Monday, December 26, 2011

Looking Forward (Not Back) to the New Year

After all the drama of my blood tests and the anticipation of Christmas, I did it! I survived Christmas! I even made it through two days of Christmas, one with M's family and one with my parents who are visiting for a whole week. So here's a quick rundown on just how well I did and how much better I'm doing.

Friday included a rather terrifying visit to the doctor's office to find out what all the tests on my blood tell us. The long and the short is that I am perfectly healthy and my doctor is expecting to see me back as soon as I'm ready to have a sonogram for my next pregnancy. Yes, you heard right - next pregnancy! I have to say I absolutely love my doctor. She was both encouraging and realistic. She says that based on my blood work and everything they saw throughout my pregnancy with Faith, we've suffered a "lightening strike." The chances of having this happen again are low enough that she highly encouraged us to try again. Yay for good news! She was also realistic about just how neurotic I can expect to be with any future pregnancies and said she will be willing to do a sonogram anytime I need one to calm my nerves. Like I said, I love my doctor! (She was also very apologetic about the amount of time I spent waiting to have my blood drawn.)

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were not easy by any means, but they also weren't as bad as I was expecting them to be. I have to say that I am very proud of M and I for doing quite well with the holiday. There were tears, but not too many, and there were happy moments, too, in spite of the tears. Overall, it was a pretty good day, and it was followed by Christmas number two with my parents today. Christmas number two was also not free of tears, but it was a good day as well. My mom and I made turkey and fixings, and she even helped me with my newest project, learning to embroider (she even started a project of her own!).

With two family Christmases over, I'm looking forward to New Year's. I think this is a holiday I can get on board with more than I could with Christmas. New Year's is about looking to the future, seeing possibilities, setting goals, and feeling the hope and promise of a new year. I think I can handle that. My prayer is that 2012 will be a better year. Not that 2011 has been all bad! The last two months somewhat ruined what was for the most part a good year. So here's hoping that 2012 starts and ends with happiness, for all of us!

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Two Months and Surviving Christmas

In case you haven't noticed, I've been having some trouble finding words over the last couple of weeks. I've started so many blog posts, it's ridiculous! Somehow everything I've tried to write has come out wrong or at least incomplete. So here it goes. I'm going to be painfully honest.

It's been two months since we lost Faith. This hasn't been the easiest week. Between preparing for Christmas and a trip to the doctor's office for some blood work, I've been overwhelmed with emotions. On Monday, I spent more than 45 minutes waiting to have a simple blood draw at the doctors office. I watched six pregnant women come and go during that time. More than one had her cigarettes out so that she could light up the second she got to her car. I'm not sure which made me more angry watching those women casually extract their cigarettes from their pockets or the fact that my doctors office made me wait so long for something that took less than five minutes watching those women treat their babies with such a lack of care. I just know that it set me back a couple months in terms of my own grieving process by reminding me again of just how unfair life can be!

Christmas is in three days, and the closer it gets the more I want to run away. My parents are coming to visit for a week, and I'm very glad we'll get to see them, but I can't help but think that maybe having them come here wasn't the best plan. It seemed like it at the time. Now, I think that we might be better off all flying someplace warm where we can pretend it's summer vacation rather than Christmas. Hawaii would be good.

Christmas can be stressful enough with parties, family dinners, shopping, extra gatherings at church. All of these are good things, but the combination can make this time of year feel very full and busy. Even though I've felt some stress related to all the events of Christmas in past years, I've enjoyed each one. This year, however, I feel like I'm just trying to survive. I think I'll be grateful when January arrives and everyone goes back to working a normal schedule. I love my family and my husband and I know I should be grateful for time with them, but to be honest, I'm mostly reminded of what's not here, what's missing, of what I should be doing and feeling. I should be seven months pregnant. I should be planning to spend the time with my mom putting up decorations in the nursery and giving instruction on where I want the crib and the rocking chair to go. I should be feeling the joy of Christmas in the anticipation of waiting to meet my child. Instead, I'm just going through the motions of Christmas traditions without feeling the emotions of the holiday.

