Myanmar, 2011: A friend gave me some leftovers since she was going out to dinner and then travelling and didn't want the food to get wasted. She left me a note on a postcard of a beautiful little girl. I kept that postcard on my desk - and looked into that little girl's eyes very often.
Laos, April 2012: I was doing a month-long assignment and missing my husband. I had written him a note about how I felt so lost and could not understand what I was doing with my life, far away from him. I was also sad and frustrated that I couldn't get pregnant.
He sent me an email that I've kept to this day - an email with his vision for our lives. He mentions in there coming home after a long dinner, to our little girl who wraps her arms around our necks and begs for a bedtime story. I take a warm shower and then join them in her bed for the story. It sounds like a dream.
Jerusalem, September 2012: I was walking around with a colleague on a Sunday evening in East Jerusalem looking for a cosy restaurant. On our way we found a single black patent leather girl's shoe. I picked it up and decided to bring it back home with me. "Perhaps it will prove a good sign", I said to my colleague. She nodded warmly. When I told my friend in New York about the shoe, she told me that she'd also been out for a walk and had also seen a single black patent little girl's shoe. Serendipity?
Hong Kong, January 2015: My little girl was born. When I look at her now I don't know why I doubted that she would ever come to me - it's as if it was meant to be. I can’t imagine myself with any other child but her. But I didn't always feel this way. People often said "Just relax, you'll get pregnant" and I always thought "Yes, but what if I don't?".
We considered adoption and went to information sessions and talked it over. We also did some fertility treatments - which made us feel so detached from one another and from the process of creating a little human. I got pregnant outside of these fertility treatments. It came from out of the blue – like a miracle after 5+ years of no success.
My little darling is almost 2.5 years old now. She is everything. My life could have been very different if it weren't for a stroke of something. Perhaps the post card, the warm email and the little shoes were signs to me that she was on her way. I really feel for women who are having difficulties getting pregnant. I know the frustration and the pain and the well-meaning comments of "Just relax - it will happen".
I don’t have any words of wisdom to offer, just my story. If any of this resonates with you, please get in touch.
Smetha
Hong Kong
[email protected]