Even So, It Is Well With My Soul

Our Little Miracles!

Oliver, 5/5/12

Silas, 9/27/09

This is not a post I particularly want to write.  This post will probably not be too witty, or include any funny anecdotes at all, actually.  But it's something God has been putting on my heart lately and though I've been fighting it for several weeks, I guess I'll just go ahead and obey (things always go better when you listen to Him.  If you're wondering.)

If you didn't know, I actually have three children-- Silas and Oliver, here with us on earth, and our first baby, who is in heaven.  I found out I was pregnant in early October 2008, after trying for one month.  We were shocked and surprised and more than a little scared.  I remember the day I found out we went to an ISU football game (those were the "before kids" days when we had money, thus season tickets) and I just felt so... weird the whole day.  I couldn't wrap my brain around it, I didn't really want to talk or think about it-- I was excited but right from the get go, I was absolutely terrified and had a feeling that something was wrong.

As the weeks went on, I told only a few friends about the baby and continued on with life.  I continued to have a nagging feeling that things weren't right, but I tried to push that aside and think about having a baby in early June.  When I was about 8 weeks pregnant I started to have a pulsing pain on my left side.  It wasn't too bad at first-- for several days I just felt uncomfortable.  As time went on, however, it got worse.  I called my doctor and spoke with a nurse, and tried to explain that I was having periods of intense pain in one localized area.  I said, literally, "I really think there is something wrong-- could I please come in for an ultrasound?" The nurse dismissed me as a hypochondriac first-time mom, and told me to take a laxative.  (No joke, that's what she said.)  I hung up the phone feeling like maybe I *was* crazy-- after all, I'd never been pregnant before, what did I know? I wasn't having any bleeding, so I thought maybe she was right.

I woke up the next morning and the pain was still present.  I actually have a pretty high pain tolerance, so I ignored it and went on my usual 5 mile run before I left for work, where I was scheduled to teach in a local sixth grade classroom.  I remember during my run that every time my foot hit the ground, my left side ached and pulsed-- it felt hot to the touch, and was a little swollen.  Still, I finished my run and got ready for work.  As the morning went on the pain got worse and worse-- towards the end of the class I had to pull a stool over to myself and sit while I talked to the kids, which is something I never do-- I like to walk around and interact when I'm teaching.  When the class was over, I gathered my things and started towards my car.

Between the office where I signed out and the parking lot, the pain became so intense that I had to walk bent over, and I was having trouble breathing.  I got in my car and started to drive to Cedar Rapids, and I called my friend Amy to let her know I was in trouble.  The ironic thing is Amy was pregnant too-- due just a few days before me.  She had been there when I called my doctor about the pain, and she knew I didn't feel right about the pregnancy.  Amy started to cry and offered to come and get me.  I told Amy I would have my husband pick me up, and just to pray for me.  I then called Jamie, and told him something was very, very wrong, and he needed to come take me to the ER.  By this time I had pulled over and parked in the Touch of Class parking lot because I couldn't drive anymore.  I then called my doctor and told the nurse that I was having excruciating pain and I didn't know what to do.... and she proceeded to put me on hold for seven minutes.  It would have been longer, but I hung up and called back again.  This time, I got another nurse who told me I needed to go to the ER right away.  Jamie pulled up and lifted me into the truck, and we sped off to Mercy, where I was admitted right away and had an ultrasound within the hour.  The admitting doctor mentioned the possibility of an ectopic pregnancy.  I knew, instantly, that that was what was happening to me.

Sure enough, the ultrasound confirmed that the baby had implanted in my left fallopian tube, which had then burst.  I was bleeding internally to a great degree.  Jamie called my parents who came as soon as they could.  I was an emotional mess, crying because my baby had died and why had this happened? I didn't have any risk factors for ectopic pregnancy, it didn't make any sense to me.  I was rushed into surgery and the burst tube and my baby, no longer living, was removed.

Needless to say, I was devastated, and remained so for several months.  Yet the point of this story is not my sadness or anger or "why me?" attitude, though I did go through all these emotions for quite some time.  The point of this story is that God is good, and sovereign, and works all things together for good for those who love him.  What, you may ask, good can come from a baby dying and my fertility reduced by over 50%? What good can come from grief so deep I didn't know if I would ever find my way back out? Isaiah 55:8-9 tells us,
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, says the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Several things have come to my attention recently.  My doula recently posted this article that hit home for me. I spent so much time angry with my former OBGYN and his staff that they refused to see me when I knew something was wrong.  Yet what if they had? I would have found out that yes, my pregnancy was a TRUE ectopic pregnancy (unlike some in the article) and I would have been pressured to have an abortion.  I thank God for protecting me from this decision.  Yes, I do believe it is better to have lost a tube than to have killed my baby.  Yes, my baby died anyway, but it was an act of God for a purpose.  I believe the purpose of my baby dying in the manner she did (in my heart I know she was a girl) was threefold.

One: My husband's mother died shortly after our baby.  It had been an absolute dream of hers to be a grandmother.  She could talk of almost nothing but us having a baby! When we told her, just days before she passed, about the baby in heaven, her eyes lit up and she said, "I get to be a grandma in heaven!" She was anxious for her pain to end (she had had a stroke and was now dying from cancer), and to be in heaven with Jesus, but the knowledge of a grandchild in heaven waiting for her, I believe, gave her a lot of peace in the very end.

Two: The circumstances of Oliver's conception and birth.  I now only have one fallopian tube (the right).  When I became pregnant with Oliver, we had an early ultrasound to establish due date (I have a very irregular cycle so I didn't really know when I'd ovulated).  The ultrasound tech was astonished to see that Oliver had in fact come from the left ovary.  By the grace of God, the egg that would be come little Oliver traveled alllll the way over to my right fallopian tube to become fertilized.  The tech told us she had read about such phenomenon, but had never seen it, nor known anyone who had seen it, in 15 years of doing ultrasounds. I believe that this happened to testify, tangibly, to the grace and power of God.  Oliver really and truly is a miracle.

Three: It changed my heart.  When my baby died, I got my first taste of what it actually means to yearn for heaven.  No, I didn't ever contemplate suicide or anything like that, but the pain I felt was actually a tool God used to shape and mold me into a more compassionate, caring person.  It also allowed me to truly understand, for the first time, that this world is not my home.  And to be very, very thankful for that.

To close this book (how do I always seem to write SO MUCH??? Sorry about that!), I hope this story encourages someone to know and truly believe that God's power and glory and knowledge are so much higher than our little brains can understand.  When I am in my darkest moments of grief for whatever reason, because of the experience of our first child, I now have peace and a deep understanding that God is in control, even if I don't like the circumstances or I can't quite see the good in the outcome yet.  I think this is best summed up by the words to one of my favorite hymns:

1. When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
   When sorrows like sea billows roll;
   Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
   It is well, it is well, with my soul.
   • Refrain:
     It is well, with my soul,
     It is well, it is well, with my soul.
2. Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
   Let this blest assurance control,
   That Christ has regarded my helpless estate,
   And hath shed His own blood for my soul.
3. My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
   My sin, not in part but the whole,
   Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more,
   Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!
4. For me, be it Christ, be it Christ hence to live:
   If Jordan above me shall roll,
   No pang shall be mine, for in death as in life
   Thou wilt whisper Thy peace to my soul.
5. But, Lord, ’tis for Thee, for Thy coming we wait,
   The sky, not the grave, is our goal;
   Oh, trump of the angel! Oh, voice of the Lord!
   Blessed hope, blessed rest of my soul!
6. And Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight,
   The clouds be rolled back as a scroll;
   The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend,
   Even so, it is well with my soul.