Today seemed rather ironic.

Infertility. On the one hand, I did a 25-minute live radio show this morning with WWJC in Deluth, during which I talked about The Infertility Companion. (If you want to listen, go to today's date and pick up the radio show about twenty minutes in.) I discussed how infertility can be a marital, spiritual, emotional, ethical, medical crisis. And I talked about how "relax" is the r-word to infertile couples. (Never, ever, ever, ever say "just relax" to a couple going to infertility. It sounds too much like "This is your fault.")

Pregnancy. Then this evening, with the help of an artist friend, my business, Aspire Productions, launched a new book. It's about pregnancy and it's called Choices: A Pregnancy Guide.

Infertility is the opposite of pregnancy, isn't it? Ironic, right?

Well, sort of. But not really. A key element links them--a passion for the sanctity of human life.

My desire in talking with infertility patients is to help couples navigate the moral maze of high-tech treatment. The pregnancy book, authored by William Cutrer, M.D. (cover design by Rhonda Oglesby, the artist friend I mentioned), was to minister to a niche market. It's written to the abortion-minded woman who walks into a pregnancy resource center and leaves considering all of her options. Most guides to pregnancy written by Christians don't address stuff like how to break it to your parents and "What if I drink?" This one does.

Choices is available in more than book form. It's also available by download for less than two bucks. That means a woman facing a pregnancy crisis never has to walk into a Christian bookstore and ask for a book on the subject. Right there in the privacy of her own home (or maybe a friend's room) she can view sono pictures of in utero babies in various stages of development. She can learn what to expect. She can read that God cares for her and the child He is weaving in her womb. Pastors and counselors can download the book, too.

Dr. Cutrer collected lots of stories from women eager to share what they'd been through--women who had faced the same situation and chose to give life a chance. Women who allowed God to make beauty from ashes.

All proceeds from Choices will go to buy additional copies of the book so we can give them away.

If you had asked me ten years ago if I would ever touch a pregnancy book, I would have said "Not even with one of those long poles people use to clean swimming pools." I would not have believed I'd read one, let alone publish one. But there's something else you should know. I got to draft the section in the book that talks about adoption. Drawing on our own situation, I was able to talk about the love of a woman who cared enough about her blue-eyed baby girl with long eyelashes to make a plan for her that included a daddy and a mommy who would love her as their own. That woman's name was Jessica, and she made me a mommy.

Perhaps irony is not the right word to describe today, after all. It's more like beauty. Once again God has made beauty from ashes--this time with me. And I pray that all the Jessicas out there who read this book will allow Him to do the same.