After a pleasant evening and a rough morning, I came out of the bathroom to find Maeby, our newest family member, snuggled in the crook of Jeremy’s torso and knees. She was the curious kind of calm we’re coming to expect from her at this point. She was accepting Jeremy’s sleepy pats with gratitude, and, without stirring, lest she wake him too significantly, she invited me into their cuddle.

I sat on the edge of the bed, forming a circle around our dog who’s been bounced around from shelter to shelter for at least a year now.

I put one hand on Maeby and one hand on Jeremy’s as his hand rested on Maeby. Jeremy moved his other hand to be on top of my hand that was patting the dog. Together we made another circle, a new family, so tender, so momentarily complete.

It’s not a secret, even though I don’t shout it publicly, but I’m not ashamed to admit that Jeremy and I have been struggling with infertility for over a year. The big life changes that we expected to come in form of a bouncing baby came instead in the form of a graduate degree and a cross-country move. We decided not to pause our lives just because we couldn’t create one.

My mother-in-law told me once I would know it was time to have a baby when I started to ache for one. The ache set in later than it did for some, but I started to feel it in my heart. When baby didn’t come, I would feel the ache in my muscles with monthly cramps, I’d feel the ache in my stomach as I started to have anxiety about whether or not we’d ever have a child. And when there was an ache in my soul, I knew it was time to get a dog.

At least for the moment, we can’t create life and don’t know why. So we saved a life instead. We adopted a doggie, and though she’s certainly so sweet that she would have been adopted anyway, it’s a revelation to me that this animal came into our lives at this exact time for a very specific purpose.

This morning in our snuggle circle I told Maeby that she’s ours now, and that we’ve been positively aching to take care of her. And even if it’s just a momentary feeling, and even though I’m still optimistic that baby will come, I enjoyed so passionately this rare feeling of completeness.

Welcome home Maeby, you’re saving my life too.