As much as I want this blog to be a place of hope, right now the best I can do is survival. We've been going back and forth about sending out a Christmas card this year, but I think I've decided against it. I hope you aren't offended that we won't be returning your cards, and I hope you won't be taking us off your list just because we don't send one. Last year we sent one with a picture of the two of us, but this year I can't handle the thought of taking a "family" picture without my pregnant belly or our daughter. I looked at store bought cards yesterday, but the messages of joy feel like a lie, and they don't make "Merry Christmas, pray for us to survive the holiday" cards. So consider this my Christmas card blessing. I hope you have more to celebrate this year than we do. I hope that you are looking forward to Christmas with all the anticipation the birth of Christ deserves. I hope you find joy in unexpected places, that your heart will overflow with gratitude, peace, and love. And, I hope you'll hold us in your prayers, that next year's Christmas will again be one of joy and hope.

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Love Story

After we lost Faith, music was one of the things that made me the most sad. Listening to the radio, most stations play love song after love song. Even church music which talks about the faithfulness and goodness of God is a struggle sometimes. While song lyrics are definitely a challenge, the music can be just as challenging. The very nature of music is to evoke an emotional reaction. One of the strange things for me about the grieving process has been that all emotions--happy, sad, and everything in between--end in tears.

This week, after seven weeks of NPR, I've been finding myself longing for music, but I think this experience has changed my taste. Classical music, especially classical Christmas music, has become my new best friend. I've never been opposed to classical music, but I've always had other preferences over classical. The last few weeks I've found the messages of on the all-Christmas-all-the-time station to be quite trite as are the love songs on many of the other stations. They simply don't meet my needs right now. Classical music has so many layers of sound, so many deep and powerful emotions.

If you listen to the radio, you know, I'm sure, that there are many stations that play a variety of styles of love songs and only a few classical stations. I've been wondering why these stations satisfied my music needs until losing my daughter. Their messages seemed fine until now. Do they remind me of my loss? Is that why they no longer satisfy? Or, are the stories within too simplistic?

I think traditional love songs seem silly mostly because my love story is not simple or easy. M and I have been married for two years and we dated for nearly three years before we got married. Parts of our story are simple and easy, others are awkward, others are funny, others are happy and joyful. None are particularly sad or difficult. Until the last seven weeks.

I've seen the statistics on what happens to couples when they lose a child. I've watched message boards on infant loss sites and seen how many women write in that they are having problems in their marriages. I won't be one of those statistics.

M reminded me a few days ago that the loss of our daughter could have been physically devastating for me. My blood might not have clotted properly. Delivering my daughter could have caused hemorrhaging or even death. In many ways, we have a second chance for our love story. Not that we really needed a second chance. The early part of our love story wasn't wrong, we didn't mess it up. We did everything right. It's more that I've realized that our story could have ended, ended in any number of ways.

I truly can't imagine sharing the experience of loss with anyone other than M. As I said in my very first post, I expected that our life together would be one of learning to love each other through the good times and the bad, but somehow I never expected the bad to be anything like this. Looking at the statistics for marriages that face challenges like ours, I realize that the marriages that survive are probably stronger. Their love stories are deeper than before. They are like many of the classical music pieces I've heard recently, layers of love like the layers of sound.

I think this is the reason I haven't been able to listen to and appreciate much of the music I loved before. My love story is changing. M and I have both been changed as individuals by the loss of our daughter, therefore, our love story must change to accommodate those changes. We are becoming a deeply layered piece of music with fast paced, joyful movements, slow, soft, melancholy movements, strings, woodwinds, horns. Layer upon layer of beautiful sound.

They say that having a baby is one of the most stressful events in a marriage, one that can either pull two people apart or can bond two people like never before. Even without her living, breathing presence, our daughter is bringing us closer together. One more gratitude in the midst of heartache.

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Surprises (and Thank Yous)

I promise I haven't abandoned my blog even though it may seem that I did. Last week and weekend were incredibly busy with preparations for class and then two days of class over the weekend. My last weekend of class for the semester! This has not been an easy semester, and I'm grateful it's over.

