In Pursuit of the Large Family Dream...

I realized that I have not shared our life story as it pertains to pursuing the large family dream, so I thought I would use this post to do just that.  I am also linking up today with mothers who have lost children and babies both born and unborn.  So, I thought this would be a good time to share the joys and trials that we have faced in pursuit of the large family dream.

(That's me in the back loving on my little brother.  Yes, I realize I look like a boy here...haha.)

Since the earliest time that I can remember, I have wanted a large family.  I know that lots of little girls dream of having babies, but for me, it was much more.  I dreamed of having lots of children and having large family celebrations.  If you ask someone who knew me as a child, they will tell you that I have loved babies and children since I was one myself:)  It was my dream...and I believe a special calling that the Lord formed in my heart when I was a child.  As a child, it seemed simple.

But, as an adult, the road to that dream has been a rocky one.  I thought I would share here our experience because looking at the picture of six smiling children can be deceiving.  It would be easy to deduce that having children has been easy for us...but you would be wrong...to some degree anyway.

In 2000, we were surprised by our first pregnancy while Peter was in law school, but quickly became very excited.  After just a few weeks we lost that precious little one.  Anyone who has gone through a miscarriage can tell you, that it is a truly difficult thing.  You are in love with the baby as soon as you know that he/she is growing inside of you.  Then to loose that baby is painful.  In an instant, all of the dreams that you had for the future are changed.  I wondered if we would ever have children.  We decided to try for another baby.  Month by month, we were disappointed all over again as we waited and prayed that God would bless us with another baby.  Month by month, I tried to understand what really wasn't mine to understand.  Month by month, I learned to trust God more with my dreams and to pursue His plan for my life...not mine.  It really wasn't until I surrendered my plan and was willing to accept God's plan...even if it meant no children...that I began to live in peace and joy.  I'm not sure that I could have learned that lesson so deeply any other way.  Having to lay the dream, that was so deeply rooted in my heart, down on the altar as Jacob did his only son Issac was not easy.  But, it was in letting go, that freedom truly came.

Looking at my family today you might think that I didn't need to worry, but, back then I had no children and couldn't see what my loving Heavenly Father had planned for me.

It took a year to conceive again after that first miscarriage.  Nine months later we had our first baby, Nathan.

 
Knowing how long it had taken us to conceive, we decided to try again when Nathan was just nine months old.  The first month, we were pregnant again.  My heart rejoiced that I was being trusted with yet another little life...and Brennan joined his big (18 month old) brother in our little family.  Thirteen months later we were surprised by a third pregnancy and nine months later, Abby entered our family.  At this point I had three babies three and under and it was busy around our house.

 
We were pregnant again just twelve months later.  Excited about our growing family and preparing to move into a new house, we were shocked when a routine checkup showed no heart beat.  I was about 15 weeks along and we were heart broken at this second loss.  I can remember sitting in the office staring at the ultrasound screen willing with everything in me to see a little heart beating.  There was a perfect little baby...but no heartbeat.  This may have been the most difficult loss for me personally.  I had felt this baby move and seen the image on the ultrasound screen.  But, we would not know the joy of raising this little one.  Our children were still too young to really understand it all so there was little explanation needed.

We were soon blessed with another baby and Wesley joined our growing family.  Two years later, Seth was born and twenty one months later Ransom made his appearance.

 (Boy that Arizona sun is bright!)

We were excited by another pregnancy just 12 months after Ransom but, once again, we lost this precious little one at 8 weeks.  With this miscarriage, we had more explaining to do as the kids were old enough to ask questions.  There really are few answers other than to trust our loving heavenly Father and guard our hearts from resentment.  It was hard to watch the kids grieve but healing that we could talk together and praise God in the good times and in the midst of our grief. 

We would love to be entrusted with more children and are hopeful that once again, we will know the joy of bringing a new little life into our family.  But, we are also at peace knowing that we are resting in the arms of a loving Heavenly Father who knows what is best for our family.  We will never forget the three little ones who are not with us, but we are at peace.

And, we are blessed!

Life and Loss

Along this road of life on which we are traveling, there are always ups and downs.  Sometimes it seems like they come in multiples...both the ups and the downs.  Last week was one of those weeks were things compounded.

I haven't written on this blog for a while.  It seems that first trimester exhaustion and sickness can make you re-prioritize and this blog was one of the first things to go.  Yes, we found out that we were expecting our seventh baby.  But, only seven and a half weeks in to the pregnancy, we miscarried.  The miscarriage came just a short time after loosing Peter's Grammie and kept us from being able to travel and be with family to celebrate Grammie's life.

If you have ever suffered a miscarriage, then you know just how deep the loss goes.  It is the loss of that precious child and also all that you began to dream about the coming changes to your family.  While grieving the loss, it is the desire of our family to trust our loving Father who was not surprised by this loss as we were.  He has the perfect plan for us and knows how it all will end.  Not only has He read the last chapter...He wrote the last chapter.  Each event in our lives is a part of shaping us into who we will become.  Now, we do have some choices in the process.  We cannot change life or loss, but we can choose how our hearts will respond.  Grief is a dangerous time for the heart.  It is easy for resentment to creep in disguised as grief...the proverbial wolf in sheep's clothing...and find a home.  Once at home in our hearts, resentment will most certainly grow like a vine that chokes out the beauty that was intended to be there.  It can become something that is altogether damaging to our lives...and the lives of our children.  Hebrews 12:15  "See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble..."  or in the NIV "Look after each other so that none of you fails to receive the grace of God. Watch out that no poisonous root of bitterness grows up to trouble you...".

