An Unexpected, Full Quiver – Katie’s Story

I’ve always wanted a big family. Okay, well, originally I thought that meant four kids. When I was in high school I felt God distinctly tell me that He would call me to adopt someday. Those feelings were solidified when I met my husband, Tim, and he felt the same way too. After we married, we said that we would have four or five kids, but joked that we would have ten or twelve. Our first, a daughter, was born in 2007 and I just loved being pregnant. I knew then that I could happily carry and birth four or five more, if God allowed. We named her Selah, which means to “pause” or “meditate,” and I adored being able to do just that as a mother to my little girl.

What I never anticipated was having trouble conceiving or sustaining pregnancies after Selah. We began trying for our second little angel the year after she was born, but instead, had three back-to-back miscarriages over the next year. By the time Selah was three years-old and all the rest of my mommy friends were pregnant with or already having their second and third babies, I began to despair, thinking that our hopes and dreams of having a large family were quickly dwindling.

We tried fertility treatments next and it was at this time that Tim and I also began to seriously consider adoption. We researched the costs, different agencies and countries to adopt from. I became so certain that adoption would probably be where the rest of our children would come from that I was surprised when we found out at the end of 2009 that the fertility treatments had worked and we were expecting a healthy baby boy. Elijah, meaning “The Lord is the one, true God,” joined our family in May of 2010 and I was overjoyed to have another sweet little one in my arms.

After Elijah was born, we looked into adoption again, but decided that we needed to wait for more consistent finances. I took the next year to enjoy motherhood and it wasn’t until the middle of 2011 that we felt confident in beginning the process of adoption when Tim’s job was more secure. We had just signed the official adoption paperwork, requesting to adopt a sibling group from Ethiopia, when we were surprised to find out we were expecting, AGAIN, this time without the help of fertility treatments! In April of 2012, we welcomed Isaac, which means “laughter” because of the huge surprise he gave us.

We knew we still wanted those two African children, though, whoever they would be, and we eagerly looked forward to word from our agency and dreamed of whom they would match us with. Selah hoped for a younger sister to play with and Tim and I tossed around what Old Testament names we would use once we got the news. But time seemed to drag on and with each passing week without word from our agency, we grew anxious. Finally, in January of 2013, just nine months after our surprise Isaac was born, we were matched with twin boys only five months younger than him. They were born in Harar, Ethiopia the previous September and then moved to an orphanage in Addis, Ethiopia.

In April, we flew to Addis and spent ten days meeting and holding our sweet, new additions to the family, touring the country and even taking a bus to visit Harar, 500 kilometers away from the boys’ new orphanage. By July, at ten months old, they were legally ours and we flew back to Addis and brought home Moses and Zechariah, which mean “drawn out” and “God has remembered.”

For years, we had prepared ourselves from agency classes, social worker visits and numerous books and resources that the biggest struggle of international adoption would be teaching these children how to bond with us as parents and siblings. However, their connection with all of us was as instant as if I had carried and born them myself.  Instead, it seemed to us that the biggest adjustment to adopting twins less than one years-old was that because Isaac was only five months older, we essentially have triplets. And since the twins were adjusting to a new home, new parents and a new routine than they were used to in their orphanage, it was much like having newborns again. They were up every three hours at night, often on opposite schedules. And once they started crawling and walking, along with Isaac, life only got crazier! Thankfully, our older two, Selah and Elijah, now 7 and 4 have been wonderful, big helpers and we have had many, many dear friends and family step in to help as well.

But, God wasn’t done with our family yet, nor His miraculous, surprising ways. Just when I was beginning to adjust to having four rambunctious and destructive boys, 3 of them under two years-old, we had another surprise pregnancy in January of 2014. We found out that we were expecting TWINS a month later and a few weeks after that, the ultrasound showed that they were BOTH boys. I grieved this news for a short time, but God continued to bring me new mercies each morning.

