Our Loss – Heaven’s Gain – October 2020

The year was 2001.

Surrounded by the boundless energy of our sixteen month old - we found out our Baby Number Two would arrive the summer of the next year. Our good news was somewhat shadowed by the aftermath of 9/11 as the world sat in shock and we wondered what type of world would welcome our little one...

We celebrated in between extreme morning sickness and fatigue. Often I would drift in and out of cat naps while our bouncing toddler would climb all over the couch as though it was the community playground. Some nights, my husband would pack her up and take her to help him set up the new office space for our growing company. He fondly remembers turning his back for a brief moment only to find she had “helped” paint the trim in the wrong color in the main area. It wasn’t as humorous back then as it is now... but we’re older now and that toddler is twenty beautiful years old.

Winter settled in and with it came a bit more calmness in the pregnancy. We had reached the second trimester.

Our little Baby Number Two shared a close due date with their cousin, so my sister and I scheduled our office visits together... We watched the cousins mature and grow.

One particularly dark evening, we received a frantic call from my sister that she was ill and being rushed to the hospital. It was believed she had already lost her baby. Fear and terror struck our innocent hearts as we waited for the tests to confirm the worst.

In a strong act of faith, she begged for them to again check for a heartbeat... and on the screen - miracle baby’s beating heart pattered softly. And strongly. She was well.

She was a miracle.

The following week, “miracle baby“, and her mom, typical baby, and I arrived for our regularly scheduled office visit. My sister checked out beautifully and then it was my turn for the routine ultrasound check.

But instead of normalcy, there were no vital signs. Nothing. No heartbeat. No sign of movement. It couldn’t be! I wasn’t the one with the crisis. The trauma. That was my sister! Not me!!

I sobbed as we drove slowly to the local hospital for more definitive testing... “Oh God... please. Give wisdom. Give strength. Help.”

It was confirmed that our precious baby had stopped growing at about eight weeks and there was no sign of viable life within my womb.

I was sent home to await a natural passing of our child...

It was a long weekend... Every trip to the bathroom felt like trauma and terror. Every cramp and pain just sucked the breath right out of my lungs.

By Monday morning, we decided to have the surgery to remove our child. We no longer possessed the strength to endure the natural waiting game.

It was brief. It was short. It was so very very sad. I felt alone. Cold. Even though our dear doctor held my hand and cried and my husband stood near until I fell asleep... I felt so very very alone. So very very sad.

Hours later we received another shocking call... after inspecting the baby more closely, it had been determined that I had experienced a partial molar pregnancy. Rare but possible. Genetically half baby, half tumor.  

For the next three months, every week our eighteen-month-old beautiful bundle of boundless energy daughter and I would head to the local hospital for me to have blood work taken in a watching and waiting game to see my HCG levels drop to zero. Any elevation of these numbers would indicate the possibility of cancerous activity in me.

What had begun as joy... was turning out to be a path of learning and suffering.

Graciously, my number hit zero on the expected timeline and we celebrated the presence of no HCG in my system. So odd to celebrate loss...

And then one day in the heart of summer, right on Baby Number Two’s due date, my beautiful niece entered the world. Whole. Safe. Beautiful. And lovely. The miracle of a safe and healthy birth was no longer something we innocently took for granted. It was dear... Precious.

Exactly one year later, our son was born. A man of God. His name, Daniel Jacob... God is my judge.

And sixteen ridiculously short months later, the world was shocked by a baby who had more energy and stamina than any endurance athlete ever possessed… our little love, Leah. Her birth changed my life forever... but that is a story for a different day.

It’s funny how pain and suffering have within themselves the primary and sufficient elements to carve and mold us into completely different people.

Before losing our second child and enduring the necessary subsequent testing - I was completely ignorant and innocent to child loss. It was something that happened to other people. People I didn’t know. People I had never talked to... or so I thought.

Even after having two more children, I found myself from time to time wondering about what kind of life we might have had with our second child being present and alive.

During one particularly hard day of grieving, I found myself crying on my knees before God asking “Why?” It wasn’t a question I asked often, but that day I had to ask.

With a gentleness that comes from a Father who had also watched his only Son die... He spoke.

“For such a time…
The allotted time.
The ordained time.
The fulfilled time.

Perfect.
Whole.
Beautiful.

...The shortness of life doesn’t devalue - but rather heightens the mission for which they were created. I saw. I knew. I saw the ravages of brokenness and I will continue to make all things good for you...

For such a time.
For an allotted time.
For my glory...”

And in that moment, I knew this pain would forever change me. But could I allow it to serve as a balm for others’ grief?  Could I take my suffering to the Cross and have it be transformed into ultimate beauty for the sake of the Kingdom? Could I offer my pain as a sacrifice to the One who gave His Son for my eternal life.

Over the years, grief came in waves... I didn’t speak often - if ever - of my experience. I nodded with understanding when someone shared the pain of their loss. I remembered...

Over the past five years, I have had the privilege... such a strange word... to walk side by side with a few moms who have experienced child loss. Each loss has been different, and each one has changed me... helped me search and find the Cross of Christ differently.

Each loss I have walked alongside has unearthed raw places within me where God has graciously seen fit to heal and restore.

One day, about two years ago, I tentatively arrived at the funeral home to say goodbye to a precious little boy who had held so much promise and expectation. As I entered with a heavy and grieving heart, I walked straight into the doctor who had cared for me during my second pregnancy. It was the first time I had seen her in almost fifteen years! Startled, she asked, “Why are you here?”

Yes... why was I there?

“To maybe bring hope and healing... just like you did for me so many years ago. When you held my hand, promised there would be a tomorrow... And pointed my eyes to a God who stands ready to take our pain and mysteriously transform it into beauty.... Yes, that's why I’m here...”

Pain and suffering holds every piece necessary for fullness. It is a divine mystery how the Creator of the Universe can take pain and brokenness and transform it into everlasting beauty.

Ashes to Beauty.
Brokenness to Whole.

Today may we find the strength in our present pain and suffering to hand over our lives to the One who can make all things new. He can take the most messed up, broken pieces and transform them into wholeness and beauty. It is a mystery as to how.

But it is true…