Over the last seven weeks (has it really been seven weeks!), I've received several much appreciated gifts to help me remember Faith that I want to share. I wear most of them every day so if you see me face to face I hope this blog helps to explain my new bling. While I am definitely not the girly-est of girls, I do enjoy jewelry, but I'm not sure that I've ever worn quite as much as I have in recent weeks. So, here's the story behind some wonderful surprises and a few thank yous to the special people who gave me these gifts!

One week after giving birth I was getting quite stir crazy sitting in the house, but I was under doctors' orders to take it easy. In my desperation to get out, M and I ran a few easy errands including a couple hours at his school where I helped him with grading and filing. One of our errands took us to a local jewelry store to look at opal rings. We were expecting Faith to share her birthstone with her daddy, but in fact she shares mine as well. We looked at a number of rings, but I decided I wasn't ready to purchase any of them. On Halloween, M surprised me with one of the rings we had looked at and I had decided I wanted. He also surprised me with a pair of tiny, delicate opal earrings.

(Three stones, one for each of us!)


I've worn both of these every day since M gave them to me. They help me feel connected to my daughter. They remind me that I am her mother even if I don't get to raise her, that she is part of me always.

A couple weeks later a wonderful friend surprised me with these:

(You can find them at: http://www.etsy.com/shop/artsychicas)

They are fertility bracelets made by a couple of friends who each experienced a miscarriage. The stones are supposed to help you conceive. I'm not sure that I fully believe that the stones can do what I'm told they will, but I do fully believe in the power of positive thinking. These bracelets are a reminder to me of the reason my daughter's name is Faith. Her name is Faith because we have faith that our journey together is not over, that we will one day be able to see her healthy and whole in heaven. Her name is Faith also because we have faith that  one day we will tell her story to her siblings.

Last week in the midst of my stressful class preparations, this arrived in the mail from one of my aunts:


The amethyst would have been Faith's birthstone had she been born as we planned. In so many ways, my daughter has two birthstones, something none of us have achieved! This wonderful aunt spent (and sometimes still spends) countless hours giving my cousins and I makeovers and manicures. I know she would have done the same for my daughter! She also lost her father just a few days before we lost Faith. Aunt K, I can't tell you how comforting it is to me to think of all the wonderful people who join my baby in heaven. She has such amazing company!

I have also been so inspired by some of the cards and emails we've received. The card all of the youth in my youth group at church signed is one of my favorites! You guys are the best! Spending time laughing and smiling with you each week makes all of this loss and grieving stuff so much easier! I also have to send a shout out to my best friends from college! Don't know what I'd do without you girls! H, your email yesterday came at just the right time and I'll be sending one back shortly!

All of this is really just my attempt at a huge, general "thank you" to all of you who have been support me during this time! Even when I hurt, I know I am blessed. You are my best blessings, so thank you!

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Living in the Light

The last couple of days I have been reminded in a number of ways that the light of hope is all around me.

I thought that I would be spending this Advent season pregnant and learning about new life and hope through my pregnancy. I expected to find myself identifying with Mary, commiserating with her as she walked the miles to Bethlehem, feeling along with her all the aches and pains of pregnancy.

Instead, I find myself identifying with the Israelites in their waiting. Generation after generation, prophet after prophet, they waited for the promised Messiah. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Micah, Hosea, all over the Hebrew Scriptures, the promise is everywhere.

So many of these prophecies talk about darkness and light. Isaiah 9:2 says,
The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
on them light has shined. 
The first verses of Isaiah 60, also speak of darkness,
Arise, shine; for your light has come,
and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.
For darkness shall cover the earth,
and thick darkness the peoples;
but the Lord will arise upon you,
and his glory will appear over you.
It seems that only by walking in darkness can we fully appreciate the Light. Sometimes we enter the darkness by choice. Other times we are thrust into darkness unprepared and unwillingly. My darkness is not by choice, but I can choose my attitude toward the darkness. I can allow the darkness to overwhelm me or I can allow the darkness to become my friend and my teacher. I can learn to know the darkness and allow it to make the Light brighter in me.

