The Crossing - Part 2 of 3

For John.

The ultrasound technician did the run through, showed us your face, your shoulders, your fingers and feet.  You wiggled and squirmed and your father and I were filled with awe and pride as we stared at the monitor.  Without any prompting, the ultrasound technician got up and left and in her place came a doctor.  He repeated the process again, politely showing us your various features, and then he paused, looked at us, and said calmly and deliberately:

“The ventricles of the brain are enlarged.”

Of course, he said much more, but for me, all the other words seemed to just float around in the air, and only some of them came to land in my consciousness.  Words like “normal life”, “shunts to drain”, “surgery after birth”, "one in a thousand".  And then I stopped listening, and I just stared at your image, still on the monitor, still squirming and growing and full of so much life.

When we got home, your father tried to explain to me what the doctor had said.  Borderline bilateral ventriculomegaly.  It is a term that, to this day, I still cannot recall, and I must ask your father each time to tell me again.  From the moment I first heard it, I have blocked it from my mind.  Your father researched it, and when we discovered just how enormous the odds of you being diagnosed with this condition were, our hearts broke into pieces.  We were convinced that this didn’t just happen by chance; instead, we believed it was yet another way that God had decided to test us.  Never before had I felt such betrayal by the God whom I had only recently begun to trust again.  I felt like we’d just been subjected to one of the dirtiest tricks that providence could play on us.

But where do you turn in times like that if not back to God?  We knew that we must carry on, and that we would love you no matter what your future held, and we asked God to not forsake us in that moment of desolation.  We cried at night and each morning, we washed away our tears and faced our days.  We told no one of your diagnosis, for we knew that the weight that would be added from well-meaning yet careless comments would be more than we could handle.  Time would reveal all, we believed, and so we prayed for a miracle, and began our journey toward acceptance of God’s will for you and for us.

In was during the midst of this journey, only a few days after that devastating ultrasound, when your father found himself in the cathedral. It was the same church in which he’d frequently prayed for a child, and where he’d often gone to find peace during those many years that we waited for you.  As he fervently prayed that day, he looked up and noticed a bishop walking towards the sanctuary.  Your father felt moved to approach him and rushed toward the front of the church and caught the bishop’s attention.  And he poured out the whole story to this holy man, the story of our years of struggle to conceive, the loss of a previous child, and now the story of you and your miraculous conception, and our most recent tragedy of facing an uncertain future with you.  The bishop listened carefully and then he simply asked, “When can you come back here with your wife?  I want to pray with you both.”  

Two days later, we sat in a quiet room with the bishop, and we talked of our lives and our various journeys in faith.  He told us that he was going to pray for you specifically and also, that your father and I would be blessed with even more children.  He then stood, walked over to my side, and asked your father to do the same.  The bishop placed his hands upon my head while your father placed his on my shoulders, and as your father and I listened, the bishop prayed aloud using words that I did not understand.  Peace filled the room and your father, in particular, said that he had felt something come over him that he could not explain.   Unlike me, he was certain that something had changed.

We went home and for the first night since we’d learned of the ventriculomegaly, we slept soundly.  But little did we know that God would be granting us one more very powerful intercessor as we made our way on this journey.  It was three days after our prayerful meeting with the bishop that your great-grandmother died.  She had been our last living grandparent and she had been so excited to meet you.  When we had last seen her, only a few months before, she had appeared well, and she spoke excitedly about your pending arrival. She loved all her grandchildren and great-grandchildren so much, and we couldn’t wait to introduce you to her.   To learn of her unexpected death was yet another blow to us.  Why now?   And yet, somehow, I felt like I knew the answer to that.   “She wants to help us,” I told your father, “and now she can help us more than ever.” So, as we stood beside her casket and looked upon her one last time, I made one final request of her, “Please, ask Jesus to heal our son.”

