beauty from ashes

The night before we got married, a close family member was involved in something tragic.  Todd and I discussed postponing the wedding over it, that's how big a deal it was. And since then - Todd, myself, or someone close to us has waded through some seriously difficult things.  Job loss, unexpected pregnancy, a NICU stay, blended family challenges, addictions, recovery, pregnancy loss, family conflict, death, divorce, financial uncertainty, pregnancy after loss, colic...

You name it, we've lived through it, in just 3 1/2 short years.  Feels like sometimes we have lived through more difficulty than most marriages do in a lifetime.

Sometimes I feel a weird kind of smugness about this.

This blog is all about openness, transparency and honesty right?  So I'm going to be honest about a few things here - sometimes I wear our hardship like some kind of twisted badge of honor.  I hear what other people talk about as being difficult and I think to myself, 'Ha.  Please.  This person has NO idea what hardship really looks like.'

Weird, right?

I've been toying with the idea of writing this blog for awhile now, but have been hesitant.  I hope it comes out on paper the way it does in my head.

After we lost Lilia, I would feel so angry and hurt when people would post negative or complaining statuses about their children on Facebook.  I wanted to scream, "DON'T YOU KNOW HOW FORTUNATE YOU ARE?"  "Don't you know how many women there are who would give their left arm to be going through what you're going through?"

And then, God sent me Declan.

Oh, my sweet Declan.

When I found out I was pregnant with Declan, I just knew that he was going to be my REDEMPTION baby.  After all, we had endured so much already - Declan was going to be the solution.  He was going to be my perfect gift after enduring what I had endured with strength.

That's a really weighty label to put on an infant.  And it's a really weighty responsibility to put on myself.  To expect myself to rise above the very real, very gritty difficulty of being a mother.  It's amazing and beautiful and life altering in a way you can never imagine - but it's also the most challenging thing I have ever, ever done in my life. The reward obviously outweighs the challenge.  Most mothers will tell you that.

I found myself confused when Declan's colic set in.  Wait...what?  Hold up here, God.  I don't think you meant to give me a baby who screams all the time.  We are already going through so much personally - I think perhaps you haven't been listening well enough.

Ha. Talk about arrogance.

With Declan, I have struggled with what my counselor (oh yeah, I have one of those too...) refers to as 'duality'  There are competing values at play, or competing emotions.  The absolute and overwhelming love of being a mother to such a precious gift.  The absolute and overwhelming exhaustion and helplessness of not knowing how to make him just feel better.  See, pregnancy after loss is supposed to be - well - rainbows.  That's why they call it it a rainbow baby.  It's supposed to be hours upon hours of gazing on a sweet, contented little face who is just so happy to be here, y'all.

Only it wasn't.  It's been hard.  It was - for about 11 weeks - hours of gazing at a face contorted in pain and screaming longer than any human being should be able to continue screaming.  And after one particularly difficult stretch where I didn't leave my house for 9 straight days - I thought I might lose it.

Since then we think that we've figured out the problem, and acid reflux medication seems to be helping.

But - I have realized that I have been prideful.  It certainly wasn't intentional.  Who wants to be prideful about enduring trials? Declan has opened my eyes to a weakness I wasn't even aware of.  As if our hardships put me a notch above or something.  As if I had a right to look down on people who were struggling with things that didn't seem to be in the realm of what *I* considered difficult.

Infertility, pregnancy, pregnancy after loss, stillbirth, colic, motherhood, the terrible 2's, the teenage years - these things are ALL difficult.  They are ALL challenging.  In different ways, to be certain, but they are all challenging.  Experiencing one doesn't make you stronger than someone who hasn't experienced it.  It just makes you different.  I now have an experience that allows me to help comfort women who miscarry.  A friend of mine can comfort women who have experienced stillbirth.  Another friend can talk someone down off the ledge during the teenage years because she's been through it.  Another friend can comfort those who want desperately to be parents but can't.

We all have our own challenges.  What is challenging to one is lollipops and unicorns to another.

God shapes and molds us for HIS use.  And sometimes it is painful, sometimes it's oh so very hard.  But everything we experience, everything we rise above can be used for good.  To bring Him honor and glory.

God is stirring a lot of stuff inside of me these days.  He is teaching me and shaping me each and every day to see the world a little more like He does.  Most days I fall painfully short of reflecting Jesus back to those that see me daily, but I am becoming increasingly aware that we all have strength somewhere deep inside of us, experiences that force us to fall down in despair and cry out for the One who hears us and can turn our pain into beauty.

I am grateful that out of sin, pride, grief and despair beauty can be born.

"To appoint to them that mourn in Zion, to give to them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified." - Isaiah 61:3

Miscarriage: Dirty Word?

I've been thinking about this post for a long, long time.  

How 'miscarriage' seems like a dirty word.

No, not technically - but it's the kind of word that feels clumsy and awkward rolling off your tongue.  It's the kind of word that makes people uncomfortable.  When I use it, I immediately wonder if I've made the other person feel bad.

I try to force myself to say it when I'm talking about our experience.  I even find myself referring to Lilia as 'the baby we lost' instead of 'my daughter, Lilia'  It's incredibly hard to say her name out loud.

It's kind of a strange place to be in.  I had a daughter.  But she only survived for a little under 16 weeks in the womb.  I never held her, never laid eyes on her.  However, I know she was there and I know she was mine.  

A friend on Facebook posted this recently and it speaks so well of how a woman who has suffered a miscarriage, stillbirth or infant loss feels.

An Ugly Pair of Shoes

Author Unknown

I am wearing a pair of shoes.

They are ugly shoes.

Uncomfortable Shoes.

I hate my shoes.

Each day I wear them, and each day I wish I had another pair.

Some days my shoes hurt so bad that I do not think I can take another step.

