make an informed decision about which approach you will use to conceive and how to navigate the decisions involved along the way. Our focus will be on how to protect each life conceived along the way and honor God’s design of conception.
We will talk about the questions we all have on this journey, trying to conceive. Questions like why is it so hard to conceive, and where is God in the process? We will also provide a practical discussion of the various ways we can support conception. This first release of the guide represents a small part of the over 60 pages we have researched and written on this and similar topics in the last several years. We’ll add a more detailed discussion on each of these methods as we can. In this first release, we have already included this more detailed discussion for in-vitro fertilization (IVF). I hope that this guide and the resources we will add in the future are helpful to you!
Take a look at our guide for those who are trying to conceive here!
What a great Father’s Day message! Thank you for all the work involved with your research. This is a wonderful and informing body of work for all parents-to-be. Looking forward to the continuing discussions.
This is just wonderful that you shared your story and that you made the fruits of your research available to others who can receive help and encouragement from what you and Monica learned through your trials. To want children and have such difficulty, and for many long delays in seeing that happen, must be a really hard season in their lives. And to make it a Father’s Day gift is just a true blessing for others who need this encouragement! God bless you and your family Many times over for your sharing these life lessons!