They haunt me, hurt me, grieve me, and yet oddly fill me.
Four years ago I was laying in a darkened room, warm jelly on my stomach, hot tears in my eyes and slowly leaking down my cheeks.
I was waiting to find out the cause of the heavy bleeding I’d been experiencing and overall fullbody illness I had been having for the previous several months. I laid there with a trace of bitterness and anger as I waited for a possible hysterectomy diagnosis or some other cyst or growth or cancer.
I laid there with a broken heart, thinking of the last ultrasound I’d had seventeen years earlier, that had delivered the news that there was no heartbeat, and at twelve weeks along, it appeared the baby had passed when it was about seven weeks. Five weeks I had lived and loved that which was already gone.
And then the tech had jolted me back to the present as she began the procedure. She put the instrument down into the jelly on my stomach, and with an “Oh...” immediately pulled it back up. I looked over at her, I looked over at the screen up on the wall.
And then I heard those words that will forever ring in my mind.
“There’s a baby in there.”
That moment in time will be clearly etched in my mind forever. That exact moment in time when life both stopped and life began all at the exact same moment.
And that baby wasn’t dead. That baby had a heartbeat. And I heard it, and then I saw it move. Alive. A baby. Alive. But how?
My eyes glued to that monitor on the wall, my hands clutching my heart, forcing myself to breath. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Willing myself to attempt some thread of rational sanity.
Nearly two decades of infertility. Nearly going broke paying for treatments. Nearly going broke and losing our ever loving minds every single day after we entered the adoption world and reality. Nearly getting divorced over the hardships and stresses it all left wreaking havoc on our current marriage. Nearly giving up all hope and rational reasoning of having a biological baby and any semblance of a "normal" life.
But suddenly, at the age of thirty-nine, there, in that room, in that moment... was a heartbeat. Was a life. Was an answer to years of pain and sorrow and pleading and begging and downright groveling with the Lord.
The little hands were clasped together in front of itself, the little heartbeat showing like little light explosions behind those clasped hands.
Life. Life we had created. Biological life that was 50% me and 50% my husband. And it was alive. And it had a heartbeat.
And it was going to be twelve weeks along the following morning. Three months old and had been hidden and unknown until that exactly moment.
Surreal. Unreal. And yet absolutely real all at the same time.
And that is what I’m laying here thinking about. In the dark, all alone this morning.
I can still remember it like it was yesterday, and I can’t honestly believe that somehow four years have already slipped by since then. Four years. Some days it feels an eternity, some days but a blink.
I can remember the feeling of the whirlwind of emotions of my life immediately before that moment. The pain, the sorrow, the previous miscarriage, the infertility, the struggle, the frustration, the devastation, the lost, the helpless, the hopeless, the anger, the fighting, the disappointment, the resentment, the envy... and now four years later I would come to know that all of those exact same things, and so much more, would again be experienced in a much bigger, greater, more intense way.
What we had experienced in life up until that one exact moment ... we would soon learn would be nothing compared to what we were in store to experience and endure in the days, weeks, months and years ahead.
No that baby with that little heartbeat that day is not a beautiful, sassy, spunky three year old right now in our home. There are no pink dresses and sparkly shoes and hair bows and little dollies anywhere in our house four years later. No. There is only a gaping hole in our hearts left there when we had to lower her into a hole in the ground on that unseasonably warm late March day in the cemetery on the other end of town.
Time does not heal all things. It may temporally dull them a little, but I don’t think this is something I will ever fully heal from this side of heaven. Most days I’m ok with that, most days I have come to terms with the hand life has dealt me... but some days I’m not.
Some days I am still overtaken with an intense anger at God. Some days I’m am still overtaken by an intense grief from a loss I cannot honestly fathom or fully bear. Some days I am still so completely lost and hurting inside it leaves me almost unable to go on, to function, to continue forward.
