There are losses in life that are visible, and there are losses that are invisible. This one feels like both. We didn't lose a child we held in our arms, but we lost the expectation of children conceived through our love. We lost the ease of a future we had always assumed. We lost something deeply intimate and deeply personal.

In many respects, the prospect of permanent infertility is akin to a terminal diagnosis. The weight can feel heavy, almost unbearable. This life - this existence - is for a more magnanimous purpose: to be in relationship with God and to share in His own blessed life. We do not earn it; it is pure gift at the cost of Jesus' Passion, death and resurrection. Indeed, your life has not ended, it has changed.

When I hate my heart and body with all its problems that make me permanently infertile, I see a heart that was pierced for me and loves me when I can't love myself. If that perfect heart can love my imperfect one, then maybe I am worthy of love. When your heart can't take anymore, let His heart carry yours.

Mirabel Madrigal is the only member of her extraordinary family who didn't receive a magical gift. If you've walked the road of infertility, you know exactly what that feels like. Young Mirabel approaches her magical door on the night she's supposed to receive her gift. Her family gathers. And then... nothing. The door disappears. She becomes the only Madrigal without a gift in a family where gifts define identity and value. I remember my own "door ceremony." Each month, the