The Crossing - Part 1 of 3

This is not a birth story; it is the story of our crossing from the island of infertility into the land of parenthood.  We waited for a long time to make this crossing and when it finally happened, it was far from what we'd always dreamed becoming parents would be like. I like to think that the years we struggled to have children prepared us for this crossing, but maybe not.  Maybe instead, those years and this crossing prepared us for what still lies ahead. Only God knows.

This story has a happy ending, and to this day, I am not sure why.  We didn't expect it, certainly did nothing to earn it, and even less to deserve it.  Why did everything work out the way we prayed for it to when, for so many, it does not?  I do not know. I don't think anyone really knows.  Those kinds of questions are the great mysteries of this life that we are not meant to solve.  All I know is that we were blessed, not favored by any means, but blessed.  We have been entrusted with much and now, much more will be expected of us (Luke 12:48).

It was during the infertility years and even more, during this crossing, that I asked so many, many times, "Why me?"  "Why us?"   It took years for me to understand that it was a pointless question, really, because there is no satisfactory answer.  I suppose if God gave us the answer to that one, we'd have no reason to long for our greatest crossing yet to come. and the only crossing that truly matters.

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For John.

It was December 9, 2009, and you were about to change everything.

Two weeks before that, a miracle had occurred, and you had entered our world. However, I was far from being ready to accept that you were real when I looked at that positive pregnancy test with your father on that Wednesday morning.  “This won’t end well,” was all I could think, and I gathered my lunch and headed to my office, where I was determined to bury any thought of you with my piles of paperwork and the distraction of our annual office Christmas party.

I wish I could say that there was rejoicing; I really do.  That was the way it was supposed to be, and the way your father and I had imagined it would be all those years ago.   Instead, now we guarded our hearts and prepared for the worst because, after almost nine years of trying, and after saying goodbye to the only baby we’d ever conceived four years earlier, we were convinced that we would never know the joy of having you in our lives.

The first few days after we discovered you existed were long and trying.  Your father and I felt the stress of waiting for blood work results and our mood was tense and anxious.  When the doctor called and said everything looked good so far, I felt relief, but not peace.  The next eight months, I knew, would be the longest of my life.  We called your grandparents soon after, and gave them our news, but in my diary, I wrote that their response was “anti-climatic” because they too, could no longer picture your father and me as the parents we longed to be.  The image of me as a mother holding her child in her arms had faded away over the years.

The next few weeks were exhausting in every way imaginable.  Every cramp in my abdomen convinced me that your time with me would be short.  Instead of giving me hope, the soreness from the weekly progesterone injections served only as a daily reminder of how much at-risk my pregnancy was.  The biggest thing that I felt grateful for at the time was morning sickness that was not too severe, thus allowing me to continue through my workdays with the same intensity and fervor that had been my antidote to all the depression and sadness I’d been fighting during the past several years.  On December 28, 2009, I saw you for the very first time, the flicker of a heartbeat, and I thanked the Holy Innocents for this gift on their feast day, and I prayed that you would not become one of them. 

The new year came and went and you grew inside me.  My doctor seemed surprised by how well you and I were doing, and after a few months, the progesterone injections were discontinued.  My pregnancy seemed to be progressing normally, but I still could not bring myself to believe that you would one day be real and sleeping in my arms.  Other than our immediate family, your father and I shared the news of your existence with no one and our family kept our secret.  We had all become accustomed to keeping our pain to ourselves. 

Eventually, I had to buy maternity clothes and could no longer hide you.  When our co-workers and friends discovered that I was expecting, there was astonishment.  Your father and I had fit their image of the “childless by choice” career-couple well.  As a 41-year old woman who had been married almost a decade, it had been assumed that children were not part of our future. To see my protruding belly now shattered every perception that others had of me, and I took a certain amount of pleasure in finally being shed of that image of me that reflected nothing of the person I was inside. 

The second trimester was a time of healing for me both physically and spiritually.  As the morning sickness subsided and eventually disappeared completely, I found myself relishing in a newfound energy.  Your father and I would take daily walks down our countryside lane each evening and talk about our future with you.  What would your name be?  Would you be a boy or a girl?  Would you be a red-head like your daddy was?  Spiritually, I was growing as well, and my prayers of petition that had been endless for years slowly became prayers of thanksgiving.  “This could really happen to us,” I thought.  “Why not?” 

