Keeping in Teutsch

I've had a few people asking me how things were going church-wise since I wrote the "Problem with Church" post, so I thought I'd update those who are interested.

After writing that post, I put the link to it on Facebook and got a lot of encouraging comments. The following week, the assistant pastor at East Bayou emailed me, saying someone had shared the post with him, he understood my frustrations, and would love to talk to me about the issues I had with the small group setting at East Bayou, as they knew it was one of the areas they needed to improve. I was a little shocked to see an email from him, but it spoke volumes to me to have someone from the church reach out, so I agreed to meet with him. We basically just talked about our small group experiences, but he did encourage Matt and me to pray about leading our own small group (since they need more leaders). Matt and I had been talking about how we just needed to choose a church, join, get more involved, and then we would probably feel better about the situation. (Which is what many who originally commented on the post had suggested.) So, that's what we did!

Since that post was written, we've joined East Bayou, will officially start our small group (with three other couples) in a few weeks, I've started volunteering at the check-in desk in the kids' area, Matt is about to start working sound, and I recorded my story on infertility and job loss for the church's "My Story" series, which you can see here if you haven't already. (And, I'm still involved in my women's Bible study that meets twice a month as well...I REALLY love that group!)

It has pretty much always been my belief that as a mother your number one ministry should be and is your children, and my friend Jaime echoed my thoughts when she blogged recently about this. (Coincidentally, I had been thinking of blogging about this topic myself, so thanks Jaime for giving me the nudge to do it and letting me share some of your thoughts here!) Jaime wrote the following and it is spot on with how I feel:

I want to take this role so seriously but I feel so humbled and clueless[…]. I know to pray with him and read the Word to him. We talk about Jesus and Cash will gladly point to his heart if you ask him where Jesus is...but I'm not sure if I've ever felt more clueless…about the "rules" for effectively teaching him what it means to Love and serve Jesus with his whole heart. I think the feelings of inadequacy come from how seriously I take this role in my life...

I feel that if I get nothing else right in raising Juliette (and future children), it's okay as long as they learn the extreme importance of having an authentic relationship with God and actually have it. Since before Juliette was even conceived, I have prayed (as I am now praying for child #2, who hasn't been conceived, in addition to Juliette) that they will one day be saved, that God will give them a passion for Him that will guide them through the tumultuous teen years (because I dread those years) and beyond, that they will have wisdom beyond their years, that He will prepare Godly spouses for them, and that they will have the desire to grow close to Him, among many other things. And another thing: That He will give Matt and me the wisdom and the words when they ask the tough questions and that we will be godly role models. To be in charge of teaching my child about Christ and having the responsibility of their salvation in my hands can be frightening, because I don't feel like I'm good at this AT ALL, but at the same time, it's exciting and brings me to God in prayer so much more! 


Before becoming a mother, I had heard people say that having children gave them a clearer understanding of God’s love for us and what it means to have child-like faith. I LOVE having a front-row seat to Juliette’s child-like faith. It is awe-inspiring…and so very humbling too! For example, when the tornado in Joplin, Missouri, happened, Matt had told Juliette that day during lunch that they needed to pray for the people who were hurt. (He obviously didn’t go into the details with her.) For a few weeks, she diligently prayed every night for them, but what was incredibly humbling to me was when we went to my parents the following weekend and in the middle of the morning, while Mom and I were talking about the tornado, Juliette asked us if we wanted to pray for the people who were hurt. Of course, we didn’t refuse, and although Juliette decided she wanted me to pray instead of her, the intent behind it brought tears to my eyes. How often do we as adults stop and pray with others when it’s not a mealtime or a church service? Maybe some of you do that all the time, but sadly, that’s not the norm for me and I felt convicted. Sometimes in the middle of teaching your children, they teach you!

I have to say, though, until recently I'd never heard parents really discuss this in terms of how inadequate they feel or clueless (like Jaime said). I don't think it's bad to feel this way, and I imagine, like Jaime said above, that those that feel that way have those feelings because of how serious they are taking this job, which is a good thing!