This Advent I choose to let the Light grow in my darkness. The author of Lamentations will be my guide. Lamentations 3 says,
I am one who has seen affliction
under the rod of God’s wrath;
he has driven and brought me
into darkness without any light;
against me alone he turns his hand,
again and again, all day long... 
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul,
‘therefore I will hope in him...’ 
For the Lord will not reject for ever.
Although he causes grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
for he does not willingly afflict or grieve anyone.
May you know the Light this Advent, may you let that Light shine for those walking in darkness, and may we all be blessed by the Light in new and unexpected ways. 

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Post-Thanksgiving Thoughts

I don't know if you noticed this or not, but last week I added two tabs at the top of the page for "A Little Gratitude" and "A LOT of Gratitude." Starting with the first Sunday in November, our church had several sermons on gratitude. You might have guessed this already, but I've had trouble with gratitude this year. These lists have been good reminders for me as well as a good exercise in focusing on the things I have to be grateful for rather than focusing on self-pity. If you get a minute and you haven't taken a look at those tabs, feel free to do so. I'd love to hear a few of your "little gratitude-s" and your "lot of gratitude-s."

One of my "little gratitude-s" has become a "lot of gratitude" over the last couple days. Wednesday night at eight or nine, M discovered a dripping sound in our bathroom and realized that we had a leak in the wall. Water was starting to leak through the ceiling in our basement bathroom as well as under the shower unit in our bathroom. My gratitude grew when my father-in-law came over, opened up the wall so we could access the leak and jerry-rigged the pipes to buy us a few more days until we could have it repaired. Yesterday, after more than a week and a half of waiting for the plumber, we finally have all of our plumbing working! The gratitude just kept growing!

While the plumber was working, we put up our Christmas tree. I think if we weren't having people at our house over the next few weeks we probably wouldn't put up our tree this year, but I'm glad we did. Putting the tree up is one of those things I was looking forward to doing pregnant this year, so it wasn't my favorite thing to do, but it went better than I expected. No tears!! It looks great, but more than that we ended up with a lot of entertainment out of the process!

Step one was easy, put the tree together. Step two: fluff out the branches. This was fine until I started working on the lower branches. Our kitten, Lilly, decided she wanted to help, and here's where things got complicated. Lilly quickly figured out that she could climb up the tree. The next thing we knew we had this:


She really seemed to like it in there. Step three: add lights and decorate the tree. No problem. She found other ways to entertain herself for the most part. M's family stopped by to drop off a spotlight for our outside decorations and they stayed for coffee. While we were visiting, Lilly decided to try again. Unfortunately, her second try at snuggling in the tree proved hazardous for our tree stand. The tree started to lean and then wouldn't stay up at all. Thanks (again) to my father-in-law (seriously, the man has MacGyver-like abilities!) and a piece of red yarn the tree never completely fell, but for a couple hours it really looked like we'd hanged our Christmas tree.

It is now standing straight and tall and kitty-proof. Lilly can climb around to her heart's content and all she does is shake the tree. My father-in-law created a very sturdy stand for us which raises our tree's height by quite a bit. Take a look:


One final picture for your entertainment:

(Tail courtesy of Tiger Lilly)

Monday, November 21, 2011

One month...

My daughter was born one month ago today. The last few days have not been easy. Saturday was one month since our lives changed and we began to learn about grief. I relived those awful moments in the doctor's office of waiting and reheard those words, "no heartbeat" over and over in my head. Yesterday, I mentally relived the induction, the hours of waiting. Last night, I slept restlessly knowing the moment would come when it was one month since our daughter was born. Today, I drove by my daughter's grave in the church cemetery. Today, I am sad.

Even in my sadness, I realize how much I've grown over the last month. I would still go back and change, well, everything if I had the chance, but I have grown.

