Alex and Susan skipped the morning session of the couples’ retreat and huddled close in another room, sharing a secret grief. They were childless, but not by choice-one of approximately ten million couples in the United States who struggle with infertility. Away from the distractions of daily life, their sorrow had engulfed them. The standard opening question of practically every conversation at the couples’ retreat had been, “How many children do you have?”
When that question arises, particularly in Christian circles, the infertile-an estimated one in six couples-have several choices, as my husband and I have learned over the last seven years. They may honestly admit their difficulty and risk receiving unsolicited advice. “Just relax” and “Adopt, and then you’ll get pregnant” are two bromides frequently offered. The infertile, on the other hand, may cold-shoulder the questioner out of pure self-defense, leaving a mistaken impression that they are unfeeling, selfish, or uninterested in children. It is not easy to explain, in a few sentences, all the complicated waves of emotion affecting couples who either cannot conceive or cannot carry a pregnancy to term.
Almost without exception, couples experience infertility as a deep spiritual, emotional, and marital crisis. Stepping Stones, a newsletter for infertile couples published in Wichita, Kansas, articulates the spiritual questions plaguing these couples: “Self-concept, self-image, the very basis of our masculinity and femininity, all seem jeopardized by infertility. Since we have been taught that children are a gift from God, and we haven’t received that gift, we examine ourselves by asking: Am I being punished? Would I be a bad parent? If God isn’t going to give me a child, why doesn’t he take away my longing? Don’t I have enough faith? Can I make a deal with God?”
Emotionally, infertility confronts a couple with the simultaneous strain of a crisis (every twenty-eight days when pregnancy does not occur) and a chronic condition (as months and years go by). The wear and tear of this chronic crisis most often hits the wife harder, since she is the one who anticipates bearing a child and perhaps defines her most important roles in life and marriage through child rearing. A roller-coaster ride of hope and despair leaves both partners feeling emotionally destabilized.
When they realize their infertility is final-and pregnancy will not occur in the ordinary course of events-they grieve. All the familiar “stages” of grieving may be present, even though no one has died. The couple may experience any combination of surprise, denial, isolation, anger, guilt, and depression.
Stress on the marriage is inevitable. Initial medical interventions to enhance fertility disrupt the couple’s most intimate moments by requiring intercourse to be planned for the days when the woman is most likely to be fertile. Often, this is accomplished by having her take her temperature daily, recording the results on graph paper. When the infertility can be traced clearly to one partner, the strain is intensified. About 30 percent of the cases are due to physical problems of the woman, 30 percent are traced to the man, and the remainder result from a combination of factors or are undiagnosed.
Carol and Dan struggled with different responses to infertility after he was diagnosed with a congenital condition that kept him from producing any sperm. Dan alternated between disbelief and the sense that his masculinity was under assault. He wanted to put the brakes on considering any alternatives until he came to terms with the news. Carol, on the other hand, flew into action. She contacted several adoption agencies, collecting forms and getting on lists. She explored artificial insemination by donor, feeling unable to accept the idea of “missing out” on pregnancy and childbirth.
But Dan opposed artificial insemination. “I felt as if I’d be the only loser,” he said. “And what would we tell the child? As long as there are other people around who know the child was conceived by a donor, it is deceitful to raise that child without telling him of his true parentage.” Because of his opposition, they abandoned the idea of donor insemination. But problems between them lingered.
“When one mate has a definite problem, the other one tries to go easy on him, to spare him,” Carol recalls. “Sometimes I felt I really could not share my sadness or frustration. That has been the hardest part for me. I have had to learn how to allow him to help me through this.”
Seeking resolution
Clearly, infertility presents a dilemma. The church, though, has an enormous reservoir of resources to help.
The first step involves recognizing infertility as a legitimate condition with a variety of possible solutions. Telling an infertile couple, as one Christian leader did, that “God can work miracles” rings terribly hollow. A better response is to approach involuntary childlessness just like any other disease or chronic condition a parishioner may develop.
In the case of Alex and Susan, what they considered a miraculous answer to prayer came in the form of a simple announcement from the minister leading the couples’ retreat they attended. As they cried and prayed together in the morning, away from the other couples, they overheard John Yates, rector of The Falls Church (Episcopal) in northern Virginia, invite childless couples to meet following the retreat’s evening session to discuss common concerns. At 9:30, they and eight other couples tentatively entered a meeting room, not knowing quite what to say to one another.
John’s wife, Susan, eased the tension with a simple reading from the Gospel of Luke. Elizabeth and Zechariah, she read, “were upright in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commandments and regulations blamelessly. But they had no children.” Susan, mother of five, spoke confidently of how valuable everyone is to God, whether childless or not. Infertility should never be misconstrued as punishment, she said, nor does it mean God has abandoned a couple.