Yet, I continue to wear them.

I get funny looks wearing these shoes.

They are looks of sympathy.

I can tell in others eyes that they are glad they are my shoes and not theirs.

They never talk about my shoes.

To learn how awful my shoes are might make them uncomfortable.

To truly understand these shoes you must walk in them.

But, once you put them on, you can never take them off.

I now realize that I am not the only one who wears these shoes.

There are many pairs in the world.

Some women are like me and ache daily as they try and walk in them.

Some have learned how to walk in them so they don’t hurt quite as much.

Some have worn the shoes so long that days will go by

before they think of how much they hurt.

No woman deserves to wear these shoes.

Yet, because of the shoes I am a stronger woman.

These shoes have given me the strength to face anything.

They have made me who I am.

I will forever walk in the shoes of a woman who has lost a child.

My current pregnancy reminds me that even a new, well fitting pair of shoes doesn't erase or take away the memory and feelings of the ugly, uncomfortable shoes.  A lot of days, I see my new shoes and feel bad about putting the ugly, uncomfortable shoes away.  And some days I wear one ugly shoe, and one of my new shoes.

When I first immersed myself in the pregnancy loss community, there were a lot of people who welcomed me and said something to the effect of, "It's a club no one wants to join, but we welcome you with big hugs and lots of prayers"

A friend asked me the other day how I was processing this pregnancy.  I told her, very honestly, that I wasn't processing it very well.  How I thought my grieving was at a good place until I got pregnant again.  How I'm struggling to understand things I thought I understood.  How I'm anxious and scared, angry and sad, conflicted and happy.  

Many of you know the background with my first two children.  And then we found out last year while on a beach vacation that I was pregnant with Lilia.  A pregnancy that wasn't planned OR unplanned - and one we found ourselves so excited for.  

But this baby - this baby I prayed for.  The first of my children that I actively prayed for BEFORE conception.  And it's powerful to think that the Lord listened and gave me this baby - I think about that a lot, and wonder who he will be.  What his personality will be like, what his presence in our family will mean.  I have found more joy in being a mother than in anything else in my life, and I can't imagine our family without any of the children that are a part of it.

I know our little rainbow baby boy, currently kicking and growing inside of me, will bring some healing to my heart and to our family.  

But it's hard to walk while wearing one new shoe and one uncomfortable one.  It will be a journey that is different than any I've taken in the past but one I am grateful for.  I know God is stretching me, encouraging me and gently pushing me to rely more on him.  To trust Him more, to lean on Him and to use my pain for growth.

For this child I prayed; and the Lord has given me my petition which I asked of him.

                                                                                                                         ~1 Samuel 1:27

Forward

The pregnancy after a miscarriage is weird.  Your heart is still tender, broken and cautious.  Your head is full of the what if scenarios you've spent months reading about online.  You remember the stories of women you've met or read about - pregnancies lost at 9 weeks, 22 weeks, 39 weeks, 41 weeks - it's virtually impossible to take for granted a healthy baby.

I told myself if we were blessed to get pregnant again, I would enjoy every second.  I would relish in the life growing within me, and cherish every second of nausea, every headache, every night with an aching back or hips.  That I would live each day with pure and complete JOY to be able to have another experience with childbirth.

When I got the positive result on my pregnancy test - the one I had been praying desperately for - I immediately started shaking and crying.  I was terrified.

In many ways though, I have been able to enjoy so much of this pregnancy - it has been my easiest.
The women I've known in the past who love being pregnant because they feel great and aren't sick?  I've always envied those women.  But (knock on wood) this time around, I am one of them.  I have been blessed with my easiest pregnancy.  No sickness, no nausea, no headaches, no food aversions.  Just the need for my daily nap.

But it's been very hard for me to look forward.  To focus on October.  To think about holding my baby boy in my arms and staring into his sweet face.  I'm stuck in September of last year.  I'm stuck in the pain, in the fear, in the unknown.  And every milestone I hit with this little guy is a glaring reminder of what I lost with Lilia.  Not ever feeling her kick for the first time, not having the big happy moment when we learned she was a girl.  And it's been sad.

Most days are a roller coaster of emotions.  Gratitude, relief and excitement over a healthy, growing baby.  Sadness and heartbreak over the baby we lost.  Feeling like it's ok to celebrate a new life, feeling like it's not ok to move on from the last.  I finally allowed myself my first baby purchase (well, truthfully it was an exchange with a friend, but I haven't felt brave enough to buy anything in a store just yet)

I know I'm not alone in these feelings - I know I'm surrounded by many, many women who understand where I'm coming from.  Look around you - 1 in 4 women have been affected by loss.  1 in 4.  There are many of us who know the fear and excitement of looking forward, and the pain of looking back.

I remember quite frequently something my husband wrote in a blog awhile back - something I've quoted him as saying in previous writings about Lilia.  He said that as followers of Christ, 'we are called to be fearless because death does not get the last word.'

That's a bold statement.  And it's been a difficult one for me to put into practice.  I wish I could say that I've been fearless for the last 19 weeks.  I wish I could say I have put my full and complete trust in Christ.  And while I do feel that this pregnancy, this child is in His hands - I can't say I've been without fear, without doubt.  I have prayed harder for this baby than I have for anything else in my life.  That whole praying without ceasing thing we read about in the bible?  I get it now.  This baby has me on my knees, praying without ceasing.

So I have no choice but to look forward, to embrace the new life growing within me, to trust God and His plan for me.  To hope that this precious boy continues growing and is healthy and joins our family in October.  And until then, I take comfort in scripture and the knowledge that God is intimately aware of my broken heart and my fearful spirit.

       Be strong and take heart,
            all ye who hope in the Lord

                 - Psalm 31:24