Practitioner Diary Vol. 2

*This situation really happened, as unbelievable as it may be after you read this account, it really happened.

So I am at home on Friday and it's around 4:45pm when I get a phone call. It is a man calling to inquire about fertilitycare and when he and his girlfriend can start learning CrMS. He asks how soon they need to learn if she is already pregnant. I tell him that I usually have them come to an intro. session around 8 months so she can get used to doing observations now before the baby comes. I am thinking this is going to be a typical inquiry phone call when he drops the bomb and says "How soon can we learn if we were going to terminate the pregnancy?" There was a momentary internal freak out when I tried to collect my thoughts to respond. I asked how far along she was and he originally said about 12weeks well later in the conversation I learned that they were much farther along than that around 20weeks because they already knew the gender of the baby. 

He kept saying things like "this is the best thing for our baby," "we are not ready to be parents" and "we don't want to give our baby up for adoption because there is no guarantee that she will be happy." With every typical remark that you hear about justifying abortion I tried to answer him calmly and compassionately. I don't know what it feels like to have an unplanned or unwanted pregnancy but I do know suffering that has to deal with fertility. Every part of my being wanted to scream and say "PLEASE DON'T KILL YOUR BABY! I WILL ADOPT YOUR BABY or FOSTER HER UNTIL YOU ARE READY!" 

Instead I informed him on fetal development and how already his daughter feels pain and will feel the pain of the abortion. I also let him know how this will affect his girlfriend in the long run and the health complications she may have. I talked to him about post partum depression that she will experience and the help she will need in the long run in dealing with this decision. I tried to be a good listener but I also called him out on some of the fallacies he was spouting. There was a point in the conversation where the phone got cut off and I didn't have his number but, he called back which tells me he wanted to talk about this and was not sure about the decision they had made. We left the conversation with me letting him know he can call back at any time whether or not they go through with the abortion and learn CrMS from the other practitioner at our center. 

After I got off the phone with him I wept and prayed. I hate it that people who don't want to get pregnant can get pregnant and people who want to can't. I hate sin. I had been texting our pro-life coordinator and she was texting me resources as I was talking to the guy. I talked to her afterward and just broke down. I asked her how on earth does she talk to these couples on a regular basis! I could not even handle one! Being pro-life is hard and being infertile doing pro-life work is extra hard. I was a little mad at God that I would have to be the one receiving this phone call. Whether it was a prank or not (the phone call took place on Halloween) it felt like a cosmic cruel joke. Why would an infertile gal who has lost a child before have to be on the other end of that phone call?! I had some choice words with God afterward and cried A LOT. 

I know there is spiritual warfare in the work that I do but this took it to a whole new level. Following God's will is not easy, especially when it involves suffering. Our respect life coordinator reminded me that God doesn't always call the most qualified for the task but will give me the tools I need to get through the task. This opened up a new level of suffering for me and I have to say it stings and is painful. It has taken much prayer and daily Mass to give this situation to God and let it go. I think the enemy was hoping I would get so discouraged from this that I would just collapse inward. Well that's not gonna happen because God is bigger and stronger than all of this! These are some of the interesting situations we as practitioners get into and need to navigate which is another reason why I am so thankful for the other practitioners who do the work I do. I pray these parents change their mind and choose adoption or to parent. I pray they see this child for who she is, a beautiful gift and creature created by God.