Did You Know...

Did you know this week in National Infertility Awareness Week? There are some amazing gems on the internet this week as so many families talk about their struggle to start or add to a family. I spent an hour here yesterday crying over the women who reflected my fears in their comments.

Comments like:

"What IF I am only able to mother children who already have a mother?"
"What IF this hole in my heart never goes away"
"What IF we can't ever come up with the funds to adopt and we don't get pregnant?"
"What IF children are still years away for us? Can I make it that long?"

I wanted to share a gem from LDS General Conference I've found comfort in. Below are some of the most powerful excerpts from Dieter F. Uchtdorf's talk Continue in Patience.

"Patience—the ability to put our desires on hold for a time—is a precious and rare virtue. We want what we want, and we want it now. Therefore, the very idea of patience may seem unpleasant and, at times, bitter....

[P}atience is not passive resignation, nor is it failing to act because of our fears. Patience means active waiting and enduring. It means staying with something and doing all that we can—working, hoping, and exercising faith; bearing hardship with fortitude, even when the desires of our hearts are delayed....

Every one of us is called to wait in our own way. We wait for answers to prayers. We wait for things which at the time may appear so right and so good to us that we can’t possibly imagine why Heavenly Father would delay the answer....

Often the deep valleys of our present will be understood only by looking back on them from the mountains of our future experience. Often we can’t see the Lord’s hand in our lives until long after trials have passed. Often the most difficult times of our lives are essential building blocks that form the foundation of our character and pave the way to future opportunity, understanding, and happiness."

I love where he says "bearing hardships with fortitude, even when the desires of our harts are delayed." dictionary.com defines fortitude as "strength of mind that allows one to endure pain or adversity with courage." I'm striving (meaning I'm not there yet) to endure pain and adversity with more courage and less fear.