Since I am a type-A personality, though, I think it does make me feel like I'm winging it sometimes since there is no actual check-list for teaching your child about Christ. But, since Jaime and I clearly are echoing each other thoughts on this, I think it’s important to say to other parents who feel the same way, "You are not alone in your thoughts and feelings on this and it doesn't make you a 'bad' Christian to feel inadequate about your ability to teach your children about Christ. We should be taking this responsibility seriously, so let's encourage each other and pray for each other."

When I sit back and think about how I was raised (and I think my parents did a good job with this), I think that it takes multiple things: having your children in church consistently (and make being in church a top priority and not a "option"), praying for and with your children (and making prayer part of your family's daily life), reading them the Bible and talking about what you've read, using teachable moments in the course of everyday life to teach/talk about God, His commands, etc., and practicing what you are preaching to your kids. I think as humans sometimes we try to make Christianity more complicated than it really is and I'm sure there are some things that I'm not thinking of that my parents did, but my point is to say, we don't need to try to complicate it into a long check-list, no matter how easy and nice that would be for us Type-A personalities! Sometimes the most effective ways are the simplest ways!

So, I didn’t write this post with the intention of saying “this is how you do it,” because believe me, I’m just taking it one day at a time relying on God to walk me through it. I just want to challenge others (myself included) to make teaching our children about God one of our top priorities (and not just that there is one [head-knowledge], but going deeper than that [heart-knowledge]). That doesn't mean you can't go on mission trips or serve in a ministry capacity to other people. It just means that we don't need to rely on the church to teach our children. And that we don't need to neglect the mission field we have between our own four walls!

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it. --Proverbs 22:6

Part 1 of this post can be read by clicking here. Also, because of the details that go along with telling our infertility story, some of you guy readers might feel like I'm sharing too much information, so proceed with caution!

Part of me always knew, in the back of my mind, that one day I would have trouble getting pregnant. Since pretty much day one of my "passage into womanhood," I had problems ranging from periods that wouldn't stop without medical intervention or simply no periods at all. And at the young age of 13--after at least a year or more of 3-month intervals on and off the Pill--my doctor put me on the Pill permanently. He offered to refer me to someone else so we could identify what was actually wrong (instead of just using the Pill as a Band-Aid for the problem), but I was in junior high and I didn't want to be poked and prodded and undergo tests that were more appropriate for older, maturer women. I just wanted to be a normal teenager, so my Mom and I declined any further evaluations or tests and I spent the next decade growing up, graduating from high school, falling in love, getting married, graduating college, and working on my career--all while popping a Pill nightly to keep me "normal."

Since Matt and I were so young when we got married in December 2000, we decided that we wanted to wait at least five years before we had a child. In February 2004, six months after I graduated college and six months before Matt graduated with his masters degree, we bought our first home. Up until that point in our marriage, children hadn't really been a thought since we were still in such a transition period in our lives. Buying a home meant we could finally settle down, though, and it wasn't long before I started getting serious about growing our family. Matt, however, is an only child and seemed to not have much interest in children (or didn't really know what to do with them when we were around them), so as a test of his parenting abilities, I agreed to let him adopt a puppy from the pound. Zoe was like our first child and Matt babied her so much (and still does!) that I knew we were ready...Matt had passed my test! So, in late summer of 2004, I stopped taking the Pill and was anxious to see if the same problems I had as a young teenager were still there. It didn't take long for my fears to be confirmed.

As the months went by, I tried to stay optimistic, thinking maybe the Pill just needs to get out of my system and I'll be regular then. But by Spring 2005, it was apparent that I needed to see a doctor since I wasn't having my periods. My doctor ran some blood work, which came back normal, and then over the next six months or so of that year, he regularly prescribed me hormones to make my periods start and Clomid to increase my chances of getting pregnant. I tried to not get frustrated by the fact that he seemed to not be very aggressive about finding the root of the problem and oftentimes through that first year, I questioned whether I should change doctors or even go see an infertility specialist. I found myself constantly feeling like I was wanting to "bypass God" if I took more aggressive measures or that if I prayed harder or had more faith, I wouldn't need medical intervention.

