I feel like for anyone who reads this blog regularly it must be incredibly depressing. I feel kind of bad about that. But I remind myself the purpose of this blog is not to be uplifting, but rather it is to share our journey, which is unfortunately a pretty sad and painful one. This is my life and it is pretty messy right now. So for those who are brave enough to continue the journey with us, here we go.
We celebrated Christmas. It was actually, all things considered, a lovely day. Watching Riley open her gifts and see how excited she was about them was an absolute joy. My favorite moment was when she opened a Hello Kitty (her absolute favorite!) outfit from my sister and her husband and Riley held it up, looked at it with big eyes, shook her head slowly back and forth and said very slowly, in almost a whisper, "Beautiful." But when the present opening was over and all the festivities were winding down, a sad feeling came over me. Maybe it was my sadness over losing the babies, maybe it was the fact that we will soon get the latest news on whether or not my my mother in law's cancer is shrinking, maybe it was just all the build up for a holiday that comes and goes so quickly. But I felt sad. Jason and I saw the doctor in St. Louis last week. Our appointment pretty much confirmed all the information we already knew from our previous phone conversation with him. We now just have to decide what we want to do. If we are ready to take that leap. The doctor is ready when we are. We are still thinking it all over.
We watched a movie recently, "The Words". It is an amazing movie. It confirmed many things I have already been thinking for a long time now. People may wonder how a person becomes so sad, so different than what they once were. The answer is simply this...life. Life happens to all of us and there is nothing we can do to stop it. Sometimes life is amazing and beautiful. Sometimes life is tragic. I have witnessed enough close family and friends go through tragedy and have faced enough myself recently to know this, we are all just one tragedy away from our lives becoming divided into what once was and what now is. I once was a young, beautiful, happy girl full of life. My life was divided by the death of my children. I am not that person anymore. But I am working hard to find my way to being a new person, one who has experienced tragedy but has not let it get the best of her. Sometimes even I think I should just get over it, move on, just stop being so sad about it all. But then I remind myself that my most recent miscarriage was just three short months ago. For most women just one miscarriage like that would be devastating. And I have had six. Jason told me recently that it is like the scar on his hand. When he owned his lawn and landscape business he dropped a mower on his hand and had to go to the ER for stitches. It was a pretty bad wound. It was deep. And even now that it has healed and scarred over, though the pain is not like it once was, he still feels pain when he hits the scar just right, claps, or when his wedding ring presses into it. My wounds are fresh. They have not healed yet and the worst part is just when one starts to heal, I get another one. My wounds will scar over and heal eventually, but I may never see a newborn baby and not feel a twinge of sadness, December 3rd may never come and go without me remembering it is the day my child died, finding out I am pregnant may never again be a happy time, but rather one of anxiety, just counting each day, each week as a success and as one day closer to the day my baby will be born and out of what may possibly be the most dangerous place it will ever be, in the womb of its own mother. But with time, just like the old man in "The Words" perhaps I will find my peace with it all too. Until then, I think about this, a life lived without any trial, any testing rarely produces faith, perseverance, trust, insight. A life lived with tragedy and hopelessness sometimes is the most perfect setting for God to work His greatest miracles.
I love you always and forever and no matter what.
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