Christmas 2014

Christmas Day is here again.  It seems a Christmas cannot pass without me thinking about the four children we lost.  Gabriel, the first child we lost would have been toddling around by now and getting into mischief.  James, the last child we lost would have been an infant curled up in my arms.  I would have sat in the easy chair, bought for the sole purpose of rocking babies, and rocked him gently next to the fire.  We lost them all so early we don’t know if they were boys or girls.  We picked names for each as they slipped away from us regardless of this fact.  Gabriel, Hope, Eva, and James.  This morning as I awoke I had Eric Clapton’s song “Tears in Heaven” on my mind.  Would they know me in heaven?  Would I know them?  Do I hold any significance to them at all, since they would have no remnant of human emotion to attach to me?  Would they love me as much as I have loved them?  So many questions are swirling in my mind.  I think about Christmas morning and the presents that aren’t under the tree and the excitement of the children I’ll never meet this side of heaven.  There is still a deep ache of pain and longing to hold even just one of them. 

When James departed from us I lost the ability to conceive naturally.  The doctor still said in vitro was an option for us but I’d need to lose weight first.  I started back on the journey of weight loss.  First, just the 15 pounds the doctor said was necessary came off, then more and more.  And as the weight came off and as time passed, the fog of depression that had held me hostage began to lift.  In that time my husband got a new job, my 15 year old daughter started at a new school and I took on more of the household responsibilities.  And I began to realize how much I’d been missing while in pursuit of having more children and drowning in the pit of grief and despair.  My children are amazing and I missed so much.  I saw how they had been affected by the events of the last two years.  I saw my husband’s passion for work come alive and we began to function as a family again.  We spent much time in prayer and considering if we’d continue to go down the path for more children and concluded to let that dream go.  I’ve sensed that Our Lord has other plans for us.  And while I’m at peace with that decision and in hopeful expectation of what God will reveal, my heart still aches for our lost little ones and breaks in realization that the days of wide-eyed childhood wonder and silliness are past.  I know that His plan is best and that what He has in store for us will be better than anything we can imagine, but I must confess that I am envious of my friends with young ones and those who are starting that adventure.  I know He will eventually heal this pain fully and reveal His plan in His perfect time.  In the meantime, I will have moments of sadness, moments of doubting our decision, and times where sharing in my friends joy is too painful of a reminder of what we missed out on.  Those are the days when I hold fast to prayer and cry out for healing.  I am OK with that and I ask those I love to be OK with that too.

One bit of comfort I hold onto is that we have a Lord who is able to sympathize with us.  God lost a child too, His one and only son.  He gave Him up for us.  Knowing now how painful it is to give up a child you didn’t know, I can’t imagine the pain that it brought Our Father to give up His son whom He knew and loved for us.  Us, those who had walked away from God, deprioritized Him, chased idols, despised Him, and rejected Him, we are the ones He suffered and died for.  I’ve been reading a book recently called “Found in Him” by Elyse Fitzpatrick.  The first half of the book discusses the incarnation of Jesus, how God became man.  This mystery is too great for my finite mind to comprehend, that the infinite God who created the heavens and the earth and each and every one of us became a man, and a baby at that.  And the book walks through that mystery and then points out some other aspects of the incarnation that I’d never stopped to consider.  The point that sticks with me best was about His suffering.  When I think of Jesus’ suffering, I immediately consider His death on the cross, but His suffering was so much more than that.  He was God in the flesh.  Jesus was a human and as such he suffered.  Consider that he probably bruised his knee a couple time or may have been teased.  We know he mourned and wept.  To be human is to suffer, and even if He’d never gone to the cross, being human alone was suffering.  Jesus was perfect, but His life was not perfect and all those things that we endure day in and day out, difficult people, unmet desires, the temptation to take on more than we should or to rest when we oughtn’t, etc., He endured too.   

So while I find myself somewhat melancholy today in remembrance of the children I have lost.  I also think of the Savior whose birth we celebrate today, who came here to suffer on my behalf.  I think of my Heavenly Father who willingly and graciously did for me what I know to be the greatest pain a parent can endure, while I had begged and pleaded that I would be spared that same pain.  I’m so glad that He did give up His son and I look forward to where He will lead us next.

My prayers and thoughts to all who are grieving loved ones today.  May Our Lord comfort you.