By Fall 2005, I was fed up, though, and had come around to the realization that further medical intervention didn't mean I was relying on man to fix my problem, but that these doctors were simply one of God's tools! It had been a year and we still had no clue what the problem was, so I decided to try another Ob/Gyn who I had heard good things about. Before we left the other doctor, though, we had a sperm analysis done and were told that Matt had a normal level of sperm but that the count was on the lower end of normal and he should probably avoid hot baths. Considering that Matt likes to get in the bathtub and read and had just finished getting his masters in English, which requires a lot of reading, I banned him from the bathtub until we were pregnant!

Changing doctors made me feel optimistic again. I went for my first appointment in October 2005 and the doctor--before even doing an exam or ultrasound--said he felt I had a mild form of Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS) based on what I had told him about my history. An ultrasound showed that one of my ovaries was huge and had cysts on them and that it was most likely because of the treatment of hormones and Clomid that the other doctor had me on. I'm a little fuzzy on the workings of insulin and its relation to PCOS, so I might not be totally correct in how I describe it, but basically, women with PCOS typically suffer from insulin-resistance, meaning their body doesn't respond to insulin like it should and therefore more insulin is made, which can cause your ovaries to develop cysts. High insulin levels lead to your ovaries producing higher levels of male hormones and thus ovulation becomes affected. In short, your hormones are all out of whack and as was my case, the hormone that told the egg to release from the ovary wasn't working, therefore I wasn't ovulating. (Clear as mud, huh?)

My new doctor's first course of action was to get my ovary back to its normal size and to get rid of the cysts. He prescribed metformin, a form of glucophage that is typically used to treat diabetes and regulate insulin in your body. I was also scheduled for a laparoscopy (exploratory surgery to look at my reproductive organs) and a hysterosalpingogram or HSG (better known as a tubal dye study) for the first week of November 2005. The laparoscopy showed that the metformin had helped to shrink my ovary back, that the cysts were gone, and that everything looked good. The HSG showed no blockage in my fallopian tubes and I was sent home with a follow-up appointment for the next week and a very positive outlook from the doctor.

At my follow-up appointment, we were given the go-ahead to try again that month, this time taking both metformin and Clomid, as well as charting my basal body temperature. I had been charting my basal body temperature (your temperature at rest, before getting out of bed in the morning, using a special thermometer) almost since we had started trying to conceive, but didn't know the facts behind why it was so important until I read "Taking Charge of Your Fertility" by Toni Weschler. "Taking Charge of Your Fertility" was such an eye-opener to me, as I never knew some of the signs my body was giving me, especially when it came to cervical mucus. Yes, I went there! Too much information, I know, but desperate times call for desperate measures, and if taking two medicines, recording my basal body temperature into software that analyzed it for me and told me when I would be most fertile, checking my cervical mucus daily, and a healthy dose of prayer would lead to pregnancy, I was all for it!

In telling my story, I can't skip over the spiritual side of it. There was about a year there that I felt desperate all the time, where my prayers were made up of literally begging and pleading, and where my emotions were running so high that news of my friends' pregnancies (and there were quite a few during that time) left me running to God crying, "Why?" "Why Me? Why Can't I Have a Baby?" As I shared in the first part of this post, in the excerpt from the book, I'm a control freak and oftentimes God uses situations that he knows will get your attention to teach you some important life lessons. For me, I thought I could control my body, even though I had never actually been in control of my menstrual cycle. None of us are, but my perception of pregnancy had everything to do with controlling whether I got pregnant or not and nothing to do with allowing God to control such an important step in my life, in our marriage. I thought I was in control and I thought it would happen on MY timeline. God took this opportunity as a wonderful teaching moment in my life, and I don't regret it at all. And then I did something crazy around the time I changed doctors. I quit praying!