I have learned a lot about pastoral care. I know now that there really aren't "right" things to say to someone who is grieving, but there are definitely "wrong" things to say. I know that a hug (even though the books might tell you hugs are crossing boundaries) can communicate far beyond words strength and love to someone who is grieving. I know that personal tragedy can make pastors more empathetic and compassionate. I have always known that the cloud of witnesses on the other side is waiting to welcome us when our bodies give out, but I now know on a personal level just how comforting it is to be able to look forward to that reunion, to seeing someone you love so deeply as the whole, perfect person they could have been or were in life.

I have learned, too, that this experience is making me a better parent. I think I would have been a wonderful mother to my daughter, but I think I will be an even better parent to any other children we may have. I will be more patient when my child is colicky because I know just how lucky I am to have a healthy, breathing baby. I will be more intentional in protecting my time with my child because every moment will feel like a privilege. I will love more, laugh harder, and enjoy every minute. I will also be an overprotective worrier the entire time, and I will probably embarrass the heck out of my kids because of it. But, who cares? No parent is perfect, and I think losing my daughter earns me the right to be a bit of an anxious parent!

I have also learned that grief, in the words of a former English teacher and friend, sucks! There really are few words in the English language that define grief in quite so accurate a way. Grief on good days is like a broken bone, the dull ache that just refuses to go away. On bad days, grief is like labor pains without the happy end of a baby, sharp waves of pain that don't allow you to focus on anything but what you feel. I realize that this analogy misses many people, but there really is no better way to describe bad days when you're grieving. Like labor pains that give birth to a stillborn baby, grief feel like a slap in the face, like the brokenness of the world is mocking you. It just sucks!

So, today is a sad day, but I have reasons to be grateful. I am grateful that I can get through these "one month" days now rather than in a couple days. Thanksgiving may bring with it struggles of its own, but at least the "one month" days are not the day of Thanksgiving (or for that matter, Christmas next month!). I am grateful that I have a husband who reminds me that maybe one month is not so much a marker of what we've lost but something to celebrate. We have survived. We have learned to find hope in the midst of our sadness. We are not feeling the heartbreak of our loss the way we were one month ago. I am grateful that I am "grieving well." This loss has been devastating, but somehow I have managed to put my life back together. Each day I find new ways to keep going, new things to look forward to, new hope. For example, I found these verses from Isaiah 54 just yesterday. While they don't speak to my exact situation, they still feel a bit like a promise.
"Sing, O barren one who did not bear;
burst into song and shout, 
you who have not been in labor! 
For the children of the desolate woman 
will be more than the children of her that is married, 
says the Lord
Enlarge the site of your tent, 
and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out; 
do not hold back; 
lengthen your cords and strengthen your stakes. 
For you will spread out to the right and to the left, 
and your descendants will possess the nations 
and will settle the desolate towns."
We named our daughter Faith as a reminder that God is faithful, that this is not the end of our story, but the beginning, that God gives good gifts, that we will one day be parents to a healthy child. Today, even in my sadness, I claim these words from Isaiah 54, as a promise that one day my silent house will be overflowing with the noise of children and my time will be filled with the pleasures of parenthood rather than a blog about my journey. (Sorry, but I will trade this blog in quite easily if it means I'm spending time being a mom!!)

Friday, November 18, 2011

Tears from the Pulpit and Other Awkward and Embarrassing Moments

If you were in my church this past Sunday, you had the unfortunate honor of seeing me break down and cry before, during and after praying from the pulpit. For those of you who were not present, let me explain. In our congregation, the Morning Prayer (also known as the Congregational Prayer or Pastoral Prayer) usually follows the "Songs of Praise and Worship." This past Sunday was no exception. We sang three songs and I made it through the first two without too much difficulty. Our third song, "I Love You, Lord," happened to be one of many on my mental list of songs I planned to sing to our baby. I had completely forgotten about that list until the song started, and I lost it. I never even got one word or note of the song out. I just stood there and cried. I tried really hard to shut out the song and regain my composure. It just didn't happen. I suppose I can be proud that I made it the whole way through my prayer without stopping, but it was ugly. My voice was cracking, and there were times when I could barely read what I had written. The best thing anyone can say is that I survived and the congregation survived. I usually enjoy participating in the service in this way, but I think it might be a while before I am brave enough to try again. Tears may be healing, but that doesn't stop "crying in the pulpit" from getting added to the list of embarrassing moments I've had over the last four weeks! Here's a few more:

