This Shore, Part II

...So its with wet hair and tired lungs that I write today, from the deep, where I remember and feel and where I can share the story of how the day she was born was the same day she left and of how He is only ever good.  

Continued from This Shore, Part 1

*****

My water broke on a Tuesday afternoon, just two days after Jubilee and I were baptized.  Even then, His timing wasn’t lost on me.  Just enough time to surrender, to submit, to trust, to know Him just that much more before she left.  Only me and my little ones in the house that afternoon, my trembling fingers striking wrong key after wrong key trying to call her daddy and her grandmother- to tell them it was time.  

Months before we had been told we shouldn't expect even minutes with her- that her body was too small, her growth too slow.  It was then that we had been given the option to terminate the pregnancy,  and we knew immediately that we wanted to be her parents for as long as we could- that we wanted to see what the Author of life had in store for our sweet girl, and we cherished every moment of the time we had been given.  We loved her so much and experienced so much joy in the space between then and this moment...and now the time had come.

We had waited and we had wondered and we had prayed.  We didn’t know how much time we’d have with her or what it would be like for her. I had begged Him not to let her suffer, but we knew it was a good possibility.  We had prayed for time with her, but we knew the chances were slim.  We had hoped for a miracle, and we knew it was possible. We had begged and prayed and hoped and it was time.

“I’m so afraid," I got out just before getting off the phone with a friend who was suppose to come by that evening with a meal.  And I was.  I was so, so afraid because it was time, and there was so much we didn’t know, and could it be that the waiting had been so long but that now it had all come so soon?

They came quickly, her daddy and her grandmother, and the breathing was labored when we entered the hospital- my fear escaping in long, short, long, short breaths as my heart wondered what was to come?

My dad had come straight from work and beat us to the ER.  He stood at the counter, asking about me and I tapped him on the arm from the wheelchair.  There was an urgency in each of us- today was the day. They led us upstairs, a rag tag gang consisting of a laboring mother, an anticipating daddy and a just-from-work Grandad.  I’m convinced the other two were as afraid as I was then, and I knew there was a network of family and friends, all wondering the same.  All this waiting and wondering and now its time and what is He going to do? 

They wheeled me into a room where they hooked me up to the ultrasound machine, and my husband and I saw Jubilee's little heartbeat just swooshing away as always, and they confirmed that I was in labor.  My dad waited outside our room, and that’s when he saw her- in the hallway, and asked her to be my nurse.  My dad had spoken at a ministry retreat that weekend, just two days before.  He had told them about Jubilee’s story, about how God was teaching us to shout for joy and give thanks in all things- about how He is always good, even in this.  He had shown them her picture and shared her story and when he was done, they knew her, and to know her is to know Him because her story is His story. 

And he saw her, a woman who had been at the retreat, who had heard Jubilee’s story, standing there in the hallway in her nursing scrubs.  Trembling in the room down the hall, I didn’t know that He was already at work. He always is. 

The doctors confirmed we would be having our baby soon, and they left the room.  My head and heart reeling, wrapped up in crisp white hospital blankets, my hands still trembling with the questions, desperately clutching her daddy’s hand,  my dad walked into the room with her.  He told me about how she had been there just days ago- that she knew our girl and that she was going to be my nurse.  He introduced her to me, and I looked into her eyes, and I don't know how I didn't just fall apart right there.  He was already at work. Relief washed over me and a peace entered my heart that didn’t leave for hours and hours.  Tears stung behind my eyes as the fear slipped away and my heart heard what He was saying, I’m here.  I’m always here, and I’m only good. This is the day I have made, Beloved, rejoice and be glad in it.

What a gift God gave me in giving me permission not to fear.  In giving me permission to trust Him.  There’s no way to describe the long moments that followed other than to say He was there, in every little detail, in every little way.

My mom soon caught up to us, leaving Jubilee’s sweet brother with dear friends at home to rest and play Tuesday evening and into Wednesday. They moved us to another delivery room, a big one, and gave us the room next door too- a generous gift of a private place for family and friends to stay and wait. Wednesday came, and with it my sister and brother in law, my husbands’ parents, and my closest girlfriends.  The pains were dull but intense, the progress slow, and then there was an epidural because I didn’t want the increasing pain to distract me from what was coming- I wanted to be able to focus on the few moments I had with her- not the pain of bringing her here.  

Those hours of waiting and wondering were filled with prayers and peace.  My heart was full knowing I would get to hold her.  I didn’t know or mind how long- I just wanted to meet my girl.  The joy of finally getting to hold her in my arms overshadowed any fear.  In fact, I didn’t think about any of the what-if’s at all- and there could have been so very, very many.  Had we not met with children’s hospice?  With the NICU doctors?  With the social workers?  All in preparation for the vast array of what-ifs?  And now, here we were, at the dawn of her birthday, and not a single question came to my mind.  I just wanted to see her, hold her, love her on the outside.  

