Jennifer Saake

The first 15 years of our marriage were saturated by dreams of parenthood, and endless cycles of negative pregnancy tests, miscarriages, adoption losses, and three beautiful bring-home babies...  Please read read more .

I, Jennifer Saake , stumbled into the online world in my mid-early 20s, around 1995 or '96. As you may have noticed, I've been fairly quiet this past couple of years. Here's why. After processing my own journey online for so long, last year I sort of ran out of words and went into public hibernation. As I prepare to once again start fresh in an attempt to plunge back into the blogosphere, here's my backstory, divided into about 10 sub-headings so than you can skim topics. (Many of the headings are linked to more detailed pages.): Infertility, Miscarriages, Adoption Losses Three years in, our infertility and loss journeys became lived out in the public eye, as God allowed me the incredible privilege of interacting with tens of thousands of other grieving women, both through  Hannah's Prayer Ministries  and then, a decade later, with the publication of  my first book , Hannah's Hope: Seeking God's Heart in the Midst of Infertility, Miscarriage, & Adoptio...

I'm taking a brief break from my stroke anniversary series because today is "Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day". I've prayed all day about what to post. I'm not into the 7pm candle lighting personally. (Not a sin, just not my thing!)  My parents attended the funeral of a 6-month-old today. I've prayed, but did not know what to post. Then I listened to this seminary podcast, for training pastors and counted at least 3 first-hand child loss stories, along with the comfort of the gospel.  Look for Season 1, episode 7. While there are multiple touching loss stories throughout the episode, starting 10 minutes from the end and going until 2 1/2 minutes from the end is especially powerful to me. Six minutes from the end is very comforting! (The last 60 seconds are a rainbow baby hope story, so you can specifically decide if that would encourage you tonight or not.)  While most of us are not training fo...

With babies in Heaven as well as the blessing of raising children on earth, Mother's Day is always a mixed bag of extreme emotions for me. Undoubtedly, I am overwhelmingly thankful for my living miracles, likely much more aware of what a gift they are than I would have been had they come easily. Perhaps intensified by "knowing what I am missing" as I watch my earthly children grow, though it has been over 19 years since my 3rd pregnancy loss, my heart is still tender concerning my kids no longer here. Read more  about infertility, miscarriage, and adoption loss, at  JenniferSaake.blogspot.com/2021/04/hannahs.html  and be my guest to read the first chapter of my book, Hannah's Hope , free at   hannahshopebook.com/media/HannahHopeChapter1.pd This will be my first MD in a new church and I already know that there will be a baby dedication ceremony this week, so I'm half holding my breath as I wait to see how the service will unfold. Thankfully, we are a verse-by-ve...

This article has been updated and re-published at  https://infertilitymom.substack.com/p/the-infertilitymom-journey-infertility .  From 1992-2006, Rick and I prayed for children. We spent more than a decade seriously entrenched in the daily struggles of infertility, demanding costly emotional, medical, and financial investments. We opened our hearts to thirteen children we longed to parent. We grieved ten babies we did not get to raise (miscarriages and adoption losses). We've experienced the indescribable joy of parenting three living miracles. Since 1996, I've participated in a variety of online forums and platforms, first using pseudonyms related to  Hannah , then  over the past two decades, as  @InfertilityMom . I  founded  Hannah's Prayer Ministries  in 1994 , and authored   Hannah's Hope: Seeking God's Heart in the Midst of Infertility, Miscarriage, and Adoption Loss  in 2005. Please  enjoy  a free pdf version of the book...

JenniferSaake   spring 2019 I grew up on the mission field, spending 7 years in Japan. (No, I did not learn more than a very few words of the language.) While I moved about 17 times in childhood, most recently I lived in Northern Nevada, 45 minutes from Lake Tahoe, for over two decades. We moved to Arizona in 2019. I can touch my nose with the tip of my tongue and can pick up items with my toes. There were 6  Jennifer s in my first grade class in the the late 1970s. Find out more on the  Saake Pronunciation Guide .                                                                                                    Our journey to parenthood took the long path of infertility, miscarriage, and adoption loss that I've briefly reco...