SHARING PART OF OUR REAL & RAW STORY

SHARING PART OF OUR REAL & RAW STORY

~ A very hard part I wish I didn't have to...

I've waited all week to share this, and honestly wasn't sure if I would. Some years I do, and some I do not. I don't share often, but when I do I share a lot. Sorry it's so long, but I feel this is a topic that needs to be more understood, and made aware of.

This week is National Infertility Awareness Week...and I am 1 in 8. ❤️‍🩹

1 in 8 in the U.S., 1 in 6 worldwide.

One in every 8 (or 6 globally) people has or is struggling with infertility, and it can be anyone you know.

Also as an fyi, if there is a plan, diet, pill, supplement, herb, test, old wives tale, I've probably tried it over the last 13 years...so please, I appreciate no advice or messages, thank you! 😉👍

Much of my issues stem from a bacterial infection of bartonella (cat scratch fever) that I contracted from a kitten we rescued in 2013, so mine is quite different from most. Subsequently, I've had a number of health issues since that time. I am still believing for the Lord to heal my body completely, and I'm also doing what I can to help that to happen.

For those who don't know...

Darin and I have tried to have a child for almost 13 years of our 15 year marriage, and it has been the hardest thing I have had to walk through besides my father's death. It is grief that is ongoing, and isn't just something you can move on from or get past really...because as long as you are trying or hoping for a child, it continues, month after month, year after year. Many of you know that we are now attempting to adopt, which has come with it's own struggles...but the struggle & pain of infertility is still there, and very real. It takes great faith, and great determination to continue to trust the Lord in this struggle, and continue to let Him heal me of the grief that it brings. God is doing something through, and in, all of this. I just can't see it yet.

PROPHECY GONE AWRY ~

We've also had more prayers, prophetic words, and declarations than I can say tbh, and I am very grateful for them all...yet worn out at the same time. It is honestly hard to hear now, after so many of them have been wrong (or the timing has been off on them anyway).

I've actually had many try to put a date on when we would have a child ("I see your child coming this year!"), and all of them were wrong. It is frustrating to me that many haven't been taught enough in the prophetic, that they don't know not to do that. That is prophecy 101...don't prophesy about children or marriages, and don't put dates unless you know that you know for certain!

I can see how many have been hurt and completely turned off by good intentioned, but very wrong and misused prophecies. Had I not been stronger, and not been who I was, it would have done the same to me. But honestly, even with me, it was hard to discern if what they were saying was of the Lord...especially because this particular topic is so close to my heart, and I wanted it to be true so badly. However, it never was, and that made it even more painful.

Maybe this is part of why I want to do my part to train & equip within the prophetic so much. It is sooo very needed! Too many are out there prophesying out of their own mind and will, or they are picking up on the desires of the heart of the person being prophesied to. This is not true prophecy, but based in carnality at the least, and witchcraft at it's worst. That is for another post though.

SO WHAT IS INFERTILITY?

Infertility is technically the inability to conceive within a year of trying to have a child. Ours has been a 13 year journey, that is still ongoing.

But really, it it is so much more.

It is desperately longing to do the most basic thing that a woman does, and that is to have a child. It's wanting to know what it feels like to have a life growing inside of you. A life that has your eyes and his smile. A life that you created in love, and will be the perfect blend of the two of you. 💞

Infertility makes you feel alone, isolated and different. So many other women have and are what you are not and do not have. Women were created to have children. It is part of the way God made us...so when we cannot, we struggle with feeling less than, incomplete, and not fully the woman we want to be. You avoid conversations with mothers, because although you've been around children most of your life, and taken care of many...you still feel like an outsider. You struggle to hang out with other women who are mothers (and now even grandmothers) because you know there isn't much you can add to the conversation, as most women love discussing their children.

It’s somehow loving a child you have never met, and missing them fiercely every day. It’s loneliness as your house is absent from the pitter patters of tiny feet in the morning, or giggles from bath time at night. Whether those come from a birth child, or adopted, it is still something we greatly miss. We can feel the missing piece.

