Rose amongst the thorns

Shortly after coming home with Marybeth I was beginning to enjoy feeding her, even though it did take a lot of work to keep her awake and keep her drinking and latched on. My alarm would go off in the wee hours of the morning. Though I was exhausted from doing one of the hardest things I’ve ever done (delivering a baby) I had to wake up, had to keep going. No more sleeping all night long, now I would sleep for two and a half hours at a time (her feedings when we first brought her home took an hour) and then back up again to drag my tired self out of bed.

  My hubby would be found in deep slumber, I would be found lumbering out of my warm cozy bed, and wandering through my house to go and wake one sweet and warm little babe to feed and nourish her. I was striving to keep two people awake! Not only the baby but also MYSELF!

But somehow, even in the midst of difficulties, God makes it ALL worth every minute!

I’m thoroughly convinced that every trial, every difficulty, God seasons with grace and mercy! Think about it….pain and difficulty in labor is a punishment for Eve’s disobedience and it has fallen upon every mother since the first one. That is God’s justice, we deserve that. But PRAISE HIM that He also has GRACE and MERCY!

His mercy: think about it…labor though hard, could be worse! After all we actually deserve worse!

His GRACE: think about it….WE GET A BABY OUT OF THE WHOLEDEAL! If that is not GRACE than what is??!!

I didn’t experience too bad of morning sickness while pregnant but I have friends who do, and they all say it is worth every minute! Every minute is worth it because one day they know they will hold that precious babe that caused all that sickness and in that moment they won’t even remember all that sickness anyway. Heaven will be like this for everyone! All our pain and hardships will be but a blip on the radar compared to being with God forever!

Pregnancy is not an easy thing, from morning sickness…to back-pain or pinched nerve pain…to just carrying around all that extra weight…to swelling ankles… to stretch marks… to a totally changed figure…to just being plain uncomfortable much of the time (towards the end of the pregnancy… It is just plain difficult!

The same is true of labor, only I believe it is harder than the pregnancy itself lol!

 Oh man is it hard! I won’t lie about that, but it is all worth it when the doctor holds that crying baby up and hands her to you to snuggle and hold for the first time! Nothing can compare! This is grace in the midst of His justice!

He made labor worth it! Worth every pain filled second!

It is worth it we say for those mother’s whose babies make it, but what about those mothers who endure the morning sickness, and sometimes even the labor, only to have a stillborn child or a miscarriage. Is it worth it then? What about them?

I can’t imagine going through all that difficulty, all the hardship of pregnancy and labor only to lose that precious gift from heaven. But some friends of mine have had to walk through this. I don’t care if it was a miscarriage or a still birth, losing a child (that is what they are!) losing that precious life is never easy! My own mom lost her precious gift.

I recall the day. Mom told Krista and Joe and I that we could come to the doctor’s visit and hear the heart beat. So that is what we did. I was only like eight or nine or so. I was so excited; after all this would be my first time hearing a baby’s heart beat (I wasn’t old enough when Joe was born).

  I remember we were listening and listening….the nurse moved the Doppler along...my young ears strained to hear that heart beat. But there was nothing. You could have heard a pin drop in that room.  Our little baby boy had gotten the cord wrapped around his neck and he had passed away sometime before that day. My mom would now have to deliver a dead son.  We named him Joshua. He was only sixteen weeks-old. He would be seventeen now if he had lived. But that was not God’s will for Joshua. God wanted Joshua to live a short time in the womb, and then He wanted Joshua back in heaven with Him.

My mom went through the struggles of pregnancy…and then labor only to deliver his lifeless little body. No baby to bring home for the first time.  No baby to nourish… no baby to lay in the crib. No baby to wear Joe’s hand me downs. He was gone and there wasn’t a thing we could do. The question begs asking, was it worth it?

YES! She would tell you this! EVERY hard thing GOD MAKES WORTHIT!

We all grew in that (still are!).

 And my mom has been able to “comfort others also, with the comfort that she received from God.”(Emphasis added).

You see it is all in perspective! My mom has said time and again that she is thankful! Thankful for losing Joshua? Why? HOW? Our feelings scream that this is so false…so wrong…but the truth which sets us free says yes it is true!

She can be thankful because she has it in perspective! She has told me time and again that she will never have to worry about Joshua not accepting Christ as his Savior, or of Joshua walking away from the Lord because JOSHUA is ALREADY WITH HIM! These are worries that she has about all her living children, but she will never have for Joshua!

All in perspective! She found the rose in the thorns.

The Olympics have finally finished out, and perhaps you enjoyed them, perhaps you really do not care and are maybe tired of hearing about it lol! Josh and I watched them pretty much every night! In fact I’m pretty sure Miriam is going to recognize the music scheme to the Olympics for years to come lol!

This year they did some really cool things. One of which was to allow us to hear from the Olympians parents. The sacrifices they have made, the love and encouragement that helped to bring the athlete to Olympic material. I enjoyed those featurettes (or whatever you would call it). I liked watching the home videos of the athletes, watching how their moms were behind them and helped them.

But one mother in particular stood out to me. She is the mom of skier, (don’t recall her last name, I believer her first name is Sarah??) who lost her life when she hit her head during a ski run. This mom had the right perspective. She said something along the lines of “I was upset about losing my daughter…but then I remembered how blessed I was for ever having known her!” Instead of getting angry over losing her, she instead was glad that she ever got to know her daughter! She chose to focus on what she had, versus what she had lost! WHAT a perspective! What grace in the midst of trial and grief!

What a rose amongst the thorns of life!