During the transition of doctors, I read a book (which I can't remember the name of) of one woman's story of infertility. In the book, she talked about ceasing her prayers for a while because she felt the main reason she was praying so much was because she felt she needed to "remind God." I suddenly felt convicted about my prayer life because I realized that control freak in me was coming out in my prayers and without really realizing it, I was trying to control God. My prayers were definitely becoming a "reminder" to God (as if He would ever forget!), and I was treating Him like a child does their parent when they want something really badly--I was trying to "wear Him down," hoping He'd change His mind and go with MY timing, not His. I had become a woman obsessed with trying to convince God to go along with my plans and it wasn't good. So, that fall of 2005, I said a prayer and it went something like this, "God, I know you know the desires of my heart and I know you don't have to be reminded. I've become obsessed and I'm not praying to you for the right reasons. I know that you will answer my prayers in YOUR timing, so I'm not going to ask you again." That Fall I had such a peace. That doesn't mean that I didn't pray to God at all during that time, but I specifically quit asking Him to give us a baby. If I was getting anxious, I would ask for patience, peace, whatever I needed at the time. I firmly believe that, for me, I needed to come to this place in my relationship with God before He would give us our miracle!

The first cycle I had in November 2005, after having the laparoscopy and the HSG, while taking the metformin and Clomid and following some of the more natural tracking methods as discussed in "Taking Charge of Your Fertility," was "the one." On December 23, 2005, I stood staring at a faint second line, my heart pounding, trying hard to contain my excitement. Could it be? Was this for real? For a year and a half, I had stood at that same bathroom sink staring down at just one line. One line that dashed my dreams month after month. A line that to me symbolized failure.

I wasn't supposed to start my period until that day and had actually already taken two tests the following two days and hadn't taken the trash out yet. I pulled the prior two tests out of the trash and was shocked to see a very faint second line on them, so faint that I had missed them the two days prior. I knew then...this really was for real! I remember clearly that Matt was on the couch watching TV when I nonchalantly came walking into the living room with the stick in my hand to announce the news. He wasn't so convinced over the faint second line, so I hightailed it to Walgreens to get one of those tests that are indisputable, the ones that say either "Pregnant" or "Not Pregnant." It said "Pregnant" and although I was thrilled, I was still reserved about it because I knew this wasn't necessarily a "happy ever after" moment, that we could lose the baby. For the first 15 weeks of my pregnancy, I continued taking my basal body temperature because I knew that if I were going to miscarry, my temperature would start dropping back down. After 15 weeks, I quit taking it since we were out of the first trimester and on August 24, 2006, we welcomed Miss Juliette Geniece to the world. Funny thing about God's timing, three months into my pregnancy my company was bought out by a bigger one that offered cheaper insurance premiums, awesome insurance that cut my costs of having her in half, and 100% paid maternity leave (which I wouldn't have had before). God knew the best time all along, of course!

Since her arrival, life has taken some twists and turns that I didn't really foresee. I had always hoped to be done having my children by the time I was 30. This past December, I hit the Big 3-0 and we haven't had any more children. In 2009, before Juliette's 3rd birthday, we downsized and moved to a new town in order for my husband to go back to school for his doctorate. Juliette is always asking about having a baby, and I know she would make an excellent big sister. I often find myself wishing we could have another one right now and feel the same longing that I felt when we were trying to conceive Juliette, but without the desperation (since the circumstances are different). Because of my age and because of the problems we encountered before, we plan to start trying for number two at the beginning of next year in the hopes that God will bless us with another baby before Matt graduates and we make another transition to a new town. Because it has been over five years since our infertility journey, I've found the same feelings and attitudes toward a new pregnancy have begin to surface: denial over a problem, wanting to control when we get pregnant, thinking it will be a quick fix if we do encounter the same problem. Writing our story out this weekend, though, has helped me to relive some of those emotions and feelings (even though I didn't really want to) and I hope the lessons I learned the first time around in regards to control and God's timing stay at the forefront of my mind.

