It's another snow day here.
One that finds my family asleep downstairs, tucked away in the covers while blessed pregnancy hormones wake me up every morning easily by six. Really, though, six is nothin'. It's the midnight, two, and four o'clock wake ups that get a little wearing... So here I sit with my cup of coffee and the blog post that I've tried to write with just the right words.
One year ago this week I simply wrote that after going in to hear the sweet baby's heartbeat nestled in my tummy, we found that he or she had passed away. I've thought a lot about this over the last few days.
In all reality, this day encompassed one of the biggest fears of my life. Then, setting my alarm for four a.m. Wednesday morning to take the medication to start my body's process so that the procedure would be easier in a few hours. Walking into the hospital just an hour later. Just Chris and me. The silence and cold of the morning. Filling out the forms and repeating to the five different doctors that, yes, I was there for a D&C. I didn't think these things happened to me. Tears upon tears with every nurse who came in to start the IVs, all with my precious husband beside me, unable to do anything but hold me. And it not really helping. His hurt. Then the dear elderly woman who volunteered at the hospital who came in and asked to pray with me. She knew that this was not just an operation, but was me losing my baby, something many seemed to just not understand. She gave me a very small gift, something assembled by a group of volunteers, a makeshift angel, utterly simple but somehow just enough to touch my heart and remind me that my Lord was already embracing the sweet soul I had already loved. Home again, knowing I was not pregnant now.
Over the next few days, weeks, months, my heart wrestled with so much fear. I wouldn't say I was bitter or angry or questioning the goodness of my Heavenly Father. I can understand how some would. And I've been there for other life questions. But with this, I was fearful. Fearful of the future, fearful of another loss, fearful of never being able to feel a baby kick within me again, suddenly the world was full of fears. What a tremendous opponent fear is. And in some areas of my life, I battle this daily, hourly, nightly.
But in July, I went to church one morning and heard the pastor speak on healing. Kind of a radical topic, one that could make many uncomfortable because sometimes, many times, we ask for healing and don't see it for a long time...if ever. But I realized, through an incredible tear fest (SO embarrassing - we're talkin' streamin' mascara, valleys of mismatched foundation down my cheeks...) that through it all, I realized I needed rescue from fear, healing from fear. And so I asked in my heart, prayed for healing from the sickness that only I knew about but was so contagious. There wasn't a bolt of lightning next. There wasn't a fireworks display, not even in my heart, really. But I asked. And my perspective changed. I recognized my battle.
And the next day, the Lord answered the cry of my heart with "Yes, I am giving you another baby, my child."
This is a picture taken just yesterday of my dear baby boy within.
He chose to show me his faithfulness through another pregnancy, one not void of opportunities to wonder, to fear, but chose to answer me yes to my plea.
But there are areas of my life I still wait for, still battle fear over. I'm young, I know, but one prayer in particular I've prayed for almost ten years now and still try to wait expectantly. But I have learned not to fear. And as I adore my daughter, my precious light, I have learned not to fear, because, truly, the love that bubbles and swirls and washes within for her...
Her innocence, her curiosity, her stubborn streak...
The love that makes her sweet rolly wrists kissable.
The love that makes her scribbles a masterpiece.
A mother's love is only a glimmer, a dim reflection of the all-encompassing, overcoming, overpowering, all forgiving reality of true Love found in Jesus.
