As I said, I felt like everything was falling apart this summer. Greg would probably tell you August was the worst of my sadness and I am sure that had a lot to do with another year of our birthday's passing as well. The good news is change was on the way and it was 100% a God thing.
When I graduated college I secured my first job and was promptly laid off six weeks after starting. It was 2008 and the advertising world was feeling the crunch of the recession BAD. I was part of a 30% lay off company wide and that event definitely changed the trajectory of my career. In those six weeks I was just starting to get my feet under me with a couple of big projects and the lead on one of those was Sandy. She was amazing, full of joy and positive energy, you couldn't help but like her. She was a great project lead and just when we were in the thick of becoming good friends, we both got laid off. Go figure right?!Over the course of the last eight years Sandy and I have kept in touch off and on. We met for coffee a few times, did a yoga class together, got our dogs together once but nothing consistent by any means.
While in the pit of my despair this summer I thought I should look for a new job and lo and behold there were some postings at a place I knew Sandy worked so on a whim I reached out asking her to meet me for a lunch date so I could grill her about the company. Little did I know how much that lunch would change my perspective on everything. When we met for lunch we caught up as much as one can in an hour, talked jobs and as we were leaving Sandy exploded in joy and told me she was expecting twins! I was so happy for her, we talked about all of the excitement surrounding their arrival and briefly about her road to get there, which wasn't easy by any means. My reaction to hearing her story was immediately to well up and begin crying big painful tears. I was so embarrassed because those tears weren't for her and her road to pregnancy, but for me and mine.
Man, she took that moment and totally wrapped me in grace. She said, "Somethings wrong isn't it?" I shook my head yes, overwhelmed by tears. She said, "This is bigger than a talk at lunch isn't it?" Again I nodded and with that she invited me to her house that Saturday to talk more. It was like this wave of of relief was washing over me again and again and I could not stop crying. I cried the entire drive back to the office, in the parking lot and finally at my desk. I FINALLY found someone to talk to about all of this, someone who was going to really GET IT and I was just overcome with emotion.
I headed over to Sandy's for coffee and breakfast goodies a couple of days later and we enjoyed a beautiful cool fall day, it was September 12th. We made small talk and then got in to the meat and potatoes of our visit and I cried and she cried and it was one of the most healing moments of my life, and I believe it was absolutely 100% orchestrated by God. I mean I met Sandy by chance 8 years ago, we kept in touch off and on but always had a great connection and looking back that's because God knew I would need her down the road in a big way. We talked about infertility, and what we had both been through. I told her about my IVF concerns and she gave me her thoughts. She gave me spreadsheets of medication comparisons and told me I could do it, that I was strong enough and gave me enough encouragement to not want to give up, especially on God. She agreed that the Dr. we both were seeing was a total jerk and told me to be more assertive towards him. She told me about failure and the beautiful success of her twins coming in the Winter. She told me about the moment everything changed for her and I knew I was having a bit of that moment myself talking to her, that my journey was not over, I needed to keep on trekking forward.
Toward the end of our visit Sandy told me about a bible study group she was leading at the church she was involved with and invited me to come. She told me about this set of prayer warriors at the church that were all old enough to be my parents and possibly even my grandparents and that they were amazing, I just had to go she said. I was skeptical, a bible study with a bunch of older ladies that I know nothing about? Prayer warriors? I am not the demographic they are looking for. I am broken and my trust in God has been in a valley not a peak. But I agreed. What a group of ladies I was about to meet...
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