Our precious new set of twins arrived via caesarian section on September 14, 2014. Noah Robert and Josiah Paul, our smallest babies yet, weighed in at 7 and 5 pounds, respectively. Their arrival meant that as an entire family we could no longer fit in our eight passenger minivan and we are bursting at the seams in our 3 bedroom, 1 bath 1200 square foot home. However, this past summer, God provided Tim with a significant and long prayed-for promotion at work, which allowed us to get approved for a loan on a new, 2015 Ford Transit nine-passenger van. He has also blessed us with a large community of family, friends and even strangers who want to help us with meals, housecleaning, childcare as well as the remodeling to expand our small house to accommodate our large family!

We are amazed at God’s gift of seven children in seven years, and it has opened our eyes to become aware of our need for Jesus, family, friends and our church to help us. He has blessed us with the chance to experience and embrace the most beautiful picture of community and the powerful testimony of His provision as we open the doors of our lives, hearts and home to experience His grace, “do life” together, and raise this pack of children with the help and love of a multitude of others. And while I cannot even remember what life was like just seven years ago with only one baby girl, God’s grace and goodness has been abundant, and we continue to trust that He will provide for all our needs.

~~~~~

Made to Mother is partnering with the Evans Project to fundraise and build enough support to be able to help expand Tim and Katie Evans’s home and assist in funding the purchase of their new family car. For years Tim and Katie have played a huge part in and blessed the lives of so many people. They have opened their home and lives to everyone who has needed or asked for help. We now see this as an opportunity to give back to them that blessing, as we donate our own time and resources and ask others for help in supporting this family.

If you would like to learn more about the Evans Project, please visit the Evans Project Page for more information and to donate. 100% of your donations will go directly to the Evans family. Thank you so much for supporting this loving, godly family and being a part of the amazing work that God continues to do through them!

Surviving a Stillbirth at 36 weeks – Guest Post by Taylor Arthur at Red Vine Spirituality

My husband, Jack was traveling the day my sister-in-law, Semmelle, and I excitedly walked into my OB’s office for my 36 week appointment. She had never been to an ultra sound before, and I was so excited to show her a sneak peak of her new nephew. I met her at my mother’s that afternoon, where relatives were still visiting after throwing me a beautiful baby shower the weekend before. My cousins and I had stayed up until late the previous night, unpacking gifts, laundering tiny clothes, and decorating the nursery while we ate chocolate cake and giggled like little girls. Caleb was the first grandchild for both Jack’s and my families. After years of fighting an extreme case of bipolar disorder and wondering if I would ever be well enough to bear my own children, we felt the world was celebrating with us as we prepared to welcome our victory child.

At first, they couldn’t find the heartbeat in the exam room. I became furious with the nurse, assuming she was inept. They brought in another nurse, and she, too, could not find the heartbeat. My OBGYN was called in. We were rushed to the ultrasound room as my OBGYN shouted orders to her receptionist to call her nanny and tell her she’d be late. I didn’t realize that anything could be that wrong until I heard the ultrasound tech gasp.
“What?!” I screamed.
“THERE’S NO HEARTBEAT.”

As I write this, years later, I still cry. I remember begging them to do an emergency c-section, kicking and screaming like a three year-old and my sister’s face covered in agony. I remember leaving with my dead baby still inside me, Semmelle driving me back to my parents’ home. I remember calling my husband’s family, knowing that Jack was somewhere in an airplane, still believing that our baby would be born and live, and knowing that I would have to be the one to tell him we were living a horror I had never even thought to imagine.

Shock makes some people crazy. Shock makes me sane, and I am able to see what is necessary and what is not. I am able to function and choose. I am able to get on the phone with my husband, while he is sitting on the airplane, and tell him his first son will be born dead. I am able to do that because he needs to stay on that plane and come home to me. I laid in my parents’ bed and waited as well-meaning, shocked relatives came in one at a time to tell me they loved me and rub my belly as they had done so many times throughout my pregnancy. I laid in bed and prayed the Our Father and the Hail Mary over and over, because they were the only prayers that I could muster. I asked my mother if she thought I was unlucky. If I was cursed. I prayed Jack home to me, praying that he, too, would not be taken from me.

