Worrying

I remember my 28th birthday vividly.  Three weeks prior I had miscarried my first child.  I was still reeling from shock and grief when my birthday came around.  The day my miscarriage was confirmed at the hospital, I came home and closed the door to my guest bedroom.  That was the room we were going to turn into a nursery for the baby.  The few cards, gifts and baby things we had purchased in those three months we were expecting were all stashed in that room and I couldn't bare to see them, so I just closed the door and it remained closed until my birthday.  For some reason that day I decided to go in.  I still remember laying on the bed, surrounded by all the baby things and sobbing while my husband sat beside me.  After crying and looking through all the baby's things, I walked out of the room, closed the door behind me and didn't open it again for months.  I felt a sad feeling every time I just walked by that room, which was 20 times a day since it is right beside my own bedroom. 

This week we took Riley's crib apart to move it out to make room for her new bed.  I saw a sticker on it, under the mattress.  It had the date it was delivered on it...1/29/2010, one year and one day exactly from the night I spent my birthday crying.  One year later, the same room that had once only reminded me of what I had lost was now birthing something new, was being transformed into a nursery for our miracle Riley who I was six months pregnant with.  The song I have sung at church many Sunday mornings echos in my mind, "You have turned my mourning into dancing.  You have turned my sorrow into joy".  God took the door to a room and a heart that had been closed and opened it, ushering in new life and joy with the opening.  That room is still Riley's room today.

If only I could have known that God had a baby coming for me, that He was going to redeem that pain and loss.  "Worrying does not take away tomorrow's troubles.  It takes away today's peace."  My mother-in-law sent that to me.  Certainly she knows all too well about worrying lately.  Between the two of us, she and I have had enough to worry about to last a life time.  "What if I miscarry again?  What if next time the baby makes it to 20 weeks, or 24 or 30 and then dies.  Could I survive that? What if the baby is born but isn't healthy?  Will my children even be close if they are so far apart in age?  Am I going to be too old to even keep up with a baby by the time I have another one?  What if I never have another one?"  Worry, worry, worry.  But it's true, worrying will not change what is to be and serves only to rob me of today's joy and peace.  Life, especially mine, must be lived one day at a time.  Today I have a healthy, beautiful daughter, an amazing husband and a family I love.  Let the peace of that seep in and save tomorrow's troubles for tomorrow.  God's grace will be there when they come.  "Don't worry about anything, but pray about everything.  With thankful hearts offer up your prayers and requests to God." Philippians 4:6.  I will fight the worrisome thoughts in my mind.  I will pray about them and release them to the only One who has any power to change them.  I will make my request and I will wait with patient endurance for Him to open the door once again.