"Do I have what it takes?"

So in many ways, I had to figure out on my own what it means to "be a man," and I thought I was doing a pretty okay job of it... but now I feel like Nature (or God) said, "Nope, time's up. Sorry, you failed! Here's your punishment," and yanked the cosmic rug from under me.

For a man faced with infertility, the diagnosis feels like a referendum on his masculinity. True, the diagnosis doesn't (or shouldn't) change who and what the man is, but... that's not how it feels. Our culture has strong stereotypes of expectation for both genders, and much pain is caused for members of both genders when those expectations are not met - men just aren't likely to talk about it as much. But that's a part of the male stereotype: a man is not supposed to talk about how he feels, not supposed to let on when he's struggling. Men are supposed to be strong, and stoic, and rational, and disciplined, and self-sufficient. Sex is unfortunately, and unfairly, a core part of our cultural definition of maleness, too; "real men have sex (and lots of it)," our society would say. Sex is something that men are supposed to be good at, virility a sign of a man's strength, so if he's not a superstud, then it can only mean that he's not "man enough." That stereotype is also BULLSHIT, as likely most men would agree... but in honest moments, those men would also admit they feel pressure to live up to the stereotype nonetheless. What the rational mind knows doesn't make the emotional wound any less real.

I've lamented already about the lack of good resources for dealing with male infertility. The question of "are you man enough?" is not a new one to me, however. I also mentioned before that I grew up without a father, as my parents split while my mom was pregnant with me. Honestly, that never bothered me very much growing up; I couldn't miss what I never had. But it left me wounded in ways that I never realized until I matured enough to understand what I had missed. This crisis of fatherlessness hit home a few years ago, after I had graduated college and began to develop a deeper friendship with a man who has become a father figure to me. Two books were huge helps to me at that time, and I returned to them recently; while they may have been written to address the fatherless wound, their fundamental purpose is to help a man answer the questions that most men carry around inside themselves, whether they're ever vulnerable enough to admit it or not.

The first of these two books is To Own a Dragon by Donald Miller (now re-published under the regrettably inferior title Father Fiction). Miller writes in a very accessible, often humorous, conversational and compelling style, recounting the tale of his own crisis of fatherlessness in adulthood, and relating many of the lessons he learned from mentor & co-author John MacMurray, with whom he lived for a few years as an adult. Many of Miller's experiences mirror my own, so reading his story encouraged me in knowing that I'm not alone. Young men (and women) are wounded when their fathers walk out on them, and the wound introduces a fundamental question that follows those young men into adulthood - "Am I a real man? Am I doing this right? Have I become what I'm supposed to be?" There is no book I would recommend more highly to any man who has experienced fatherlessness, or to fathers raising sons of their own, or even to women who want to better understand their fatherless men. But while the book has nothing to do with infertility, the questions it highlights and the hope it offers are encouraging to me even now.

The other book I just re-read is The Way of the Wild Heart by John Eldredge. This one was written as a sequel to Eldredge's Wild at Heart, which is much better known, but I didn't get nearly as much from that one as from this. Eldredge's writing style is much more dry than Donald Miller's, but no less piercing and insightful, and this book resonated with me even more now. It's subtitled "A Map for the Masculine Journey," written for "unfinished men" looking for an answer to the fundamental question, "Do I have what it takes?" That couldn't be more relevant for me right now, and this book has less to do with fatherlessness or any other specific issue, and more to do with becoming the men that God wants us to be. Maybe there's not yet a book to help men emotionally and psychologically in dealing with infertility, but certainly this is the next best thing. I don't agree with everything that Eldredge has to say, but he hits the nail on the head far more often than not, and his work here has once again been a huge blessing to me. If you're a guy at any stage of life, whether you grew up fatherless or not, I'd say this book is worth your time to find and read.

Switching gears... the nurse did actually call us back, just minutes after my previous post was completed.  And evidently what I'm experiencing is indeed normal after this surgery, even if the pain is sometimes quite intense. It's supposed to get better after 2-3 weeks, she said, though it hasn't improved very much yet... so it's just a waiting game now, I suppose. And I hope she's right. God, grant us patience, courage and strength. And healing.