  • Being rude to someone I ran into in the grocery store and knowing I was being rude even as I did it because I simply didn't have the energy to explain that we'd just lost our daughter. (She was very gracious when my mother-in-law apologized for me a couple weeks later.)
  • Crying in coffee shops. Coffee shops are a great place to meet people to talk, but when the topic of conversation is something emotional like losing a child, it can be a bit uncomfortable for everyone. (Suggestions of better places to meet for these conversations would be appreciated! These are good conversations which I plan to continue even if they have to be in public places.)
  • Explaining to the plumber who put in our new furnace a few weeks ago and returned to fix our leaky shower that I no longer have a due date, that my daughter arrived three weeks ago with no heartbeat. These conversations are not so much embarrassing as they are awkward. The person who asked always feels horrible for asking, and I have yet to find a way of making that moment less awkward or helping the other person feel better about asking! (By the way, that plumber did not fix the leaky shower and has not been back to try again. We've called and are still waiting. Not sure how I feel about that, but I'm hoping it doesn't have anything to do with the awkwardness of our last conversation. Shout out to my father-in-law who put a cap on the end of the pipe so that the leak is temporarily solved!!)
In spite of the embarrassing nature of crying in public places, I am incredibly grateful for the community of other mothers who have lost their daughters. Don't get me wrong! This is one club in which I would rather not be a member, but it is surprising good to talk to, cry with, and get to know other women who have lost their children and in particular their daughters. I spent my entire morning today with a woman who lost her daughter a few months ago, and I feel so blessed by our time together. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it was not what I ended up getting!

I hope that this doesn't burst your bubble, but pastors are human. We don't always know the right thing to say. We don't have this sense of "divine confidence" that allows us to walk into situations without fear or anxiety. We are human. We get nervous. We question our own abilities. We sometimes put our foot in our mouth.

I was nervous going into my meeting this morning. I am a control freak who likes to know the outcome of conversations before she has them. It has been hard for me to put myself out there without having expectations for a conversation, and I have gone into more than one conversation in the last four weeks dreading the outcome because I simply didn't know what to expect. I had no idea that I would leave the coffee shop this morning feeling so hopeful and so happy. I laughed. I cried. I talked. I listened. I feel like I found a kindred spirit, another grieving soul who tries to live every day with hope, who chooses to see the light at the end of the tunnel even when it's hard. I have been blessed, and I am learning that good grieving is grieving with hope. May you find light and hope and promise no matter what you face today, tomorrow, and all the tomorrows after, and may we all find ways to "grieve good."

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Thoughts on Blogging

If you found my first blog on Facebook yesterday, I'm sure you noticed my note that I never thought I'd be a blogger. Starting in middle school or maybe even before, I started keeping a journal, but I have long realized that the thoughts in my journal are far from profound. There have been challenging times in my life, but for the most part, these experiences have not seemed blog-worthy. To be perfectly honest, even three weeks ago I would have said that you would never find me blogging about my life. I realized that the experience of losing my daughter was something that I could blog about, but I simply couldn't imagine sharing such a private, emotional experience on the internet. I have changed my mind (obviously!). Here's why.

Within days of Faith's birth, I received no less than three suggestions that I contact a woman who had lost her daughter in March and had started a blog. If you're curious about her blog you can find it here: http://hardermagic.blogspot.com/. I started reading her story and realized that much of what she said in her early posts resonated with my own experience. She is very honest in her blogging, and when I started reading her blog, I couldn't imagine being that honest with people who care about me, much less with strangers who might find my blog by chance. I have been profoundly touched by R's blog, so much so that I suddenly found myself wanting to share my own story. I hope that by sharing through this blog I might reach out to someone else in my situation, that I can help those around me understand my struggles, and that I might find healing.

