Some thoughts I wanted to share

I've been thinking a lot lately of the Disney stories. They all follow a similar blueprint. A painful, struggling life followed by a happily ever after, where everything is made better and the pain is forgotten. I think we – at least I – grew up expecting that 'happily ever after' moment to come. I'd endure some pain and then get the reward and it would all be singing birds and dancing flowers after that.
It's only been recently that I've learned that the happily ever after doesn't erase the pain that came before. That pain endured leaves scars. Scars that can affect our ability to accept the happily ever after. I, along with everyone I know, expected that when I learned I was pregnant again, I would be filled with relief and happiness. Here is that Happily Ever After moment. You never have to be sad again. That was the expectation. I was floored to find that this dreamed of moment was met with shock and then abject terror. Paralyzing fear. For weeks I felt like I couldn't breathe. Couldn't move.
After what had seemed like an unending period of loss and sadness and empty hoping...I didn't know how to exist in the Happily Ever After. It was so foreign to me. I felt like the scars that I carried made me unfit for that life. I knew how to be The One Who Couldn't Have Children. I had embraced that.
I was sure that this Happily Ever After moment would be, like the last one, short lived and end in crushing despair. I wanted to be ready for that. I expected it.
My Fairy Godmother/Guardian Angel, given to me by a loving God to be my constant companion in this life, kept trying to whisper reassurance in my ear. But fear and doubt screamed so much louder. Hard as I tried, I couldn't drown them out.
As the days wore on and turned into weeks, with no tragedy in sight, I began to understand. There is no Happily Ever After moment when our lives suddenly become easy. Cinderella lived a life of loneliness and abuse. She found happiness after she reached out for it. But she likely carried the scars of her childhood throughout her life. Snow White had to leave all she knew when her life was threatened. She made the best of her situation and finally found happiness. But she had to live with the knowledge that she had been hated and driven from her home.
Scars like these never leave. They don't disappear.
I spent countless hours and unending tears, pleading for a child. Begging for the opportunity to share the creation of life with the man I love most dearly. I lost a child before I ever met it. I wallowed in the depths of hell and misery, wondering why I should be denied the thing I longed for most. I will carry the scars of that journey throughout eternity. They won't disappear. They will never leave.
No, there is not one Happily Ever After moment. I have learned that our lives are filled with many Happily Ever After moments. They are interwoven with the moments of sadness, of struggle, of growth. All of these moments weave together to become the beautiful tapestry of our lives. Darkness and pain, broken by bright, shining moments of beauty beyond compare. It's the darkness that makes the shining moments so beautiful. It is the struggle that makes the Happily Ever After moments so sweet.
Right now, even though I expected this part to be part of the Happily Ever After moment, it is still a daily struggle. I fight the fear back every day. My Fairy Godmother whispers to me that it's time, all will be well. I fight to only listen to that voice. Some days the voices of fear win, but most days now She wins. I look forward to that brightly shining moment, my long awaited Happily Ever After moment, when I will hold my oh so loved and prayed for child, look into it's eyes, and know. That moment is all the sweeter, not in spite of, but because of the scars I carry.