It was the day after my 30th birthday, and I was lamenting to one of my best friends how burnt out I was. I was burnt out from the burdens I was carrying at work as well as with my own healing, which I felt had just taken another backslide. With the wisdom and love borne from over twelve years of friendship, she gently reminded me of how far I had come and how much I had put into this process. She had gifted me with a book by Meg Hunter-Kilmer for my birthday called Eyes Fixed on Jesus: A Journey into the Gospels and encouraged me to do just that. To fix my eyes on Jesus. To seek the source behind the healing rather than the healing itself.

As one of my friends at work says, “Everyone’s got something,” meaning we all have a cross to bear, a weakness or suffering to endure. I am keenly aware of the “thorn…in the flesh…to keep me from being too elated.” (cf 2 Corinthians 12:7) As someone who struggles with pride and self-sufficiency, I know this thorn keeps me utterly dependent on Christ. Which is right where He wants me. 

Every year I pick a word and saint of the year through Jen Fulwiler’s random generator. This year I got “Faith” and it was one of those times that as soon as it popped up I knew why. I needed it. I needed it desperately. Because in pursuit of the healing, I had forgotten the Healer, and the importance of trusting  the Healer. The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines faith as “the theological virtue by which we believe in God and all that He has said and revealed to us, and that the Holy Church proposes for our belief, because He is truth itself. By faith ‘man freely commits his entire self to God.’ For this reason the believer seeks to know and do God’s will.” (CCC, 1814)

I realized I had stopped asking the Lord what His desires for me are, and had stopped praying for His will to be done in the midst of praying for my healing. I had stopped just letting Him love me. And as I’m writing this, know that I’m just beginning this process and that I don’t have all the answers. I’m just beginning to be reminded again that union with Jesus forever is the goal. As Meg Hunter-Kilmer writes in her book, “Jesus did not, it seems, cure them all. Apparently, He knew that some would do better without being healed, at that time or possibly ever. Though Jesus worked many miracles, both for love of the sick and to show His power, He is in the business of saving souls, not merely bodies. Sometimes He leaves us in our suffering in order to save our souls.” (Eyes Fixed on Jesus, pg. 95)

Whether infertility has brought up physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual suffering (it and many other types of suffering tends to bring up all four) that needs to be healed, I encourage you to take the focus off of this for a moment or however long the Lord invites you to. To take the focus off the PCOS, the endometriosis, the thyroid disorder, the autoimmune disease, the ovulation defect, the cancer, the low sperm counts, or the anxiety, depression, trauma, loss of faith, hope, or trust. And instead to shift your focus and heart and eyes to Jesus. What is He telling you? How is He loving you? How is He inviting you into faith and hope and union with Him rather than a treatment? To fix your eyes on Jesus doesn’t mean that you need to stop treatment (although don’t be afraid if you need to – even just temporarily). To fix your eyes on Jesus means to more deeply enter into relationship with the Lover of your soul, the God-Man Who walked the Earth 2000 years ago Who we read about in the Scriptures, the Eucharistic Lord Who is always waiting for you, and the Source of our hope.

The Catechism defines hope as “the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ’s promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit.” (CCC, 1817) This grace of the Holy Spirit is the same grace that Paul talks about in 2 Corinthians. It is the grace that “is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9) 

Now none of us (especially me) like to be weak or feel like we’re not in control. But if we accept our crosses and our weaknesses and give up control, then Christ in His perfect love for us can begin to work. He can carry the cross. He can make up for what I am lacking. He can triumph over sin and death. He can be our Savior which is Who He is and wants to be. 

I hope that you and I, like Paul, may be able to say “for the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities; for when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Corinthians 12:10) And I want to not just be content but “raise songs of thanks to you Father. To bless Your heart when it beats or breaks. Either way I surrender. It’s all a gift. Praise the giver.” (Matt Maher, “Praise the Giver”) It will not be immediate. It will not be without acknowledging my suffering or working to heal it. It will not be without my eyes wandering as I try to fix them on Jesus. It will be a lifelong process of faith and hope in Jesus.

Caroline Gindhart is a nurse practitioner at Divine Mercy Women’s Health in Camp Hill/Carlisle, Pennsylvania. She received her nursing degrees from Penn State University. In her professional work, she diagnoses the root causes of infertility and treats in a way that cooperates with the woman’s cycle using her training in the Creighton Model and NaPro Technology.