There are days I wish I could head to Target and ask the pharmacist “Do you have strength in a bottle?” Imagine the blank stare I’d get from the pharmacist. Trust me I’ve searched and a bottle of Strength isn’t in the vitamin isle nor is it in the beverage isle. Strength is something we gain, something we pull out of our little toe when we have nothing left to go on.

It amazes me how cruel people can be and how quickly they pass judgement on to someone. The other day someone told me: “Ya know AmandaJean your infertility is God’s way of thinning the heard.” I honestly didn’t know what to do, I just looked down at the ground and said “I didn’t do this to myself, I am not flawed, my my body just got destroyed.”

People are so quick to judge. If they only knew what I’ve been through, what happened to me. Then, then they would understand. My body wasn’t meant to carry a child, my eggs are fertile, but I can’t go through IVF because of the hormones. The hormones are what put me in this mess. The birth control I used robbed me of my body and it took away they very thing I was trying to prevent. Yet, that very same birth control that almost ended my life, brought me more strength than I could ever imagine.

The strength to live, the strength to inject myself twice a day for 3 weeks with life saving Lovenox, the strength to endure 6 months of twice a week INR tests, countless CT Scans, and the strength to take a new infection in my lung with a grain of salt. Strength to understand that I will never be the woman that I once was. Time and time again I am reminded of how lucky I am. Reminded that if I had gotten to the hospital 5 minutes later, I would be dead. Thats right I would have been dead at 26.

Death is the alternative and that is one I am not willing to visit anytime soon. Uterine cancer tried to take over my body. It lost I won. Winning is something I’ve been doing a lot of lately. The best decision I made was to fight for my body and bring it back from the aftermath of the birth control.

Slowly my body is coming back. The meds are right, vitamins are great, and today is a good day. Tomorrow is uncertain and constant chest pain reminds me to fight a little harder. There are days where I am ok with not having children and then there are days where I cry into my cheeros before work. I have always been a fan of options.

Options provide me with hope and I don’t want to completely close the door on motherhood. My right of carrying and creating a child was taken from me. An I will be damned if someone or anyone tries to take away my option of adoption or a surrogate. Those options are mine and you can’t take them from me.

So this is what I have to say to the haters and to the people who don’t understand: No, my inability to carry a child is not God’s way of thinning the heard. It is not his way of eliminating my genes from the gene pool. He is looking out for me and that is why God brought me Angela, a woman who wants to be my surrogate. That is why we have thousands of orphans all around the world waiting for a woman like me to be there mom. I am not damaged, I am not flawed, nor am I inferior to you. I am simply me and this, this was God’s plan. You can look down on me and you can snicker behind my back. Go ahead throw your religous garbage at my feet and make me feel weak. Because nothing you can say or do will make me feel inferior. Nothing will break my strength. Maybe one day when I don’t need it, I will bottle my strength and sell it to you.