Some days I do at least attempt to trust the plan for my life and humbly trust and obey... but not today. Today I’m choosing to allow myself to sit in my grief and tears and mixing in my anger and frustration and overwhelming disappointment. And you know what - that’s ok. It’s ok to not be ok. And that is going to be me today.
Today I will remember when I first saw her, first heard her precious little heartbeat, first learned of her miraculous existence.
Today I will hurt and I will grieve what was taken from me and what was not fairly dealt to me. Today I will feel anger and resentment towards a good God, an awesome and mighty and powerful God. Today I will ache for all the things lost and taken from me and from within me. Today I will allow myself to remember and to feel and to hurt and to be emotional. And today that will be ok.
Tomorrow I will maybe work on viewing the positive side of all this again, and maybe it won’t be until several tomorrows from now. Yes, I know deep inside that this was all meant for good and had made me a better person overall, but to be completely honest, that reality is a hard reality to have all the time. That reality takes a lot of work to keep up and keep strong in front of me.
Today I don't want to be strong. Today I'm going to remember, and hurt, and grieve that which I wanted and fought so gallantly for for so so so long - and would then come to lose almost as quickly as I was given. And I don't care how good God is, or how positive a person can be... that... that reality, my friends, sucks and is utterly not fair.
No that baby with that little heartbeat that day is not a beautiful, sassy, spunky three year old right now in our home. There are no pink dresses and sparkly shoes and hair bows and little dollies anywhere in our house four years later. No. There is only a gaping hole in our hearts left there when we had to lower her into a hole in the ground on that unseasonably warm late March day in the cemetery on the other end of town.
Time does not heal all things. It may temporally dull them a little, but I don’t think this is something I will ever fully heal from this side of heaven. Most days I’m ok with that, most days I have come to terms with the hand life has dealt me... but some days I’m not.
Some days I am still overtaken with an intense anger at God. Some days I’m am still overtaken by an intense grief from a loss I cannot honestly fathom or fully bear. Some days I am still so completely lost and hurting inside it leaves me almost unable to go on, to function, to continue forward.
Some days I do at least attempt to trust the plan for my life and humbly trust and obey... but not today. Today I’m choosing to allow myself to sit in my grief and tears and mixing in my anger and frustration and overwhelming disappointment. And you know what - that’s ok. It’s ok to not be ok. And that is going to be me today.
Today I will remember when I first saw her, first heard her precious little heartbeat, first learned of her miraculous existence.
Today I will hurt and I will grieve what was taken from me and what was not fairly dealt to me. Today I will feel anger and resentment towards a good God, an awesome and mighty and powerful God. Today I will ache for all the things lost and taken from me and from within me. Today I will allow myself to remember and to feel and to hurt and to be emotional. And today that will be ok.
Tomorrow I will maybe work on viewing the positive side of all this again, and maybe it won’t be until several tomorrows from now. Yes, I know deep inside that this was all meant for good and had made me a better person overall, but to be completely honest, that reality is a hard reality to have all the time. That reality takes a lot of work to keep up and keep strong in front of me.
Today I don't want to be strong. Today I'm going to remember, and hurt, and grieve that which I wanted and fought so gallantly for for so so so long - and would then come to lose almost as quickly as I was given. And I don't care how good God is, or how positive a person can be... that... that reality, my friends, sucks and is utterly not fair.
Today I am going to allow all those broken shards still deep within me, still pricking and bleeding within me, to pierce me with all their pain and sorrow and unrest. And it will be fine... and I will be fine. Yes, this too shall pass, it always does. But for today, and for this season in which I am yet again going to re-enter for the forth time, it’s going to have to be ok if I let the hard and ugly stay just a little while longer and not let it pass.
Today I'm officially entering season four of our "Journey to Faith" - our love and our loss of our precious little Faith MaryJo, my greatest gift and my largest tragedy suffered thus far in my life.
I will remember, I will hurt, I will grieve, and I will celebrate her in all she was and all she never was able to be.