In mid-April, we went in for our 20-week ultrasound.  We were excited because we had been told that this was the point at which we would learn if we had a son or a daughter.  We had decided that we wanted to know your gender as soon as possible. Because the fear of losing you was still great in our hearts, we wanted to know as much as we could about you for as long as you were ours.  When we walked out of that sonography room, we thanked God for giving us a son.  A son!  Even more, our sonographer had indicated we had nothing to fear, and we thanked God for a child who was growing and healthy. For once, we felt peace.

Another month passed.  Of my entire pregnancy, those four weeks turned out to be the best of all.  It was spring and everywhere around me, I saw life was bursting forth and I rejoiced in it. We planted our garden, took walks in the woods, and made plans for our future with you.  I finally felt confident enough to set up a baby registry, and your grandmother began planning a baby shower.  My blood work and regular checkups indicated that all was going well with you, and each day was better than the one before it.  I had never felt so incredibly blessed.

But then one day, your father called me while I was at work.  “They want us to have another ultrasound,” he said, “and this time, they want it done at the perinatal center.”  He went on to say that he had asked the doctor’s office why this was needed, and the nurse had only said that they wanted to keep a close eye on me because I was still considered high risk and that it was just a precaution.  “Plus, we get a 3-D image of our baby,” your father told me, which made me excited, and I naively looked forward to the day.  And so, two days later, we got another look at you, and our world turned upside down.

Almost Five

We have a birthday coming up next week.  Our eldest (by a whopping six

months and two weeks) will be turning five years old.  I still find myself staring at this little man, wondering if having him in my life is just a dream.  To say he is a miracle to us just doesn't seem adequate.  He is a daily reminder to me of God's mercy and compassion.

I don't know what the future holds for this little guy.  I pray for him and his brother daily, but I do not worry.  I know beyond any doubt that He belongs to God more than he belongs to me and that God holds his future.  And it was in thinking about that during the past few weeks that I felt inspired to finally write the story about the months that preceded his birth. Although it obviously has a happy ending, it is still a story filled with fear and pain and hope and faith, and it has taken me five years to face the emotions again and be ready to tell it.  In honor of his birthday, I will share it here this coming week.

In the meantime, here are a few wise words from an almost five-year-old.  We were killing time one rainy day last month and I had my laptop out and just started randomly asking John questions and jotting down his answers.  For posterity's sake, I decided to record them here.  The time just goes by way too fast and I will soon forget these moments.   

Oh...and don't let the second question fool you. His birthday really is next week. I asked him these questions on June 10 and he was hoping that by saying his birthday was in June, he'd maybe score a chocolate cake a month earlier. He's always thinking and usually a step ahead of me!

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What’s your name? John 

When were you born? June

Where were you born? Missouri

What’s your favorite food?  Candy!

What’s your favorite color? Blue

What do you love to do with Mommy? Sleep

What do you love to do with Daddy?  Play drums.

What do you love to do with Joah?  Hug him and throw him in the air.

What do you want to be when you are a grown up?  Old.

What do you love about your mommy?  Your eyes.

What do you love about your daddy?  His drums.

Do you like summer or winter better?  Summer!

What’s your favorite thing to do outside?  Swimming

What’s your favorite thing to do inside?  TV

What’s your favorite prayer?  Angel of God prayer.

What scares you most?  Lightning

What’s your favorite animal?  Zebras

Do you like Christmas or Easter better?  Easter because I get a lot of candy.

What makes you sad?  If Joah is crying and hurt. 

What makes you happy?  Going places.

What makes you angry?  Joah biting me.

What is something mommy always says to you?  Go poo poo.

How old are you?  Four.

How old is mommy?  I don’t know.  Twelve? Thirty?  Eighty?

What are you very good at?  Maybe helping Mommy.