I definitely feel so cared for: I´ve received cards, flowers, emails, Facebook messages, phone calls, home-cooked meals, personal visits. Thanks for checking in with us to see how we´re doing.
I haven´t written in my blog for about 7 days now. I just don´t know where to start, don´t know exactly what to share. I actually have a number of different experiences from the last 10 days scribbled out on to the backs of shopping receipts found in my wallet so that I might share them at a later date, if nothing else, so as not to forget them in the future. However, right now, demotivation is starting to hit. There´s a part of me that is grieving...and I need to grieve; but I don´t seem to have a lot of time to do it...and I´m also trying to find the balance so as not to fall into self-pity and the woe-is-me trap.
It´s a strange feeling. I get sad....and want to be sad for a while....then I remember all the things I remembered as we waited for Rebeca´s going-home day to arrive....all the truth that she is now well, that I will see her again one day, that the Lord is taking care of her. I also continue to think of all the moms around the world that have had to watch their children die from hunger, from war situations, from illnesses, etc. It´s hard to feel too sorry for myself then.
Yesterday I was quite sad (and still in a bit of physical pain). I told Ruben that my mind understands why Rebeca Grace did not survive. Trisomy 18 totally messed up her development and her body just wasn´t able to sustain her....but my heart, my heart does not understand. I really wish I could hold her, could know her more. *Sigh* These desires will have to wait for heaven....and it´s the delay, the missing,that makes me sad, as well as the suffering that she might have experienced....but she was just arriving at the "age" or gestation of beginning to feel pain (26 weeks). Maybe that´s why she didn´t live longer. Who knows?
At any rate, I want to try to find the balance of remembering and celebrating her and living differently because of her and not waivering to the one side of depression nor to the other side of just forgetting and moving on as if nothing happened. It´s sort of a weird situation.
Yesterday, I was also quite angry for no apparent reason. Poor Ruben. Pray that I would not take anything else out on him. It was just a moment....but I was angry at him for nothing that he did. I also raised my voice with Aaron when he threw his food on the floor. He started crying because I yelled at him and I started crying because I yelled at him and because my heart hurts and is just not sure how to feel.
I´ve been granted a short leave-of-absence for medical reasons (just time enough to heal up physcially). During this time, the state pays your income. Of course, since it´s just 10-day leave I don´t know how much it will help to have the state pay me :-) and since I´m mostly at home anyway, my life hasn´t changed much with medical leave or no medical leave. I will need to get back to my normal routine, although there is not a great desire to get back to normal life just yet.
During these days, I have been able to spend time with Ruben and Aaron. I´ve also been able to do a bit of reading.
In the last month I´ve received a couple of books: Silent Grief by Clara Hinton and A Shelter in the Time of Storm, Meditations on God and trouble by Paul David Tripp.
In addition, I just received a link from a friend about a lady named Nancy Guthrie who lost TWO of her children to a rare disease, each one died after living for about 6 months. Below is a video of a 1 1/2 hour interview with Guthrie on Suffering, Hope and the Centrality of Christ with Nancy Guthrie from John Piper´s website, Desiring God.
I´ve been listening to the interview as I´ve been writing. I´ve been able to relate to a lot of what she says. It´s been encouraging and confirming. Around the 30-minute mark, she makes a statement about faith that has really encouraged me regarding how we´ve been facing our journey with Rebeca:
"Faith is not always defined by the ability to work up fervor to believe God to do a miracle; but that faith is trusting God to do what is right....I think real faith is submitting to what God wants."
She also mentions how sorrow and joy can co-exist. She also mentions the reality that faith does not take away pain. She also talks about grief and how dealing with it has adapted over the years.
Based on the things I´ve read and heard about child loss and grieving, there are some dark days yet ahead. Deep grief often takes 6 months to a year to set in. Nice.
Tuesday at 7:30pm was the day that I had to run to the emergency room in search of a prescription for antibiotics for the urinary tract infection that I thought I had (which, in the end, I did not have.) I waited for 4 hours to see the doctor. While I waited, I read 3/4 of the book Silent Grief. It was helpful to prepare for the reality that maybe noone will be able to care quite as deeply as Ruben and I will in this situation because they might be limited in their ability to understand.
Then, around 11:30pm I was hit with the reality that I FORGOT about Rebeca´s ashes. I was so sad! When I crawled into bed around 2:30am, Ruben woke up and I told him, "We forgot..." He actually didn´t forget, but in the midst of the busyness, he decided that we could wait. Even her father remembered. How could I have forgotten her? Her mommy? The only remains of her? So, the reality of the 90 days is definitely necessary, definitely needed. We haven´t scheduled a day to pick up the ashes yet, let alone plan out any kind of memorial or celebration of life, but we will. Once we get to that day I´ll let you know.
Aaron´s waking up so I´ll stop for now. Feel free to keep checking in. If I don´t answer the phone right now, don´t worry. I´m not suicidal. I just don´t feel like talking right now. Thanks for keeping up with the process. I appreciate you.
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