So, as our family walks through this time of grief and loss, we are striving to guard our hearts to refuse entrance to any resentment.  As parents, we set the tone for the kids and they follow our example.  It is our desire to trust God with the details and have open hearts and arms to receive His perfect plan for our family.  With six children here with us and three in Heaven, I can say that we are truly blessed...and we are grateful even in the midst of loosing this precious little one. 

If you are walking through a miscarriage, just know that you are not alone.  There is no one right or wrong way to grieve the loss, but guarding hearts from the growing and overpowering vine of resentment is ever so important.

"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose."  Romans 8:28

Update:

I found this beautiful audio of Michelle Duggar reading a letter that she wrote to her precious baby Jubilee Shalom who is now in Heaven and wanted to link to it here.  I feel the same way about the three babies that we have in Heaven.

If you have lost a baby before meeting face to face, here is a great, informative website.

A friend of mine sent me a message the other day to express her concern and understanding of our loss.  Something that she wrote really spoke to me and I want to share it here.  She said that these little ones who live and then leave this Earth, never to be born, were created for the pleasure and enjoyment of our Heavenly Father alone.  He created them knowing that they would live for a very short time.  What a privilege that he chose me to carry three of these little ones!

"Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints"

Psalm 116:15

Tonight I was meditating on this verse and the implications that it has for death and how our Heavenly Father views dying. As I look back over this last season of life, I see the ways that death has touched our lives.

Death has reared it's ugly head more than once in my circle of friends and loved ones recently. We said goodbye to Chris Klicka and Tom Flavin, both amazing husbands, homeschool fathers, and friends and mentors to many (many more than they knew) when illness ended their lives. Then we said goodbye to Darly Martin, (http://heartfireintl.org/2011/09/daryl-video/) also a husband and father who was serving on the mission field in Malawi with his family when a tragic accident occurred.

Death has made his way into my homeschool curriculum and thus discussions with my children as we read Patricia St. John's Tanglewood's Secret. (Her books explain amazing scriptural truths in simple easy to understand ways right through the story. I highly recommend reading them with your family, by the way! Here is a link http://www.kingsleypress.com/patricia-st-john.html)

Death has even made his way into the John Piper audios that Peter and I have been listening to over time. (http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/conference-messages/victor-watters-converses-with-death)

Ugly. This was how I had always looked at death. I had seen him before and he was ugly, scary, and intimidating. During my teen years, I lost three great-grandparents and three grandparents along with several close family friends. I also lost a friend that had been an elementary school mate of mine in a tragic car accident at the age of 15.

Peter, too had experienced death in his childhood with the loss of his big sister, Christy, whom he admired, looked up to, and loved. The playmate and friend of his preschool years who left this world at such a young age. (We gave her name to our only daughter, Abigail Christine).

Then just a few years ago, we relived that pain when we experienced two different miscarriages, lost my precious niece, Olivia at just a few days old, her little brother Ryan before he was born, and my cousin, Danny.

Over the years, I have not been able to see much but the pain of these losses. Knowing and believing with all of my heart that God was (and still is!) in control and that He had (and has) the master plan, I trusted but still had a negative view of death.

Ugly was the only word that I had to describe death. I...well...I hated him! He had caused much pain. And yet, as I look at what scripture has to say about death...it is quite different. “Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints.” Psalm 116:15. Precious...how could death be precious? Here I was confronted with a serious conflict between what I thought to be right and what scripture was plainly stating. Precious was not a word that I would have ever used to describe the death of a saint.

As I pondered this thought and meditated on what it means to be “His saint”, the Lord really changed my view of death.

As a mom, I know what it means to have someone “belong” to you...in a since. My children are...well... mine! I love every one of them with a love that cannot be explained. I remember the anticipation that Peter and I felt as we prepared for each one of those precious little lives. We knew about when they were coming and we gathered things together, communicated with friends and family about their arrival, and anxiously awaited the day that we could hold them in our arms. Finally, the day came. As they left everything that they had ever known, we rejoiced in their arrival. We gathered each one in our arms as they were born and then took them home. And, yes, it was precious!

So, this is the mental picture that the Lord gave me as I was dwelling on what it is like when one of “His saints” dies. It is more of a birth really, than a death. Our Heavenly Father is waiting for that day when He will call home His child. He prepares and waits for that perfect moment...and then finally, they are brought home. One at a time He welcomes them into His arms. At last He has His child and it is precious! “Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints.” Precious. Precious. I read that over and over and it means more to me each time. Precious. It truly is precious.

Now with an incredibly different view of death than I have ever had before, I can honestly rejoice as loved ones leave this earth...everything that they have ever known...and our Heavenly Father holds them in His arms and carries them home. Rejoice. Celebrate. It is precious!

“Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting?” I Corinthians 15:54b-55a

Now, for the first time in my 36 years, I can say this verse with confidence. 

Thank you Lord for changing my earthly view of this eternal celebration.