R's blog is not the only one by far that I have found over the last weeks that has been helpful. Another blog, found here http://www.dazeddad.com/, tells the story of loss from a father's perspective. The author of this blog is also a United Methodist pastor. His blog both echos many of my feelings and also has helped me understand my husband's experience better. This is a perspective that often gets lost and forgotten, and I know that in my own grief it's easy to forget that M lost his daughter, too, that while I felt her move within me, he never experienced her in the same way and that creates an entirely different kind of grief.

I hope that you'll keep reading even when my posts tend to focus on the mundane rather than the profound as they undoubtedly will. I have list of post ideas that will at least get us through a few weeks, things that have been rumbling around in my head and are finally in a form that I feel comfortable sharing. So, along those lines, here are a few both profound and mundane things I have learned in the last four weeks.

  • There are entirely too many parents out there blogging about the loss of their children. Yes, we live in a broken world. Yes, the brokenness of our world means that there will always be parents who lose their children. That doesn't mean we have to be okay with it. God can walk with us in our anger, frustration, confusion, and disappointment!
  • Prayer works in ways that are impossible to understand. Whether I'm present with you or not, your prayers are keeping me together, so keep praying! Even on days when things appear to be going well on the surface, I still need to know that people are praying, so don't stop telling me!
  • Hugs, shoulder squeezes, any simple touch, all these are great ways to communicate to me what you feel when you don't know what to say. Honestly, I don't know what to say either. We don't have words for this experience. Hugs really do help!
  • Hope is hard to kill. Yes, this ironic since my name happens to be Hope, but I mean this on a much deeper level than my own physical body. It may currently be a shriveled, sad-looking shell of what used to exist in my heart, but I still have hope. Even when I feel my worst and my face feels chapped from crying, I still have hope that life will get better, that joy will come, that I will be able to listen to stations other than NPR on the radio without getting emotional, that I will once again be able to plan for the future, and that one day there will be another pregnancy with a happier ending.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

No Matter What Goes Right Lyrics

If the mountains never crumble,
And the rivers don't run dry,
The oceans keep on pounding,
The sun stays in the sky;
If apples keep on falling,
And three and two is five,
I'll still be loving you
No matter what goes right.
If the world keeps on turning,
And snow keeps falling white,
Fire keeps on burning,
And daylight follows every night;
If flowers bloom in springtime,
And birds remember how to fly,
I'll still be loving you
No matter what goes right.
No matter what goes right,
I'll still be loving you;
No matter what goes right,
I will stand by you.
And when couples fight their troubles,
It unites their hearts,
When the good times roll,
they can drift apart;
I'll still be loving you
No matter what goes right.
When all this work is over,
And my ship comes sailing in,
You'll always be my lover,
You'll always be my friend.
If the stars up in the heavens
Keep on shining clear and bright,
I'll still be loving you,
No matter what goes right.
No matter what goes right,
I'll still be loving you;
No matter what goes right,
I will stand by you.
And when couples fight their troubles,
It unites their hearts,
When the good times roll,
they can drift apart;
I'll still be loving you
No matter what goes right.
No matter what goes right,
I'll still be loving you;
No matter what goes right,
I will stand by you.
And when couples fight their troubles,
It unites their hearts,
When the good times roll,
they can drift apart;
I'll still be loving you
No matter what goes right.

No Matter What Goes Right

When I was fourteen or fifteen, I heard the song "No Matter What Goes Right" by Trout Fishing in America. Anyone who know them knows that the vast majority of their songs are quite humorous. "No Matter What Goes Right" is a song about marriage and loving your spouse no matter what goes right in life. It is an answer to all the songs about relationships surviving all the obstacles. While I recognized (and the song acknowledges) that no life will be completely free of challenges, I (being a complete idealist and a teenager) began to expect that my life and my future marriage would be just this way. Of course there would be challenges, but I had made all the right choices and fully expected that I would have a "No Matter What Goes Right" kind of life.The last eight weeks or so have forced me to face reality in a way no idealist ever hopes they must. I'll start at the beginning.
In late September, my husband, M, and I had our furnace inspected and discovered two cracks in the heat exchanger. This resulted in a couple of weeks of no heat, no air conditioning, and a hefty bill. It also saved us from the awful fate of carbon monoxide poisoning. Since I was seventeen weeks pregnant with our first child, we gladly paid and inspected our brand new furnace. Thank you, Lennox! While this changed how we planned to spend our money, we quickly embraced this bump in the road.