But yet you hold onto hope as you continue to try, until you find yourself once more on the bathroom floor holding another negative test, trying to hold back the tears again. Or for me now, after years of that (I haven't tested in years), grieving somewhat every time we have a child they call us about, that ends up not being our adoptive child. 💔

This leads to feelings of regret and intense sorrow, as the bedroom down the hall, which has been set up as a nursery for years, is a place where you only sit and imagine the children that are not there. A place where you cry out to God for Him to do what only He can do. (And yes, we've had a nursery or child's room set up for 7 years now.)

It is trying to understand why those who abuse their children or don't even want more children, are given such blessings. We have someone in our family that is this way. But you...you have to fight, and work, and struggle beyond your strength, exhausting all of your resources to even try to receive what some take for granted. Why Lord...why is this so hard for us??

It's frustration that leads to desperation as you try every recommended vitamin, test, treatment procedure, medicine, and diet instructed. Only to hear your doctor say - "I just don't think it's going to happen for you"... And so you go home with only the hope, that despite the odds stacked against you and the past disappointments you've endured, all things are STILL possible with God! And you cry out to him, "Lord...help us keep believing!" 🙏😭

Even when we know that the Lord can do miracles, and continuing in hope and belief that He will one day give you yours...even when we are trusting that someday we will be blessed with that "one thing" we want the most...but it is still difficult not to feel less than in the meantime. It is difficult not to feel like you are not fully the woman and wife that so many other women are, and the woman you have wanted to be ever since you were a little girl.

And yes, even as a minister, even as a woman of God, a prophetess, who is seen and called "powerful and strong" by many others...I feel this way at times. I have to pray through it, cry through it, and give it back to the Lord in the end. Again...and....again. 😓

Darin and I have had many, many prophetic words given, dreams by us and others, and confirmations about the children that the Lord will send to us. Dozens of them. Dreams of me pregnant, dreams and words of our children, whom we have already named as we felt we received the names from the Lord. We've had the nursery set up for years by faith, and we've got lots of clothes, blankets, and little baby things ready for our little one when they finally come...through birth or adoption.

We've prayed, cried, declared, decreed, warred, rested, tried, stopped trying, tried again, and everything in between. Many will say... "Just keep believing...It will happen!", not realizing what all that means and how difficult that really is to walk out for so long. It is exhausting and not something I would wish on my worst enemy.

THAT IS INFERTILITY.

It's more than just the inability to conceive.

It's dream-shattering. Soul crushing. And heartbreaking.

And yet...we have soldiered on, and tried to keep the faith, and hoped beyond all hope.

I continue to stand...but it isn't easy. I cry usually often about this battle I must walk through. And then I pick myself up once again, try to shake off the grief that wants to consume me, and move on with life, ministry, and ministering to and helping others. All the while, there are many times I wish there was someone there to minister to me at times. But this is something that most people don't talk about, and even it you do bring it up, most don't know what to say or how to respond and it just gets awkward.

Some want to only give me verses to read (I've read them all), or encouraging words of "It will happen in His timing!" or some other words that they feel I need to know. Not realizing that I do know that...and of course I have to trust that it will. But that doesn't help me in the grief and disappointment of it today. And believe me, unless you have walked through something like this for 13 years, you really don't know what it feels like to fight this battle for this long.

So...I decided I would share some of what we are walking through, with hopes that maybe some of you will feel led & remember to pray for us as we walk through this difficult and long journey. If you think of us, please pray with us for the children we are believing God for....and pray for strength for the journey and peace in the meantime. 🙏

I also wanted to share to make you aware, this week especially...

That one in 8 couples are dealing with this, and chances are you know someone who is, even if they haven't said anything. Be aware of them as we get closer to Mother's Day and Father's Day, and how difficult days like that are for them.

Be aware, and if you know someone who is struggling with infertility...reach out to them this week, to let them know you are praying for them. Let them know you are there if they want or need to talk, even if you don't fully understand or haven't been through it. And if they do want to talk...don't give advice, just listen to them. Listen to their struggle and let them talk. Then let them know you see their pain and hear their grief, and even if you don't fully understand, you can't imagine how difficult that would be, and will be praying for them.

Trust me. We appreciate it...more than you know!

Through it all...I know He is faithful & good! Believing for a good ending to this story.💝

From my heart ❤️‍🩹,

Amanda Shiflett ~ Just a woman 👩🏻‍🦰

#niaw #InfertiltyAwareness #OneInEight