I was feeding my dear Marybeth, rocking back and forth just focused on the task at hand, lost in thought and prayers. I remember thinking to myself many times that day “I wonder if Gina has had her little guy yet?” I mean after all she was technically due to have her little guy before even my Miriam was supposed to enter this world. Having no internet at home and having just had Miriam, I was kind of shut off from the world so to speak. I couldn’t wait till a church day when I could finally check facebook and see if she had him yet or not! I was SO excited! Couldn’t wait to find out what his name was, how big he was, and to see pictures. You see Gina and I worked together at camp in the kitchen. And when we figured out we were pregnant around the same time it was a neat thing. I remember back to family camp five. Her baby bump was already developing and mine was just starting. We shared a hug and talked about what we thought we were having.

I also remember when she made her announcement on facebook that she was pregnant. I at that time knew I was pregnant as well and so ached to tell her and everyone else, but we were waiting until after our first doctor’s appointment just to be sure.

I  also remember beginning to pray daily for my little one, and I would always include Gina’s aswell, seeing as we were due only about a month apart.

Whenever she would post something on face book about a milestone in her pregnancy, I would always know that in a short while I would also hit that milestone. It was neat to have her “go on before.”

But for the births of our little ones, God had different plans. Miriam came early.

 I had thought that my water was leaking, and so they tested me. Two tests came positive, and one negative. The doctor decided to induce, because if my water was truly leakingand if they did nothing we would have lost Miriam (bacteria would get into the sack and would get to her). But if they induced me and she was 3 weeks early, they said she would probably have to go to the NICU. Fear struck my heart, but it was our only option. It was either sure death (going home without doing anything) or being induced and possibly having her in the NICU. So we followed the best option we could and decided to induce.

They induced me at 7:10pmon January the 14^th, she was born a short time later at 8:43. When they induced I was dilated only at a3…I jumped to 10 that fast! I kept telling the nurses that I felt I had to push…and they said everyone feels like that and I was supposed to just breathe. They were waiting for my contractions to get more consistent. So I was like “okay, Ill just breathe.”

I stayed as quiet as I could, but shortly it got to the point where I felt I couldn’t hold it anymore. Then all the sudden without any effort on my part, my body began to push Miriam out on its own accord. Freaked of course and was like “You nurses may want to check this out.”

They checked and to their shock and mine, they saw her head already! They told me to hold on for the doctor (why they say to do that…it’s NOT possible to hold on when you are at this point!lol!). I watched them frantically set the room up for delivery. People swirling all around I just closed my eyes. Two pushes later and she was born.

Later I spoke to the nurse, asking why in the world it happened so fast like that. She told me that I was most likely in labor for the past few days (would explain the back pain that I woke up with two nights in a row). I had been waiting for the really bad pain and the consistent contractions (to tell you the truth my contractions were never consistent, that is why the nurses didn’t believe me when at first I told them I felt it was time. They were also waiting for the contractions to get consistent. But they never did.).

The Nurse also told me if I had not come in about my possible water leak, I would have ended up having Miriam at home! CRAZY! God was watching out for us! And despite the doctor’s worries, she didn’t need the NICU. She was fine. That was God’s plan for Miriam.

Josh had been talking to his father on the phone.  Still on the phone he came to Miriam’s room where I was rocking and feeding, and dropped the bomb. “Bethany, Gina has lost her baby.”

My world stopped for a second. This has happened only a few times, at the announcement of various people in my life’s deaths. I swallowed. “What? How? How could this have happened?” He was still on the phone and walked away still talking. He had to finish his conversation with his dad and then he came back to me. But while he was gone tears came like a torrent. Through tears I looked down into the face of  my little one drinking her meal. “How could this happen…why? Why do I still get my little Marybeth? I don’t deserve her! But Gina, Gina deserved her little guy!”

 In fact as I have said in previous notes because of my sin of an eating disorder I really deserved infertility and had thought that is what I would reap…I mean that was logical considering what I had sown! But that is not what God had for me, not what He had for Gina.

She is a strong woman! I look up to her! As I sat there rocking my little one, crying like there was no tomorrow, I prayed. I prayed for Gina, for Peter. For the pain they would be walking through.  I just couldn’t believe this had happened. I fully expected Gina to not write anything on facebook. To just be a recluse for a while (that is what I would be tempted to do in her shoes). But she reached out! She shared her grief, and through that God worked! He used Simon’s short life and Gina’s Christ-like response to speak to me and countless others! This was God’s will for Simon Wesley.

Gina has it in perspective! She focuses not on the loss of her son, but rather on the chance she had to know him for that time in her womb!  She chooses to focus on what she had, versus what she lost. She knows that though her son is not here in her arms; is not here to snuggle, not here to reflect God’s glory on earth. Simon is in the arms of Jesus. Simon is reflecting His radiant glory in a way he never could on this earth.  

I remember reaching out to her and just telling her that I was praying for her, hoping that she would be encouraged to know she was being prayed for. And you know what?? She encouraged me! Here I was trying to encourage her and she encouraged me!

Gina has found the rose amongst the thorns! And she has chosen to share them with us here on facebook and I’m so thankful she has! I only pray that I can find the rose amongst the thorns of this life, like she has, like my mom has, and like that lady who lost her Olympic daughter.

  It is so easy to see God’s grace in the good.

We easily see God’s grace in Miriam’s birth, the fact that she survived and is healthy in spite of being born early, but it is in Simon’s death as well. God’s grace is there, may He continue to open our eyes to find and see His grace and allow that to govern us! Our feelings scream that this can’t be, but truth and feelings almost never coincide, and when it comes down to it we always must choose truth over feelings. Eventually perhaps our feelings will align with the truth, but even if it doesn’t we still cling to truth because that is solid. Our feelings are fleeting, they change, but truth doesn’t! And so I say let’s find the roses amongst the thorns of this life!