There seems to be an abundance of pregnancies at the moment. At the beginning of last year, I realised that it had been a while since many people had told us they were expecting, and sensed that another wave of babies was on its way. This is partly because we are now very much entering the years where it's not unusual to have a baby. Until now, only some friends have had children, many of them older than us. But now, in our early 30s, it's getting much more common for those our age as well.
It's always awkward when someone has to tell you news that both they and you know is hard for you to stomach. I had a good friend who struggled with people telling her they were pregnant, because she had noticed that it was her job to make the other person feel better. Sympathetic as they may feel, hard as they know it will be to hear, my pregnant friends rely on me to tell them it's ok and I'll be ok. Doesn't feel fair, really.
But the abundance of pregnancies has given certain friends the opportunity to shine and to bless us with their empathy and tact. Just after Christmas we had dinner with a couple of my school friends, plus husbands. I knew that our hosts were expecting. At about 5pm, I received a text from the other friend, letting us know that she is also pregnant. 'Argh!' was my first thought. My second thought was to just call the hosts and say that we couldn't come. That I couldn't face it.
But I know myself better than that. I know that I shouldn't run away from those situations, because it'll only make me bitter. I knew that I needed to go to the meal, to congratulate my friend and to get over the "I'm pregnant and I know it's hard for you" hurdle. I am so glad we went.
My friends were brilliant. There was the obligatory chat at the beginning - "'How many weeks are you? How are you feeling? When's your due date?" - and it came up a few times during the evening. But it didn't dominate the conversation. And when they were talking about pregnancy, they weren't weird and awkward because of our situation. They were just normal. I am so thankful for those friends, because they took a situation that could have made me jealous and bitter, and turned it towards cherishing our friendship and enjoying their company. Thank you friends; you know who you are.
As I was anticipating this tidal wave of pregnancies, the same phrase kept coming back to me: to root out bitterness. The image in my mind was more precisely to dig out the root of bitterness before it took hold (Hebrews 12.15). Bitterness starts as jealousy, sadness and the feeling that you've been hard-done-by; this turns into obsession over what you don't have and ends in broken friendships and a hard heart. Bitterness tells you it's ok to hide from people who are pregnant because "it's too hard for me", but doesn't take into account the possibilities of blessings coming from those friends or that you might grow a little as you keep struggling to be friends with them.
So far I've done ok at not letting bitterness make its root in me; I'm usually genuinely happy when someone tells me they're pregnant and can congratulate them without being false to my emotions. But where I fall down is those people who seem to get pregnant immediately they stop contraception, or for whom it's a total surprise. Because in most cases, I can think to myself, "she's allowed to be pregnant because she's gone through X". Now, whatever X might be (from miscarriage and difficulty conceiving to unrelated things like difficult upbringings or tense marriages), it warps my perception of the pregnancy. It's a way of consoling myself because their whole life isn't perfect. But that makes life into a pair of scales, where the bad things are on one side and the great things on the other, and how I view the person is dependent upon how sad I think their life has been. Warped.
What I've been trying to do recently is to see the life of the baby. This is much easier, because however jealous I might feel towards the mother (dependent upon how much woe I think they have seen), I can't help but be excited that a new little life is coming. It's not about the parents; it's about rejoicing that a new person will soon be with us and anticipating what that person might be like, what they might enjoy, how they might impact the world.
What this does is take my perspective off my own circumstances and jealousy, and focuses on the positive. I've never been very good at being sad; ever the optimist. But this has been a blessing in itself. As I celebrate these new pregnancies and share friends' journeys towards meeting their child, I share in their joy. I stop feeling jealous and start feeling excited for my friend. I stop feeling bitter and start to look forward to meeting their new bundle of joy.
I see that looking forward to sharing their excitement is so much better than looking inward and dwelling on disappointment and bitterness.
Dig out that root before it takes hold.
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