Jack’s father greeted him at the airport and drove him to my parents’ home. He burst up the stairs to hold me in his arms, and we didn’t care who watched. We wept. We wretched. We held each other all night, knowing that would be the last night we spent alone with Caleb, the child we already loved so much. We gathered up every ounce of courage we had, and we made our way to the hospital. We had just toured the birthing center in our labor and delivery class, so we knew right where to go. Our bag had already been packed, just in case Caleb had decided to come early.

For me, before having children, labor and delivery seemed like a black hole that I would enter, having no idea how I would make my way out the other side. I was afraid of the pain, afraid of the risks involved, afraid that I might die. I had never considered that my child who had been checked and rechecked thoroughly throughout my pregnancy and was certified healthy, could die. And I never dreamed what it could be like to face all of the fears of my first childbirth, knowing that I would have to endure it all only to leave the hospital without my child.

It was a day. An entire, 24-hour-long day. I was heavily drugged, as I had requested, with an epidural that left me entirely numb and very groggy. I spent the day with loved ones hovering over me when I opened my eyes, and kneeling next to Mary at the foot of Jesus’ cross every time I closed my eyes. In both realities, I was in extreme pain, but with my eyes closed I was in the company of Jesus’ Mother. As He suffered, she suffered, and they both held me in my suffering. That day, as I lay in that hospital bed, I felt the most intense love being poured out upon me, into me by pure mother love. In her suffering, she begat love for me, born of physical and spiritual travail. It entered my laboring heart and flooded my chest cavity. This love rested upon me for weeks, as I bore the physical pains of just giving birth without the joy of my baby to help me forget them.

Caleb Joshua was born at 6:27 pm on Wednesday, March 19th, in the middle of Holy Week. Time stretched in front of me like never before. There would be too many tomorrows without him, so now was the only time to not fall asleep with exhaustion or miss one small dimple. Now was the time to make up for a lifetime of loves and hugs, kisses, baths, and songs. Those few hours would be the only ones I would ever spend with my son’s physical form, and I knew that it would most likely be a very long time until we would again be face to face.

He was baptized by our beloved Father Ed and Deacon Bill. I bathed him, undaunted by his already decomposing form, and dressed him in his going home outfit. We took many pictures, but not enough. We held him, our parents held him, and we held him again. Time stood for me. And then, I looked at Caleb’s eyes and they were crying blood. We knew it was time and I handed him to the nurse.

They wheeled me out that night only because I refused to stay the night in a hospital without my baby. I howled from my room to the car, where Jack laid in the back seat next to me until I passed out from exhaustion. I woke up early the next morning in the guest bedroom at my parents’ house. I woke up without Caleb and started to wretch again. My sobs woke Jack up, and the two of us laid in bed and cried ourselves back to sleep.

We did everything we could for our son in the days following his silent birth. I went to the funeral home and picked out his casket, his burial plot. I went to the children’s boutique and bought him his final outfit. When the sales lady asked if it was a going home outfit, I doubled over in sobs. My mother then went ahead of me into every store we entered and told them what was going on and to please leave me alone. I bought myself a hot pink dress to wear to his funeral, and his father a bright orange tie. It was Easter week and we refused to wear black.

The Tuesday after Easter, surrounded by loved ones all dressed in their best Easter clothes, we laid Caleb to rest. Our siblings, his aunts and uncles, carried his casket down the middle aisle of our church while Jack and I walked hand-in-hand behind them. We celebrated his life, as well as the unending life he was already living in heaven.

We have spent the time since Caleb’s death trying to move on. We have had two more beautiful sons and live as joyfully as we are able. But the love for our firstborn son never fades, and my yearning for him has created a deep hole in my heart that is only satiated by my relationship with Jesus. Certainly, the shock and the intense pain have subsided. What is left is an ache, deep and unyielding, gnawing in the background of a beautiful life. I still hang his stocking at Christmas, and his birth certificate will forever be displayed in our hallway upstairs with the tiny prints of his perfect feet. We celebrate his birthday every year by going on a “Caleb adventure,” with his brothers. We look forward to heaven more than ever before, but know our little Lebanite Warrior is in Good Hands, exploring the Promised Land, until we meet again.