More than likely, our journey with infertility isn't over, but I'm okay with that. God is still writing our story and if I've learned anything it's that His endings are so much better than mine!

Out of all the posts I have written, I never ask you guys for anything...not even comments! :) But, I consider this post one of the most important ones I've ever written and ask that you share the link to it with your friends or family members that are going through the heartbreaking journey of infertility. (And make sure you comment--yes, I went and asked for comments!--because I'm giving away a copy of the book "Dear God, Why Can't I Have a Baby!" See the bottom of this post for the details.)

It was the fall of 2006 and I had just returned from maternity leave and was working with author Janet Thompson on the publicity for her book "Dear God, They Say It's Cancer." (Which is a great book for those with the unfortunate diagnosis of breast cancer.) As I got to know Janet better and as things settled down publicity-wise, she shared with me her idea for her next book about infertility. She was having trouble coming up with a title that started with "Dear God" (which she wanted so that it would match her other book) and I threw out "Dear God, Why Can't I Have a Baby?" because I was fresh from the experience of asking God that question pretty much daily for a year and a half. She loved it! I was passionate about this topic and it became my personal mission at work to make sure we published it.

Fast forward to the summer of 2007 and Janet and I sat down for breakfast in Atlanta while we were there to attend the International Christian Retail Show. Janet wanted me to share our infertility story so she could include it in the book, along with many other couples' stories. So, over a quick breakfast (because nothing can ever be done at a leisurely pace at a trade show!), I shared our story and gave Janet permission to use whatever parts of it she wanted to.

At work, I was still petitioning to the Book Review Committee on her behalf because I knew this book was the book I searched for during my journey and never found. I knew this book would have been a huge comfort to me and that it would be a huge comfort and help to others too. I knew the statistics and kept sharing them: 1 out of every 10 couples in U.S. are infertile (meaning they've tried unsuccessfully for a year to get pregnant), which basically means more than 6 million people encounter problems conceiving and bearing a child. (Facts are from the American Fertility Association.) Six million people! Yet the Book Review Committee at Howard Books was made up mostly of men, and their wives hadn't struggled with infertility, so they ultimately passed on publishing this book because they didn't think there was a wide-enough audience. It made me mad because out of every book I've ever worked on, this one book that I never got to work on is the one that I was and still am the most passionate about. Janet didn't give up, though, and kept tirelessly submitting proposals to other publishers and keeping me updated on her progress as we worked on another book of hers.

In 2007, I was driving to work and heard Drew Cline (who at the time was the lead singer for NewSong) and his wife, Lori, (all you Springhill people who might not be able to place them, this is Philip Carroll's daughter and son-in-law) on the local Christian radio station in West Monroe talking about their infertility journey (among other things). I told Janet about the interview and tracked down Drew's email and was able to connect the two, which led to Drew writing the foreword for the book. At this point, Howard had passed, yet I still felt so strongly about the need for this book to get into the hands of hurting women (and men), that I kept rooting for Janet and it.

As you all know by reading past posts, major changes happened at Howard Books in 2009 and I left the Christian publishing industry. I never stopped thinking about that book, though, and wondering if Janet ever found a publisher. This past fall, Janet tracked me down on Facebook and shared the wonderful news that she had found a publisher (which coincidentally Howard's ex-VP of Sales and ex-Sales Manager now work for) and the book that had been so many years in the making would release in April 2011.

July was promising...new town, new house, new school, new church, new people. Like I said before, we were still living as if nothing had really changed. The money was still there...my security! Oh, I should have seen that lesson coming, huh? It's definitely a tough one to learn.

I'm a control freak...or more like I'm a shadow of the control freak I use to be. In 2005, I learned what happened when you give up control of your body and give all control over to God...you get a long-awaited-for pregnancy at the end of the infertility journey. So, I'd definitely encountered some prior lessons I should have put to use here. Apparently, I'm a little hard headed and have be reminded! Hopefully, I got it this time!

