Healing

Last weekend I went to a women's retreat in Indiana.  When I was first asked to go, I was in a really bad place emotionally, so I talked myself out of it and initially said "no."  I thought:  There was no way that I was going to share my feelings and be completely vulnerable with a room full of women who would probably think I'm crazy.  I knew that what I was holding inside was ugly and once the walls that I so carefully put in place came down, there was no turning back and who knew what was going to come out.  However.  The night before going, I got serious in prayer and told God that I needed answers.  I wanted to know:  Why me? Do you not love me? and Is my daughter okay?  I also knew that I had lost trust in God and was holding in major anger toward Him and pretty much any one who was happy - especially those with kids.  So, even though I completely didn't want to, I told Him I would go.  I said "I will go to this thing in hope that you will meet me half way."  I promised myself that I would make every possible effort to seek answers and find healing because I truly didn't want to feel the desperate misery I was feeling.

This women's retreat, which was actually called "an encounter", was designed to "peel away the layers, like an onion, until everything you are harboring is dealt with and you can truly encounter God."  I think I cried so much that I was actually dehydrated for days after.  Everyone there was so genuine and non-judgmental... so completely real.  In my small group when everyone began to share what they were struggling with - I soon found out that 2 of the girls in my group had lost babies (one of them had lost 3 in a row!!!).  Unreal.  It was a comfort to see how those girls have come through those losses and are stronger now.  A lady who I had never met before prayed for me and she prayed the exact phrase that went through my head after Annalise was still-born and the nurses took her to be cleaned up and dressed.  It's the same phrase that was in one of the songs at Annalise's funeral service... and she prayed it over me.  "There may be pain in the night, but joy comes in the morning."  I think the use of that phrase, was just one of the many ways in which God showed his love for me that weekend.

It's difficult to describe all the ways God showed up and rewarded my efforts in seeking Him, but I will tell you that after that weekend I have a newly found, deep peace in knowing that God desperately loves me and that my daughter is in perfect peace and love.  God has been more real to me these past several months than He has ever been before in my whole life.  I think the only reason I feel this way is because I actually put aside my doubt, my criticism and my pride and desperately sought God out like I never have before.  He tells us that if we seek Him with our whole hearts, we will find Him.  I needed answers, I needed to know He was there and he cared.  I found that He certainly doesn't disappoint.  I walked away with all my questions answered and with a new found hope.

Brutally honest

So... I am going to be brutally honest here... the past week and a half or so has been really bad.  It pains me to say that all of the strength and optimism I have shown in previous entries has been non-existent recently.  I know that these feelings have been the result of a culmination of several difficult situations these past couple of weeks.  First, our church had it's large "Harvest Fiesta" where we play games and distribute candy to appx. 1,500 cute kids dressed up in Halloween costumes.  That was difficult.  Then there was a wedding we attended where every woman I came in contact with talked constantly about their kids (no one knew my situation) and one of the bridesmaids was pregnant with twins.  To top it all off, the flower girl was a little blonde haired, blued eyed girl named Elise (much like Annalise).  I was in the rest room, and her mother turned to me and asked me to help fix Elise's hair.  I wanted to just run away, but I didn't want to be a jerk, so I quietly held her blonde locks and tried to hold back the tears.  As soon as she was done, I ran out of the bathroom and basically broke down sobbing.  To top it all off, the end of that weekend brought the beginning of my menstrual cycle -- Something I was hoping not to see again for another 9+ months.

This past week has been an exhausting roller coster of episodes of unrelenting depression, interlaced with some of the darkest anger I've had in a long time.  I am not proud of how I've acted this week or some of the feelings I've felt.  I feel further away from God than I have in a long time.  There is a part of me that is so deeply angry at Him and finally throwing blame on Him for all of this.  I even think there is a part of me that wants to hurt Him how I've been hurt.  I'm angry at Him for our daughter dying and for the fact that I have lost my joy and have been re-introduced to the dark anger I used to know as a child when my father left.  I'm also angry at the way it is affecting our marriage.  Then after all these thoughts and bad behavior, I go through moments of thinking that He allowed this to happen because I am a such a bad person that I don't deserve to be a mother and most likely will never get the chance to be a mother.  I am constantly and unreasonably angry at all parents, families, mothers or anyone around me that is happy.  I feel like I am about one conversation about kids away from having a nervous breakdown.

I tell you all of this to just be real.  I am in a bad place right now and am struggling.  If there are others of you out there struggling through situations, I don't want you to read my blog and see all this strength and courage and wonder what's wrong with you when you see nothing but pain, anger and depression in your own situation.  I want you to know that these feelings come.  However, I am determined to overcome this.  Right now, it feels like I can not and will not.  I feel like I don't have one ounce of strength or desire left to keep living.  Nothing in my life holds the same passion and desire it used to and I feel like giving up.  I HAVE to believe that this will get better.  I HAVE to believe that the storm will pass and clear skies will be in my future.  (It doesn't feel like it - but that hope is all I have to hold onto right now).  I've been down this road before and I don't want to go back there.  I know what waits at the end if I don't choose to turn this around.  If I don't choose to fix my thoughts and turn my life back toward God.  Please pray for me.  Please pray for my thoughts and my emotions and my sanity.  