Just a few weeks later, on October 19 and exactly four months to the day after finding out we were expecting our first baby, we went to the doctors office for a sonogram appointment only to learn the devastating news that our baby did not have a heart beat. Less than 24 hours later, we found ourselves in the Labor and Delivery department of the hospital awaiting the birth of our daughter, Faith, and learning what it means to say goodbye before even saying hello. There really is no way to explain what this experience is like. If you don't know, I pray you never find out. If you do, my heart hurts for you.

Faith was born on October 21, 2011, at 2:38 in the morning, was seven inches long and weighed 6 ounces. Before she was delivered we had no idea of her gender, but I decided (in my sleepy, morphine-induced stupor) that if she was a girl her name would be Faith. I believe with all my heart that God is good and God is love and that only by walking in faith will my life, will all of our lives, be worth living. My daughter's name is a reminder to me every day to abide in God's love and walk in faith that life will again be good and that no amount of sadness, anger, disappointment, or fear can separate me from God's love.

The same day that we said goodbye to our daughter we also had our five-month-old kitten, Lilly, spayed. We brought her home the next day, just hours before we buried Faith in the children's section of the cemetery at the church where I am youth pastor. She was sleepy and a bit dopey from the pain medication prescribed by our vet. M looked up the medication on the internet and discovered that it was not recommended for use in cats, but our vet had prescribed it so we went ahead and gave it to her. Ten days later she reacted. I watched as within one hour she went from being her normal, feisty, playful self to a nearly comatose kitten. She was hidden under the back of the couch, and all I could do was watch her hoping she wouldn't stop breathing before M and I could get her to the vet. They were able to stop her "episode" and the next day we brought her home only to have her go into another after the vet's office had closed for the day. We took another emergency drive to the vet and he was able to stop the episode, but had no idea what was going on or how to keep her from having another. Finally, after a total of three episodes, cleaning our entire house trying to find out if she'd been eating something she shouldn't, and feeling like horrible pet owners, the vet decided to put her on a low protein diet in hopes that her episodes were caused by her cat food. Four days later, we brought her home. It's been one week, but so far so good. No more sick, Lilly.

In the midst of our sick kitty woes, we returned to the doctor's office for my post-delivery, follow-up appointment. How I feel about the news of that appointment changes from day to day and hour to hour. There was nothing physically wrong with Faith and there is nothing physically wrong with me. There was evidence of an infection in the placenta, diagnosis: acute chorioamnionitis. There is no way to know for certain that this is what killed my daughter. It could be that the infection was caused by the amount of time I carried her after she died. The bad news, I will worry about this the entire pregnancy if I am ever pregnant again. The good news, there is no reason to think that we will necessarily lose another baby.

That brings me to this week. In any other week the events of this week would be minor, but we are beginning to feel a bit like Job. This week's challenges: a leaky shower that requires the water be turned off when we are not actively using it (I mean, seriously, we can't even shut off the shower! It just runs!!) and a funny noise from the engine of the car (thankfully, this appears to be minor!).

So, now what? Next week is Thanksgiving, and I can find only tiny things for which to be thankful (more on that later). I feel pushed to my limit and exhausted, but can't sleep (Thank God for Ambien!!). I cry when I listen to most music. I am grateful for the many women God placed in my life who have lost a child and understand my loss, but I hurt for each of them knowing they have felt or continue to feel what I feel. I REALLY want a week to go by without any major incidents. I know it won't make me hurt less, but I would be ever so grateful for one uneventful week, one lousy, "no matter what goes right" kind of week! Prayers for this would be much appreciated!