Disclaimer: I wrote this when I was feeling really down. I had just looked at all the medical bills we put on our credit card last month. I don’t feel like this very often, so don’t worry too much if I freak you out with this post.

While I was in Dallas, I went into Strasburg Children at The Shops at Willowbend. While I was exclaiming over the beautiful clothes, the manager asked if I had children, and I told her, “No, but I have nieces and nephews!” She then told me, “Maybe your heart is telling you it’s time to have children.”

Yes. Yes, it is.

She was very sweet, and told me about her daughters. She said she believes they are her “rewards” from God. We chatted for a bit, and she seemed like such a nice woman and wonderful mother.

David and I really want to have children. It’s kind of ridiculous how much. Some people say that if you have a dog or cat you can get some of that parenting instinct out of the way by babying your pet. We just look at Henry and say, “Won’t it be great when our kids are old enough to play with Henry?”

I’m tired of people asking if we have children. As soon as we tell them no, they start in saying, “Well, that’s okay. You’re young.” No, we’re not young. We have the health of a middle aged couple.

I really don’t like chronic illness and medications interfering with our ability to have children. It’s just not fair.

I don’t like using the term infertility to describe our situation. It seems disrespectful to people who’ve had miscarriages or tried IVF or fertility treatments. I’ve never even been pregnant. Still, I’m not sure what else to call it.

Please don’t tell me we should just “try” in spite of what our doctors are telling us. Please don’t tell me that it will all work out, blah, blah, blah. Yes, I know that God is in control. Yes, he ordains all things for his glory. That doesn’t make this fun or mean that I have to like it.

Stupid arthritis.

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• SITS Day!
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• My First Blog Post

Today is my SITS Day! “The Secret is in the Sauce” is a wonderful group of women bloggers who support each other through comments. I have come in contact with so many great bloggers through SITS and received encouragement, support and advice. I highly recommend you check them out.

If this is your first time visiting my blog, Welcome! I’m Ashley, a young wife. I’m married to David. We have a dog named Henry.

Henry says hi.

As you might have noticed from the banners, I love Diet Coke. I even did a vlog about Diet Coke. I also love dessert, reading and wakeboarding.

In 2008 David was diagnosed with Psoriatic Arthritis. It has completely changed our lives. I started blogging as a way to cope with the arthritis.

We’ve tried all sorts of things to ease David’s chronic joint pain from a Back 2 Life Machine, a Sleep Number Bed, chiropractic care, acupuncture, reducing David’s animal protein intake, to going gluten free. If you have a chronic illness, you know how it is. Everyone sends you information on “cures” and “remedies”. In fact, there is no cure for arthritis. There are several things that help David, but there’s nothing that completely heals him. Trust me, we’ve tried it all!

These days I write about living with chronic illness, my TMJ Disorder, how we really want children, being a caregiver and a homemaker.

In March, David accepted a new job, and we moved from Dallas, Texas to Camden, New Jersey. I’ve been blogging a lot lately about the culture shock and the challenges of taking a 70 pound dog from a four bedroom house with a yard to a two bedroom apartment.

Our backyard in Texas on one of Dallas' rare snow days.

Thank you for reading and commenting! I’d love to keep in touch through Twitter or Facebook. Love ya, sitstas!

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As every married couple knows, people ask you, “When are you going to have a baby?” all the time. Every week at church. At every wedding, baptism or baby dedication you attend. When you buy a house. When you hold a baby or play with a child. Someone’s bound to ask.

You want to know the truth?

The truth is, David and I love children. Absolutely adore our nieces and nephews. We look forward to our week to work in the church nursery, and we have a blast teaching a Sunday School class for three year olds.

Honestly? We’d have a baby right now if we could. But we can’t.

With our chronic illnesses and all our medications, we are currently physically capable. It’s very difficult being told you cannot have children until you’re healthier. And the doctors have no idea when that will be. It could be a month. It could be a year. It could be ten. 

Adoption is not an option. With our poor health, we wouldn’t even qualify to adopt. Plus, I can’t take care of David and a baby. We truly cannot have children until we’re healthy.

We’re not really worried about children. Yet. We’ve still got plenty of time, and hopefully, we’ll be healthy enough to have children before long. Most days, I’m so focused on David getting better that I don’t even think about having children. It’s just every now and then, I’ll read something, or see a stupid commercial on TV, and I’ll feel my eyes well up.

David’s pretty funny about it. We were in a toy store shopping for our nieces and nephews several months ago. We saw lots of cool toys that weren’t around when we were little, as well as toys that we remembered having fun with. As we were leaving David said, “We need to hurry up and have kids so we can buy all this cool stuff!”

Of course, he also said our dog Henry was going to help us raise our children. He said he’d get a basket we could strap on Henry’s back so he could carry a baby like a papoose. And we’d train Henry to fetch diapers and bottles. Poor Henry. He has no idea the work David has planned for him.

My parents couldn’t have children for the first ten years of their marriage. In fact, even after they had me, the doctors said it was a miracle, and they would never have another. But guess what? I have three younger brothers. I’ve heard my parents’ story so many times (see the post Fifty Facts About Ashley).

Lately what I’ve been remembering about their story is something my mother told me. She said, “If God had given us children when we wanted him to, we would have gotten a divorce. God knew what he was doing.” She said they needed those ten years of marriage to solidify their union. Not that I wasn’t the perfect daughter or anything.

Who knows why God doesn’t want us to have children right now? Maybe it’s so David and I will be a better, stronger couple. Maybe he wants us focused on other things right now. Maybe we need to grow as individuals so we can be better parents in the future. I don’t know. He is God. He is Sovereign.

So, my answer is…

We’ll have a baby when God gives us one.

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