Hopefully Not Forever...

Oh, how I ache! Oh, how I wish this pain would have passed me by!

How I desperately wish God would not have allowed this.

With the vibrant colored leaves falling, so have my tears. So many that I could soak the earth.

When I still had the beating of two precious hearts within, I was excited for Autumn. It is my favorite season. It was going to be the season I was going to rock into snow covered earth with my babies.

What am I supposed to do now?

I am back to keeping the curtains closed. I don't want to see the beautiful life that Spring brought die a beautiful death. I have seen enough of that. Even though I know the dying will usher in something new, I don't want to witness it.

I just want to rock my babies.

I want to pass by a baby section and not suppress a moan. I want to pass by a baby section and not fight back tears and be able to find a voice around the lump in my throat. I want to smile again from the depths within.

What if that is gone forever?

What if all that is left is this terrible desperation? What if all that is left is just the ability to endure and not enjoy?


What to do when faith and emotions don't always match up? How do you pour that Sweet Salve on what aches when you are too broken to see?

What do you do?


It is hard to trust, hard to see that there is a light in the distance.

It is rough. This road where I unexpectedly found myself, it is so rough, too black to see. I do not want to be here. I want to be in a rocking chair rocking my babies into a new season.

What am I supposed to do now?

Stephanie

Consider it Gift

I read these words about two months ago in a book I cannot remember. **

Do you love the gift more than The Giver?

Those are words, food for thought. Words that caused me to stop. To think.

I did not like the question at first because when I really examined self, I did not like the answer.

Yes. Yes I love my girls! More than breath, more than life itself. More than The One who blessed me with them?

Ouch! My answer stings. My response hurts.

Do you love the gift more than The Giver?

After days and weeks spent thinking, mediating, examining . . . No.

It was not an easy No for me. But the hard does not cause me to change my response.

Emmerson and Vivienne are a gift. They are His gifts to me. They are gifts and there was never a guarantee on how long I would physically hold them. The time spent does not take away the fact that they were His gifts to me.

It is up to me now, how I treat, how I react to His gift . . . my girls . . . my God. I will honor Emmerson and Vivienne. I will carry them in my heart until the last bit of air is pushed from the lungs.

Even now, I would not return this ache, this sorrow.

I hear of new mommies who want a full nights sleep, of their hope for the laundry load to be less. I now realize, through loss, how I desire for sleep to be interrupted with the cries of hunger and for my laundry to be dotted with tiny onesies. 

If before, I could have overlooked those things, those moments and chores as blessings, as gifts, then what more am I not seeing? What else does my eye need to fall on and consider it gift? Blessings?

Could my sorrow, my ache, be gift?

This question has caused me to take pause and examine my life.

There is no doubt that my life has been extremely blessed. 

Emmerson and Vivienne were and still are blessings in my life. They have caused me to open my eyes, my heart and to see everything that rains down as good. Blessings rain down. They rain down abundantly.

Blessings that cause me to hit knee and bow low. 

He rains blessings down. How often do we return those blessings with thanks?

How often do we entrust the beauty of what was given to the majesty of The Giver?

...My soul glorifies the Lord...For The Mighty One has done great things for me.

Luke 1:46:49

Stephanie

*I have received a lot of literature and have read a lot of books over the past few months. I have searched everything I have read and cannot find the source for the above question. I love to give credit where credit is due. If you know the one who asked the above question, please leave the name in the comment section that follows this post. The question is not from me.*

It Shows

On one of my previous post, I decorated it with pictures of my daughter's room. There was a famous doll sitting on the bed. I looked at the picture and was thankful that all the dirt and stains on her were not obvious in the photo.

Baby gets a bath (put in the washing machine) once a week. First I pre-treat her with a stain remover and sometimes I let her soak in my ever-present "soaking bucket" in the laundry room.