I guess the real mood shift came when the money wasn't there anymore and that was around October. In October we finally closed on our home in West Monroe and crossed off another number on our prayer list and at the same time emptied our savings to get rid of the house. Three down, two to go. Sadly, there was no longer a savings account to be our safety net. Thankfully, we have parents that could be our safety nets, but I tend to be quite prideful (another bad thing) and don't like to ask for help much. I have a sign in my kitchen that says: Faith is not believing that God can--it is knowing that He will. How appropriate it became. I never lost faith...but faith and hope aren't the same and I have to say that there were many times when I felt hopeless.

Some of you reading my blog have never experienced a job loss that lasted very long or had a bad effect on your family...that wiped out your savings, your 401(k), your hope, and what you found to be your security. Tears were frequent around here this past fall from someone who NEVER cries! It was extremely high stress for quite some time. I had been monogramming as much as I could to bring in extra money. We had just enough money between Matt's little income and my unemployment to pay the bills. I had to pray for monogramming work (or parental "gifts") in order to buy food and gas each week. Just like God, though, He never failed to see us through each week. No bill went unpaid, no body too hot or too cold, no mouth unfed. We had to cut back--way back--but we always made it through each week. The lack of money contributed to an amount of stress that I never want to experience again, but it wasn't just about the money. I couldn't get interviews. I couldn't get hired when I got interviews. And after only so much of that, I started feeling worthless and questioning what I was supposed to be doing with my life. Oftentimes, the negative thoughts and feelings running through my mind were worse than the reality of how we were going to eat that week. Those negative thoughts and emotions, fueled with high stress, led to an explosive and depressive Melissa...agitated all the time, quick to anger, easy to upset. It's amazing my family still loves me!

God IS awesome, though, and as you've already read in prior posts, he turned this bad thing in our lives to good. He showed up time and time again on a daily basis and provided for our needs. And he put a smile on my face when I saw just how awesome He is. You see, one particular crying fit came at the beginning of November. I had decided to have a booth in a private school's Christmas craft show in Ruston. I had done a booth there the year before and made $1400...the most I've ever made at a craft show. Since I had been out of work, I had worked on expanding what I could do and had built up quite a bit more samples for Christmas shirts and whatnot. Halloween weekend, though, my machine broke. I wasn't finished with samples (in fact, didn't have nearly enough to even do a show) and ended up not getting my machine back in time to complete the examples--much less in time to actually make it to the show. I was devastated and crying on Matt's shoulder, I said "I don't understand why God would allow this to happen. He knows that I'm just trying to do the one job I have right now and make money that we desperately need." My mom echoed, but like moms do, she said, "There's a reason." As you all know, a week or so later, I got the university job interview and a few weeks after that I got the job offer and had to start the week after Thanksgiving. In hindsight, I'm glad I didn't do the show in Ruston and God knew EXACTLY what he was doing! Had I done the show, I'm sure I would have gotten a lot of orders and would not have been able to complete them in a timely manner (which would have replaced one stress with another).

From the looks of this post, it would appear as if my unemployment consumed the latter half of 2009. In many ways it did. 2009 may always be known as "that" year, but it was also the year that I got to be a stay-at-home mom for 7 months...something I never thought I'd be able to do and something I may never be able to do again. Juliette will only be little once...it was such a joy to get that time with her. She helped daily give me something to smile about and laugh about and to be proud of!

2009 taught me a lot of lessons that I hope to never forget: God is still in control (just like he was in 2005); my security (including financial security) should lie in Him and only Him; He will NEVER leave me nor forsake me and He will provide for all my needs; that the bad things that happen in life can be turned to good; and that when I am weak, He is incredibly strong and many, many steps ahead of me!

I hope no one reading this ever has to go through a situation like we did. If you know someone in a similar situation, please pray for them to have peace, have faith, and have hope, because there will be better days!

We are looking forward to "better days" in 2010 and hope you have a good year too!

Melissa