Without pretending to know “all the answers,” Susan offered simply to grieve with the couples there and listen to their stories. One couple acknowledged that they disagreed about adoption; he favored it, and she opposed it. A middle-aged couple who came to the meeting recalled their struggle with infertility and passed around photographs of their adopted children, now in their teens. Agonized accounts of surgery, multiple miscarriages, and seemingly endless waiting periods for adoptions were interspersed with humorous tales of trips to the urologist.
Alex and Susan quietly shared the news they had just received from their doctors. They had very little hope of conceiving a child naturally, so the only available alternative for a biological conception was in-vitro fertilization. They harbored serious questions about this expensive, high-tech procedure and sought help from the group in sorting the facts.
Beyond addressing the specific concerns of couples, the meeting served as a starting point for a support group that met every other month for two years. Simply getting to know other couples experiencing infertility set many husbands and wives on the road toward resolution. The existence of a support group, announced regularly in church bulletins, alerted the congregation at large to be more sensitive to the problem. And meeting regularly for discussion and prayer support assured these couples they were valuable, essential members of the body of Christ. The group helped get them off the sidelines and back into action.
Seeking support
The Falls Church group met with no formal agenda, other than encouraging couples to become acquainted with one another. On several occasions speakers were invited, and these sessions were the best attended. One such meeting featured a childless couple in their sixties who explained how they had coped. They had been unable to adopt because the husband was a military officer and they moved too frequently to complete the process in any one state. They filled the void in their lives by sponsoring a number of children through the Christian Children’s Fund, building close relationships with nieces and nephews, and caring for six godchildren.
At another meeting, a couple explained the step-by-step process they went through to adopt an infant from Korea. A panel of two adults who were adopted as children and the adoptive mother of a grown woman gave the group a candid look at the issues adopted children and their parents face.
With some reluctance John Yates came to speak to the group. “This is a group I didn’t particularly want to speak to, because I don’t feel adequate,” he admitted. “I like to be able to answer everybody’s questions. I can’t do that with this group.”
The group’s organizers had provided John with a copy of an excellent book on infertility, Childless Is Not Less, by Vicky Love. He developed a theme she addresses, based on Psalm 127:1-“Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain.” After he spoke, he prayed with the group and invited couples to join him in the church sanctuary for private prayer. Several couples did and experienced a sense of emotional healing as a result. Their pastor cared, and he demonstrated it.
A different approach to a support group format is modeled by Menlo Park (California) Presbyterian Church. Theirs grew out of a six-week series of classes on infertility prepared by two members of the church. Cynthia Lovewell, a registered nurse, and LeRoy Heinrichs, an infertility specialist, developed a curriculum. Weekly discussions on different aspects of the problem were led by church members or staff with expertise in the field. Some of the topics included problems in reproduction, the emotional aspects of infertility, spiritual dimensions, and an overview of adoption alternatives.
Couples were urged to write answers to two take home questions: “What are you doing to help yourself during this stressful time?” and “List all the resources available to you that could possibly assist you in your present situation.”
One year after the classes ended, the group was still meeting regularly. Three of the original eight couples were expecting babies, and one was pursuing adoption. The other four continued toward resolving their infertility within the supportive network of a caring Christian community.
Intensive support groups such as the original one at Menlo Park and the more informal network at The Falls Church require little ongoing attention from a church’s pastoral staff. They are, instead, an ideal opportunity for lay ministry. Infertile couples in both places found that the mere exercise of getting together on a regular basis to share information, test ideas, and simply vent emotions helped tremendously.
While pastors do not need to become deeply involved in these activities, they may want to take the infertile into consideration on occasions that are particularly painful, such as Mother’s Day, infant dedications or baptisms, and Christmas. These child- and family-centered occasions are likely to send the infertile fleeing from the church while praise is lavished on the fertile. The Falls Church inaugurated an Abraham and Sarah Fund on Thanksgiving, and couples who were grateful for the gift of children were invited to donate money to assist couples with adoption or foster-care expenses.
Support from other infertile couples and a pastor’s special sensitivity were the keys to resolution for Carol and Dan, the couple struggling with male sterility. For months, Carol could not articulate her feelings in a group setting because she was so distraught. Eventually, as they came to accept their circumstances, they agreed to pursue adoption through a Christian agency. To their great surprise, a five-week-old boy was theirs a full six months before they anticipated placement. And their support group responded with a festive baby shower.
Alex and Susan attempted in-vitro fertilization twice, with no success. Feeling that the door to physical childbearing had closed tightly behind them, they went on to adopt an infant girl from Thailand. For both of these couples, the church came through with encouragement, prayer, and understanding during a genuine time of crisis.
Understanding infertility, acknowledging its emotional impact, and guiding couples toward positive solutions are steps any church leader can take. For those experiencing infertility, knowing that a church leader cares may be all it takes to help them walk a difficult path with the Lord rather than withdraw into bitterness and isolation.
-Beth Spring
McLean, Virginia
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