All because of Annalise

Lately I've felt like I've fallen into a pretty consistent pace of life.  In my mind, I think I'm coping and grieving "well".  For the most part - things feel like they've settled into a new normal.  There are those unexpected days and moments when grief and sadness sneak up on me and I have to fight back to "happiness".  James and I have been spending some much needed quality time together.  We have grown so much closer and so much more mature since we lost Annalise.  I feel even more in love with him than before - I feel more "tied to" him than ever before... if that makes sense.  I guess walking through tragedies will cement relationships together like that.  We've also been seeing a Christian counselor who has helped tremendously.  Thank God we took that step to talk through our feelings and have a guide walk us through our grief.  It is certainly healing.  We are finding out more than I think we ever wished to know about our personalities and who we are as individuals and as a couple.  Sometimes I am blown away when I think about how our little angel has given us this gift - she has opened our eyes to things we would have been otherwise missing.  She has taught us lessons that some people never get to learn.  Once we can conquer our sadness and come through this tough time, I know we are going to be better, stronger people -- all because of Annalise.  We will be better parents, better spouses, better pastors, better friends.  I guess with every tragedy, God gives us the opportunity to grow and become better versions of ourselves - more like Him, hopefully.

I miss you my love

Annalise,
Your Daddy and I have been trying our best to be strong and find the best way to cope with our grief.  Some days are much harder than others.  We miss you so much.  I know you are looking down on us and can see the tears and the sadness we are experiencing.  The both of us only want to hold you again.  I wish I knew how to make this pain go away because I hate spending my days so deeply sad and hurting.  I hate that my heart feels like it's imploding every time I see a baby or a pregnant woman.  There is a deep, empty hole in my soul which was supposed to be filled with loving you and enjoying you.  I hope you are happy my love.  I hope that you have 100's of friends and never spend a day alone.  I hope that Jesus is there to hold you and love you when you are missing your mommy and daddy.  Since I'm not there to take care of you, I can only hope all of your needs are being well met and that you daily know love like our love for you.  I am so so sorry that I cannot be there to take care of you and love on you.  I feel like nothing else in this world matters anymore because you are gone.  I feel like my purpose and my reason for living left this world when you did.  I would give anything to see you smile... to hear you laugh... to hear you say "mommy."  I can't help but feel sorry for myself that I cannot have that with you.

Please guide us my love.  Your daddy and I need you to watch us through every day.  We are having a tough time without you.  Please send some sunshine and good days our way. I love you with everything that I am.

A different reality

During these last couple of weeks of being back at work, I have had an overwhelming feeling that I am lost.  A feeling that I went "off-track" somewhere.  I was preparing and anticipating for the reality of motherhood and working part-time (or not at all).  Instead, I'm left with a new reality, a very different reality.  I'm back at work, and some moments feel like nothing ever changed - no pregnancy ever happened because I'm right back where I was - doing the same thing I was doing before.  But the fact of the matter is: everything has changed.  Everything inside of my heart and inside of my head is different.  Some days I wake up with agonizing emotional pain, wondering why any of this had to happen to us.  I wake up and I don't want to face the day.  I don't want to face this reality.  Some nights, I lay in bed with tears streaming down the sides of my face, wishing I could still be pregnant with my baby girl.  I have cried myself to sleep too many nights to count.  Sometimes the struggle seems pointless.  Then sometimes, when you add in the stresses of the world that is speeding along as we're trying to hold onto our sanity and put ourselves back together, it can all be too overwhelming.

There's a poem titled "Welcome to Holland" that a friend shared with me.  This poem so accurately sums up how I feel right now.  Sometimes I sit and cry saying, "I don't want to be in Holland.  I want to be in Italy".  It is unfair.  To any family that has had to go through the loss of a child - it is very unfair.  I don't have an answer as to why these things happen.  I spend probably the majority of my time crying out to God asking him to show me why.  Today I was just telling God that I don't know why my human mind is so desperately trying to connect the dots and gather an understanding of what has happened to us - but I NEED that.  I NEED to understand!  What I do know is that this situation has drawn me so much closer to God and has completely changed my thought patterns toward this earth and the time we spend here.  It has also changed my thoughts about heaven and hell and the reality of those places.  More than ever, I understand how temporary this life and this body is.  I understand that we do not live forever and something is going to happen when we die - we are going to go somewhere.  I know more than ever that I want to be in heaven because a piece of my heart is already there.



"Welcome To Holland"
by:  Emily Perl Kingsley

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy.  You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum.  The Michelangelo David.  The gondolas in Venice.  You may learn some handy phrases in Italian.  It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives.  You pack your bags and off you go.  Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy!  I'm supposed to be in Italy.  All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan.  They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease.  It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language.  And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It’s just a different place.  It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy.  But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips.  Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there.  And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever  go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.