I earned this life

On the heels of an exceptionally trying day, I wake up and slowly start to put back together the pieces of my shaken spirit. I say my prayers, kiss my husband, bid good morning to my children (while striving not to silently curse them for waking up so early). I combed the interwebz for my morning laughs, go over work emails, review my scheduled events and plan out my course of action.  One step at a time, I launch myself back into the world.

I'd like to say I'm ready to "take it on" and that I washed all the ugliness of yesterday down the drain with my final shampoo rinse, but I'd be lying. Yesterday still lingers over me like a shadow, a cold reminder of the fact that hard days are still ahead.

But I have released myself of the self-piteous, emotionally distraught state I found myself in last night, and I think that's a start.

Sometimes, on the hard days, it can be difficult to remember that this is the life I deserve.

I earned it.

I merited it.

This struggle, these challenges, this frustration.

I asked for it. Or it asked for me. I don't know. And I'm not entirely sure it matters.

I earned it when the surgeon told me at 15 that I had significant scar tissue and internal trauma that would forever complicate my chances for pregnancy.  

I earned it when my oncologist told me that cancer survivors don't have babies- that our eggs and bodies just seem to never be fully able to recover from the barrage of treatments that it takes to keep one alive.

I earned it when I sat, covered in tears and blood, collapsed on the floor of my washroom, mourning the loss of life that I had once held inside me.

9 miscarriages.

2 children.

You're damn right I earned this.

Becoming a parent was not something that was supposed to be "in the cards" for me. Each of my pregnancies carried with it a formidable risk of complication, with both of my births landing me in the hospital and resulting in emergency procedures to keep the babies and I safe.

It wasn't something my body was meant to do.

But it was something my spirit was meant to do.

Compelled, even- if you want to get poetic.

Call it what you will:

A miracle of science. Fate. Providence. Divine Intervention. Karma. Coincidence.

You have your words, and I have mine.

Vocation.

This is the life that I was summoned to lead.

Despite all challenges. Despite all struggles. Despite all odds.

I chose to take it on, as a challenge and as a mission, because I know no other way to live.

I am, and have somehow always been, a mother.

I have often been asked: "If you knew your child would be born with Autism, would you still have had him."

What these people don't know is that, on some level, I always knew. I have been talking all my adult life about adopting a special needs child (believing, of course, that I could never have a child of my own).  During my pregnancy, I was told that there were "abnormalities" and given the option to terminate because the risk for life-long complications was very high.

And yes, he is complicated. And yes, he probably always will be. But I learned to live when I gave birth to my handsome son, and again to my beautiful daughter.

Where once was lost, I now am found; was blind, but now I see. 

I was born again, as a parent.

I worked hard for this life, knowing full well what it entailed.

For better and for worse, I earned it.

And I wouldn't change a thing.