Moments of Clarity

Many of you who have been following my blog for awhile know that I've been struggling with my relationship with my oldest and dearest friend, BFF, who also happens to be nine months pregnant. I've always considered her to be the sister I never had...one of the few friends I've known that transcended the term.  Over the course of the last nine months, though, I've come to realize many things about our relationship, in particular, and the dicey nature of pregnant and IF relationships, in general.

Up until this week, my realization has been that both IF and pregnancy are rather all consuming. Sometimes people can't appreciate anything outside the particular bubble that their in. That’s often the case with the friendships between those who have moved on to motherhood and those that remain left behind on the IF island.

It sort of feels like boats leaving for the mainland sometimes, as more and more IRL friends move off the island and on to "the rest" of whatever is next. I'll admit that it's a hard feeling for me to process. And, that the things I have spoken over the last nine months have not always been perfect. Likewise, I imagine it's particularly difficult for those on the boats, especially those who never had to stay a day on the IF island, to relate. I get that and it explains it all, to a point.

Looking back, though, I realize that BFF has never done a particular good job of walking in other people shoes. It's just her nature, I suppose. It's a personality flaw that she struggles with, just as we all do our own. That's not to say that she hasn't been an awesome, amazing friend over these many years. God put her in my life for other reasons (and moments) and I'm grateful for her. She will always be my oldest and dearest friend. And, when this storm passes, I'm sure we'll seek out a new "normal" and move on to make new, more friendly (and less painful) memories.

However, my moment of clarity this week has been the realization that I've been avoiding the obvious. That old saying "God puts the right people in our lives at just the right times” feels particularly poignant this week. I finally understand it thanks to the contrast of BFF and our other very dear friends A & K.

A & K spent Thanksgiving Day with us. It was amazing to me, yet again, how spending time with these friends came more effortlessly than with BFF. Perhaps it was because they had spent quite awhile on the IF island having suffered many miscarriages before E was born. Somehow they understood what we were feeling without us even saying a word. When K realized that I had recently taken to calling the room I had always called the nursery "the purple room" instead, she just nodded and said ”We've been there, too," in a quiet, reassuring way.  They've been there, found a way to the other side, and are now beginning to cotemplate a second trip to the island.  Not only that, but they're willing to do all they can to help us get off the island, too.

These are the kind of things that I could beat my head against a wall for days trying to get BFF to understand. She still wouldn't, and would likely end up just silently rolling her eyes or thinking through her own nursery plans in her head. She would likely be worried about me...that I was obsessing again. Why couldn't I just be patient and wait for it to just "all work out?" As if it were that easy...but, it didn't matter how many times I said that to BFF. Her ship had long ago sailed off the island and she had no concept of what it might be like to still be there.

Not only does God put the right people in our lives at just the right time, he puts them there for just the right moments, too. I now realize that I was probably never meant to help BFF understand even an inkling of what this IF world is like. She's not the one who God put in our life to share this particular journey. I've fought against that reality for nine months. It's a hard thing for me to accept. I don't know how to disconnect from her in bits and pieces like that. It's recently felt sort of all or nothing because I just don't know how to leave the IF part out…I guess because it’s such an all consuming part of where I am at the moment.

But, now I realize that God put other wonderful friends in our lives long ago so that they could be our beacons now. No one person can be all things to another. And, that's ok. I've struggled just as much with the idea that I couldn't be the friend BFF needed me to be as that she wasn't being the one I needed. Now I see that I'm not that person for her right now either. That's an equally difficult struggle, but I just have to trust that when Hubby and I make it to the other side it will become clearer.

In the meantime, I see both that relationship and the others in my life (A & K, supportive coworkers, iV friends, and bloggie friends) in an entirely different light. I normally have a small, tight-knit group of close friends. At this moment, however, I have an extremely large, supportive group of friends at various levels of closeness. Some of the people that I once held close, I now hold a bit further back. And, others are closer than I ever imagined. It's a bit of a departure for me, but one that I welcome and appreciate so much right now. More than that, though, I am learning (slow but sure) to trust that it's all according to plan