Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord! O Lord, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy!
Psalm 130: 1-2
I was thinking last night before I drifted off to sleep, how different things were this Thanksgiving when compared with the last, how different I am now. I hardly recognize the person I was time last year.
When I think back to events over a year ago, it's as if I am Scrooge in A Christmas Carol being transported to the past. Except in my story, it isn't the Ghost of Christmas Past doing the narration. It's God. And rather than Him showing me how wonderful things were then, I hear that still, small voice in my head telling me how much I took that life for granted, how I wasted and squandered time that He so graciously gave me. Not only did I waste it, I flew through it like those people who win a million dollars and within a week have nothing to show for it. I never slowed down long enough to really take in all God has blessed me with. I threw caution to the wind, as the saying goes. I lived for the day, for myself, not worrying about tomorrow. And yet I was constantly angry about everything. I was miserable. The reason? Because I had completely shut God out of my life. My hope was gone. Only I didn't realize how dim my faith really was until I became pregnant with Cain and the problems slowly started. Now, at this phase of the journey, God is showing me my future. He has given me the opportunity to change the once ominous outcome, and He did so through the tragedy of losing my son.
When I stop to really think about it, how many parents can say that their child or children saved their lives? Oh, I don't mean in a physical sense. I mean eternally. I can say proudly that mine did. Although the pain of this journey is the most difficult I have ever endured, if I had never known Cain and been forced to lose him, I feel with utmost certainty that I would have continued to allow my eternal life to waste away, to slowly flicker out. By saying that, I, in no way, mean that I wanted to lose my child. I grieve for him every day. I grieve to the very core of my being, from a place I can't even begin to describe. And I don't mean that I didn't care enough about Cooper to change. I think if you know me, it obvious that Cooper means more to me than anything in this world, that I love him with a love I never imagined I could possess. That love cannot be put into words because no words exist. They would need to be created, and even then, they would encounter the same standard of inadequacy in describing the weight of the true emotion.
However, my pregnancy with Coop was by the book, except for the nine months of all day sickness, that is. His birth and development have coincided with the all of the standards of other children his age, so I took his health for granted. I took the time I could be spending with him for granted. I took him for granted because I never really realized how soon it could all change. Now, because of his brother, I have an even deeper love and appreciation for both of my children that I never thought possible, and a desire to make certain that Coop is equipped with a knowledge of God and what a relationship with Him really means for his health, happiness, and most importantly, his future. So that he doesn't have to wait until tragedy strikes to turn to God for help, and most importantly, so that we can all be a family again someday in Heaven.
Yes, it would be so easy right now in this time of grief and distress, to focus of all we have lost, of all we were forced to let go, especially this week. This week signaled the two month anniversary of Cain's birth and the end of his earthly life. And there have been days this week that I wanted to curl up in a ball and hide myself from the rest of the world, to wallow in my pain because that pain was all that I have left of my son. And there have been days that I cried for hours at a time, cried with every part of my body, from the hair on head to the tips of my toes. Yet within those days, within this year's struggles, uncertainties, trials and grief, God has shown me that there is still so much we still have so much to be thankful for.
I am so thankful that I have a wonderful husband and little boy at home whom I love more than I ever thought possible to love another human being. I am so thankful that God allowed me to be Cain's mother, that he allowed him to grow inside of me long enough that I could feel him move and see his face. I am thankful that He allowed Cain to hear my voice, to hear his dad's voice, to hear his brother's voice. I am so thankful for the nurses of Northside High Risk Perinatal who helped me make it through my 3 1/2 week hospital stay prior to Cain's birth. I am thankful for the specialists who did all they possibly could to save my son's life. I am thankful for all those people whom I know and don't know who have lifted us up in prayers over the course of pregnancy and our loss, those whose prayers have helped sustain me on the hardest days of my life.
But most importantly, I am thankful to God for His unfailing love because through that love, He gave His son so that mine might live forever, so that I might live forever, so we could all live forever, with Him. He gave me the certainty that I will see my son again. Yes, I think in times of tragedy, in times we lose those who are close to us, we must reflect on all we have to be thankful for. To look back at where we started, to see how far we have come. It's God's way of giving us hope, helping us make it through each day, and reminding us that He is the reason for everything good that happens to us, and that even in the bad times, we know He'll see us through and use it to bring us closer to Him, if we only let Him.
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