He was in all the waiting and the wondering.  Every moment it seemed, was filled with a gift wrapped by the very hands of God:  

For months I hadn’t been able to feel her move because she was so tiny, and in those hours before her birth, she moved freely, and I felt her almost constantly- her daddy too.  We could see her rolling under my hospital gown, and for the first time in seven months, we saw and felt her movement- her life- such a gift.  There aren't words to describe the joy in feeling my daughter moving inside after months of longing to know her better and not being able to feel but the tiniest flutter.  She was whirling and twirling that day, and I like to think its because she knew today was the day, and sister knew where she was going.  Is there anything to do but dance when you know you are about to stand in the presence of the King? Such a gracious gift feeling our precious daughter dance so very much that day.

Then there was the anesthesiologist who administered my epidural in the early morning hours.  They had told me there would be a long wait, that there was only one doctor, that there was a possibility he wouldn’t make it in time.  Then the nurse came in and said another doctor had arrived and I would be his first patient.  There were at least five women ahead of me in line, and there he was, standing at my door ready to ease the pain so I could be fully there for her birthday.  And he knew too. He knew our Jubilee because he, like my sweet nurse, had been at the retreat and heard my dad share her story. I can’t describe the praise that filled my heart in witnessing the details of God’s plan unfold.  One of my biggest hesitations going into the hospital was that no one there would know- they wouldn’t know her, they wouldn’t understand how much she had taught us- what a gift this darling girl was- what a day this birth day was- and right there, in the midst of my pain and my doubts, the Author of the story places another one who knows.  Grace upon grace.

There were the angels at the door.  The two I saw standing there, when I glanced over to my left as the days’ events swirled around me.  Taller than the door itself, standing on either side of the frame, all light and radiance with wings long and lovely and something like a staff each in hand, they stood.  And I knew.  I knew we were safe- I knew He had hedged us in from the hurt and the broken and the darkness. I knew He had gifted us those moments to spend with her and to revel in His mercies and His goodness and His grace.  To marvel at the gift of her and the greater gift of Him, all without distractions and fears and any kind of anything that would take away from those moments.  The God of angel armies handing us another helping of undeserved grace.  

He is so good.

I got tired, fell asleep to the sound of my family and friends’ voices around me as we waited, the light of the morning streaming in through the windows.  And when I woke up, the pain was instantly more intense, and with a word to the nurse, there was a rush from the doctors, and a swift gathering of my husband, my mom, my sister, and a friend, and she was here.  

My heart was as full as it was the day her brother came into the world.  She was beautiful, and I spoke over her as they placed her immediately on my chest.  Through a torrent of desperate and happy tears, a flood of emotion, I spoke to her.  I told her to go with Him.  I told her she could because He was so good and He loves her so much, and so do we, precious girl.  I spoke His name and I held her to my chest and I have never loved someone so little so much, and I have was so grateful to be her momma in those moments.  So grateful to see her little lips parted, her little button nose.  Could it be, Lord, that she is mine?  Lord, take her and hold her and love her and thank you thank you thank you for letting me do the same right now. 

The gift of now had never been more precious to me than in those moments holding her.  Tears filled her daddy’s eyes, and I don’t remember looking at anyone else but her and him and once to my nurse to ask if she was gone, and she placed the stethoscope on our daughter's little chest, and nodded that yes, yes, she was, and we had known.  But it wasn’t all sorrow because she was here- we were holding her, and we were gazing at her and drinking every last bit of her in while we could.  And He must have taken her just as her little self came into this world because, even through the epidural, I had felt the joy of her tiny movements right up until that moment when her little frame arrived. Graces of graces- born right into Heaven, that precious gift of a baby girl. No wonder she had been dancing!  

Her daddy took her then, wrapped her in a blanket and walked with the nurse to the warmer where they gently bathed her tiny frame.  I couldn't take my eyes off of her.  Her little arms and legs so small, just like they had said after looking at her ultrasound.  Her wispy blond hair, so pretty and curving over the softest of foreheads.  She was so tiny, so fragile. And those little lips, parted just so, making her look so much like her big brother when he slept.  I cherished the resemblance between the two and thanked the Lord for such a darling little girl. They weighed and measured her- one pound, ten ounces and ten inches long, and every bit a gift from the Father of Lights.  

Her daddy brought her back to me, and I held her, doted over her, drank her in as he read her Psalm over her. 

The words of Psalm 100 poured into the room, and my heart shouted for joy as we entered His gates with thanksgiving and praise because no matter how much we would miss her or how much the breaking would hurt, to think of where she was then while I held her small frame and loved the portion of her that was still there- to think of where she was- really was- of the company she was in, of the things she was seeing and hearing and breathing, to think of where she was, was the greatest gift of them all.  That God loved us so much that He sent Jesus to rescue us- that He, through His abundant grace, would give her lifeless body life in His presence and glory and one day welcome us into the same- the joy that comes with that grace and truth fills my heart even now with unending praise.  

He is only, ever always good.

Even in this. 

Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.

Worship the LORD with gladness;

come before him with joyful songs.

Know that the LORD is God.

It is he who made us, and we are his;

we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving

and his courts with praise;

give thanks to him and praise his name.

For the LORD is good and his love endures forever;

his faithfulness continues through all generations.

Psalm 100

*To be concluded this week in Part III

**all images created by TrudyHoltzPhotography