I feel the need here to pat myself on the back and tell you that I am pretty amazing at getting stains out of clothes. I really perfected my stain removing abilities after I became a mother. I used to be The Laundry Princess but in the last two years, I have had some upward movement in my company and have a new title now, The Laundry Queen. I wonder why with my new title I have not also received more pay? I guess that is a whole other post.

It is getting to the point with Baby that no matter how much I pre-treat her, soak her, or bathe her, she no longer becomes completely clean, free of the stains.

After I took those pictures, I thought back when to Baby first became a member of our family. She was so clean. There was not a speck of dirt on her and both bows on her dress were intact.

Now she has stains and one of the bows is missing.

I have tried in vain to make her like new again.

It never works.

She has been my daughters most adored companion. She has a lot of dirt on her.

She has been kissed, hugged, slipped under the covers with my daughter and kept her company while she dreams sweet, innocent dreams of a child.

She has been everywhere my daughter has been. Baby gets examined and receives her immunizations by the doctor before her forever friend.

It shows. It is evident that Baby has lived. That Baby has been loved.

So, the dirt and the wear and tear on Baby isn't really dirt at all. It is love made visible.

Love made visible . . .

". . . But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams

Stephanie

Interrupted Plans

I don't know what it is. I don't know what triggers it. It frustrates me! I am a planner; a mega-planner. I have back up plans for my back up plans. So when it comes out of the blue and hits me, I fall to my knees.

Yesterday, My Love and I were at the gym...together. Working out...together. We have not worked out together since our first daughter was born two and a half years ago. It was so nice. I felt like it was a date.

We were lifting weights and My Love said something to me (I forget what it was) and I responded with, after all, I did just have twins. We were laughing and joking around with one another before I said it and continued to do so after. But those words still lingered. I thought to myself, I did just have twins and when I go to pick up my daughter from the gym's childcare, I will just be picking up her, not Emmerson and Vivienne. I just had twins and they are not with me. They are not here.

A little while later, while we were still working out, I overhead a man saying something about his baby. Baby. I had two. When I go home, they will not be there. As we did our cool down, the sadness, the reality, weighed down on me. They are not here.

I stopped. My Love asked what was wrong. I did not respond. He took one look at my eyes (as he is accustomed to doing now when there has been a drastic change in my demeanor) and gave me a knowing look.

We get home and I retreat to my hideout - under the covers in my bed.

This morning upon rising, the lingering sadness is still there. I am trying so hard to just be normal. It consumes a surprising amount of energy.

My daughter has a fever and she is out of character for herself. She climbs up on my lap and she is still. She is never not moving. She is constantly on the go, constantly jumping and running. She does not know any other way to get from Point A to Point B.

She has climbed up on my lap and she is still. She cuddles with me and I relish it. She is never still long enough to cuddle and I can not remember the last time I have cuddled with her. Without trying, I remember back to when she was an infant and I cuddled with her all the time. I remember back to when I was pregnant with her and a smile grows on my face. Without warning, memories of my pregnancy with Emmerson and Vivienne hit me and I smile more and then I grow sad. They are not here. 

The sadness soaks in more. It takes more energy to just be normal. I am so weighed down that it begins to feel as if I am moving under water. I am so weighed down that a film covers my eyes and I can not see all that I have been blessed with.

I hurt. I ache.

It comes out of nowhere. It always takes me by surprise. I don't plan for the grief to overcome me and when it does, I do not know what to do with it.

Just when I think I am making some progress, I have set backs. When I am making progress, I fall back to what comes as second nature to me...planning. The grief comes and the plans stop. The day, the moment, stops and it stretches out to forever. It frightens me to see that as my life. I do not want it. I did not ask for this. I did not plan for this. I do not have a back up plan for this grief, for this new reality.

It is gloomy and raining on this October Day. I feel as if my heart, me, is gloomy and raining and I am having such a hard time seeing it as good. Seeing it as blessing.

I want them here with me. I want my arms to be full with the weight of them. I miss them so.

I miss and I ache so much for them. The grief has come and I am having a hard time being present.

I ask and beg of prayers from you today.

Stephanie