Broken

****Seriously, what is up with these hormones.  3 posts in a week?  So much of my creative juices have been wrapped up in life, I guess they are starting to ooze out again.****

"Maybe you and I were never meant to be complete 

Could we just be broken together?

If you can bring your shattered dreams and I'll bring mine 

Could healing still be spoken and save us 

The only way we will last forever is broken together." - Casting Crowns

Yesterday, I heard this song on the radio.  Now, I've heard it before, but never had I had the opportunity to really *listen* to it.  Yesterday was a rare occurrence where I was in the car completely alone.  Seriously, never happens.

Anyway, I was listening to the lyrics and was struck.  Not about how the song was actually talking about marriage.  Which I did realize that.  But it struck me more about my relationship with God right now.

And it got me asking, why do we spend so much time pretending we are NOT broken.  Broken in all of our relationships in some way.  No one and no relationship is perfect.

Not even those with a strong faith and relationship with God.

We are ALL broken together.

So I'll start.  How am I broken?  Well, the current thought that prompted me to look into this song and this blog was my current "broken" relationship with God.  Not necessarily broken in the terms of turned around and walked away as I am still trying to walk that path and do the work necessary to repair it.  As I know the brokenness is on my end, not His.  But broken in the sense of I am no longer able to trust God to have everything under control.

There.  I said it.

Ever since I started on this journey of prematurity, 5.5 years ago.  Truthfully, a lot of good came out of that experience and I recognize that.  However, I will have to admit that I am not OK with that.  I don't know that I will ever be OK with that.  The ONLY ending to this current pregnancy that I will be OK with is one that ends full term and with a healthy baby and mom.  I can't be OK with God's "under control."

Do good things come out of these things?  Certainly.  Can God speak and be heard through these things?  Absolutely.

But is sitting by your child's bedside and watching them struggle and suffer a justifiable means to those ends?   Watching a loved one with tubes and wires coming from all sorts of unmentionable areas, struggling for breath or to beat an illness?  Burying your child before they even had a chance to live?  Really, burying your child at all.  Are any of these a justifiable means to an end?

No.  I honestly can not say I will ever say that it is.

Not that I expect life to always be roses and rainbows.  Not that I don't recognize that He walks through it with me and puts the people in my life to help me through the valley's.  I do.  I just can't say that I can walk through life, currently, believing that I can trust Him to bring about MY ok.

Maybe it's an unrealistic expectation of mine.  I don't know.  But that's my broken.  And maybe that's ok.  And maybe we are just meant to be "broken together."

What's yours?

She never ceases...

To amaze me.

Yesterday, as I was preparing my p17 shot, (suck it, prematurity.  You will not get this one too) Elisa begins asking me all about it.  And what it's for.  The conversation goes something like this?

E: "What's that, mommy?"
Me: "It's a shot of some medicine mommy needs to take."
E: "Why do you need that, mommy?"
Me: "Well, it's to help the baby stay in mommy's tummy longer."
E thinks about that for a second: "Mom, you forgot to take that when I was in your tummy, didn't you?"

Can we say ouch?!  Preemie mom guilt 101 and my own preemie child is now laying it on me lol.

I tried to explain to her how we just didn't know I needed it when she was in my tummy.  That not every mom needs it, sometimes babies stay in their mommy's tummy until it's time to come out.  But she persisted.  "Why didn't you make the doctors give it to you?  Did you tell them you needed it?"

Can we say stubborn?

Maybe it's just maternal pride, but I can't believe how she made that connection and just this young age of 5.  But, then again, she always was a bit more "mature" than her age.  Even in the NICU.  They couldn't seem to believe how she was doing the things she was doing at her gestational age.  No vent at 29 weeks, breathing on her own.  Asking for bottles at 33 weeks gestation.  Not supposed to do that until 34.  Released at less than 36 gestation, not supposed to do that until 40.  Or more, usually.

Tenacious.

So maybe I shouldn't really be surprised that she could make that connection.  She knows her story.  I hope she wants to share her story when she's older.  Because her story is as amazing as she is.

Anxiety

"A feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, 

typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome."

Today, as I sat in church, I found myself suddenly overwhelmed with images.  Images of babies of a much earlier gestation than Elisa.  Images of sudden, unexpected deliveries coming out of left field.

I have no idea why.  There was no trigger in anything that was being discussed.  The subject matter was far removed from anything even related.  But all I know is I wanted to just curl up and cry my eyes out and beg and plead as I can NOT do another NICU stay.

I've spent most of this pregnancy pretty much removed, emotionally.  I was surprised when the test came up positive, testing on a whim because I was one day late.  Which, for me, means nothing.  And then, at what I thought was almost 8 weeks pregnant, an ultrasound showed a baby only around 5.5 weeks, almost 2 weeks behind what dates should have been.  On top of that, progesterone was waaaaay to low.  At that point, I resigned myself to the inevitable and waited for the end to start.

Only, it didn't.  2 weeks later, ultrasound showed appropriate growth and progesterone quadrupled to almost 24.

And then...I had to tell.  And in all honesty, I was terrified.  What would people think?  I beat the odds once.  Could I really do it again?  Was I insane to think I could possibly do it again?  Just because Aidan made it to 37 weeks, doesn't mean this one will.  The last pregnancy is more telling of the outcome than the previous, but my risk is no less.  

Truth be told, most of those fears came because it was what I was thinking, not really what I thought anyone else was thinking.

So here I am, 19 weeks and 2 days pregnant and beginning to enter the other most terrifying time for me in a pregnancy.  That time where there will be no attempt to stop labor should it come on.  That time where I cross my fingers, toes, legs, arms that my body will behave.

And pray, beg, plead, whatever it takes to at least make 29 if things go wrong.  Where at least I know what to expect. 

I sure hope whoever is reading this knows, that I want nothing less than 37.  I am counting on nothing less.  But I also know, realistically, that may not happen and in no way am I setting myself up for that.  I am putting my head up high, my shoulders back, believing I will make that 37.  But preparing myself for a curve ball.  I can't bury my head in the sand.

But, the irony of this morning is when we got home.  After the baby was extremely quiet and still all day yesterday, it decided to have a party at quiet time.  I couldn't help but smile and think, this one, and God, was telling me it will all be ok.

I just hope God's "ok" and my "ok" line up this time.