Balance

Isn't life crazy?

 

The last two weeks have been the kind that open your eyes in so many ways. And as I sit here trying to type this, I find myself struggling to find the right way to express the myriad emotions and understandings that these weeks have brought.

 

In fact, I just deleted about three paragraphs. In trying to be careful with my words, I'm not entirely being honest. I don't mean to say that I was trying to lie with this post. Anyone who knows me knows that I am probably too honest when it comes to matters of my heart.

 

What I find myself doing, though, is not fully opening up and simply struggling to adequately describe the profound power of balance in life.

 

My friend and I have noted over the years that our work life balances with our personal lives. The happier we are in our personal lives the more difficult our work life seems to be, and vice versa. Where we seem to be now is on the cusp, waiting to see in what direction the scales tip.

 

Balance has also presented itself in the types of people around me right now. I have my core group of families and friends, of course. It's not about them that I am thinking right now. What is fascinating to me is the people on the periphery of my life and the roles that they seem to be taken. On the one hand, I have that acquaintance who every once in a while shows me what a true friend she can be. And I think I need to explore furthering that friendship. On the other hand, I have that person who I once viewed as a true friend...who isn't so much anymore. And I don't condemn that person; I just think he is so stressed and depressed that he isn't capable of seeing the consequences of his actions.

 

And if I were a medical anomaly, I would have a third hand on which I could count that crazy stalker...but that's another story...

 

I think the most profound sign of balance comes via family and the balance between life and death.

 

Of course, there is my own loss that I wrote about in my last post. And that loss is balanced by the perfect little boy that is now in my life.

 

But this week has provided another distinct example of the balance between life and death. A few days ago, my uncle lost his mother. Though her health had been in a steady decline, the loss of a parent is still profound. And my cousins lost their grandmother which is equally profound. The balance? My cousin and his wife welcomed their first child, a beautiful little girl, into the world.

 

On the cusp of grief, joy.

 

Balance. Finding it. Recognizing it. Accepting it.

 

That last is probably the hardest. Accepting the balances in life. Accepting that with the flow must come an ebb...

 

 

 

 

 



Seven Years

 

Seven years is a long time.

 

So much has happened in seven years, the chief amongst them being the birth of my rainbow child, Nicholas. He's five years old, a thriving kindergartner. He's bright and silly and inquisitive and creative. He's coming into his own in so many ways, and my life and heart revolve around him.

 

Still, these next several days take me back in time in a heartbeat. Though I have moved on and healed so much over the past seven years, I cannot help but to remember. To ache. To yearn. To wonder.

 

I do not regret the events of seven years ago. That is not to say that I am glad that it happened. That couldn't be further from the truth. But I think that I am a profoundly different mother because of my loss, and as someone who wholeheartedly believes that every event in our lives has a deep reason behind it, I understand the reasons that my first son, Gregory, was born with angel's wings.

 

Over the next few days, I will grieve anew. I will look at the date on the calendar, the time on the clock, and I will relive those moments of seven years ago. October 5th was the last day of hope for a different outcome; by the next day I was in the hospital awaiting the inevitable. At 9:00 a.m. on October 8th, my beloved husband and I were learning how to say the most difficult good-bye of our lives.

 

It changed who I am as a mother, as a wife. As a human being.

 

And though I wish it had never happened, still I am grateful. God showed me how strong I am. He showed me what an amazing and loving man I married. God showed me how amazingly blessed I am through the outpouring of love from family and friends and colleagues, even complete strangers (some of whom became dear friends). He gave me the opportunity and voice to share my story, one that is so often taboo and unspoken, so that I could help others to understand their own grief and to find their own paths toward healing.

 

God blessed me with my very own rainbow of hope in the birth of a living son in 2008. He led me to understand that motherhood is more than just giving birth. It is opening your heart to love and care about someone more than yourself. I am a very different mother now than I would have been seven years ago, I think. I don't take my role as a mother for granted. I know how profoundly blessed I am.

 

I am blessed beyond my capacity for words.

 

I will grieve anew over the next few days. I will remember and mourn. I will embrace my husband and share his tears. I will visit the rose garden and pray for peace.

 

But I will also hold Nicholas's hand. I will watch him run through the garden with delight and joy and life.

 

I will live in the joy of each precious moment with him and with those I love.