once you have those babies, your heart is never yours again. It's a good thing, but a heart-wrenching thing at times. Every time you see a picture of a kid from a third world country, it's your own six-year old's face staring out of it. Any time you hear about abuse, or violence, or starvation, you think, only by the grace of god.
And when tragedy strikes close to you, for a moment or a few hours or days, your heart sometimes does not know the difference.
A good family friend of ours had such an episode this week. His younger brother's wife was expecting a baby, was 8 and 1/2 months along and suddenly realized she hadn't felt the baby move. Usually those situations have a happy ending... go to the hospital, get an ultrasound, baby is fine but taking it easy, "now you go home and take it easy and don't worry so much." Not this time. Baby didn't make it. She delivered him yesterday, and the friends came over to our house last night for games and distraction... but really, how can there be distraction? My heart is aching as if it were my own sister. And my emotions don't know the difference. I feel for this mother. And yet, I can't say I know how she's feeling, because I've never been through it, and in a few days I'll be able to seperate myself from it but she won't.
So I'll be saying some prayers. Any other prayers sent in the general direction of this family would doubtlessly be appreciated.
I have reasoned with myself and told myself that what I need to do is take a deep breath, and look at my children and just feel how grateful I am that they are here with me. While I feel badly for this mother, really, really feel for her as much as ever I could, I'm still a mother to three living, breathing, kids who need me to be here with them emotionally.
6 comments:
you still are so intense with the whole world, you can't seem to relax and let the world be....of course that isn't me either, i feel for the children of the world also and their mothers, oh and their fathers, oh and grandparents
Putz... you're right.
I don't know how to be any different, though.
I'll definitely send up a prayer for this family. That is tragic. Somehow we make it through these things, though, don't we?
That happened to my sister. It was so difficult for her. It was her first and they'd been trying for 6 years. It was awful to see my sister suffer and wonder why. As tragic as it was, it was an incredibly spiritual experience. That little baby was sent by Heavenly Father and will be forever hers. That was what sustained them.
that's a good, comforting way of thinking of it, Haley. I'm sure, eventually this family will find that peace too; or at least I hope they will.
The title of this post is perfect because you definitely have a mother's heart filled with compassion for children and for their mothers. One of my daughters is the mother of three beautiful children (I'm biased) and is expecting a fourth in February. Before these children were born, however, she had three miscarriages and a stillborn baby boy, Spencer, at 7 and 1/2 months. That was several years ago, and I still get a tightness in my chest and throat when I remember that painful time. What brings comfort to her is the knowledge that she'll see him again.
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