~~~~~

Taylor is from Seattle, Washington and mother to Caleb (stillborn 2008), Abraham (5), and Samuel (2), and happily married to her husband, Jack, of 14 years. She tackles mental illness, surviving stillbirth, and caring for her heart warrior, Samuel, in her weekly blogs at www.redvinespirituality.com.

The Purpose in My Pain – S.L.’s Story

I didn’t become the mom I am when my husband and I decided to start a family. Like most people, God had been shaping my life for motherhood before I even knew it. It began when I was in preschool. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was sick. I’m not certain exactly when it happened because I was so little, but some of my earliest memories are painful ones. The problem with pain, though, is that you don’t realize it’s pain when you’ve only ever been in pain.

When I was 17, I spent a an unforgettable summer on a mission trip with some wonderful friends from my church youth group. I knew then I wanted to be a missionary. The warm air in that impoverished Caribbean nation made me feel so good and I felt like I was exactly where I was supposed to be, doing what God wanted. It was humbling and exhilarating all at the same time to have the opportunity to daily share Christ with the kids I worked with. And though it was also hard, I loved being completely dependent on God. He daily gave me strength.

I didn’t want to lose the closeness I had with God or the purpose that I felt on that trip, so when I came home, I made one of the most pivotal decisions of my entire life, although I didn’t know it at the time. I prayed that God would continue to keep me completely dependent on Him. God isn’t safe. He’s good, but His ways aren’t our ways. I had no idea that only three weeks later, the pain that I had felt my whole life would become excruciatingly unbearable. I went from being an athlete to barely being able to walk. It was so bad, I had to crawl up stairs and it hurt even to be touched. If someone just accidentally bumped into me, I was reduced to tears.

The summer ended and I began my senior year of high school, but everything had changed. I needed all the support I could get, so gone were my plans to attend college out of state and when I lost my voice, my dreams to major in music also ended. I realized I wasn’t healthy enough to go live overseas anymore so I couldn’t go into missions, either. I was devastated. And, to make it even worse, I still didn’t have a diagnosis. I was so scared because pain like that usually means something bad. Really bad. It took a year before I was finally diagnosed with fibromyalgia; a chronic illness that has to do with overactive nerves and causes miserable pain. There is no cure for it and my case was severe, yet, I was relieved knowing that it wouldn’t take my life like some of the others diseases that were being considered. Still, I felt so hopeless and lost in darkness. Didn’t God understand that all I wanted to do was to serve Him? I felt like He took my ability to do that, but truly, I had the complete dependence I had asked for.

It took me a few years before I could understand the point of all my failed dreams. God wanted to teach me something first. I learned how to manage my illness and got it under control so I could live pretty normally despite being in constant pain. I met and married my husband, Brian, finished college with a degree in psychology, and we started a family.

I had always wanted a little girl. Desperately wanted a little girl. And we had Ethan. Then, two years later, we had Luke. Four years after that, Jackson joined our family. Don’t get me wrong, I adore my three boys! But, when I found out that I was having a third boy, I cried. All the feelings of loss crept back upon me and another dream died. I sobbed to God, asking Him, “Why can’t I catch a break? I’ve lost so much already and now I’m never going to have the daughter I’ve always wanted. Why does my life look so different from what I planned on it being? I just want to be normal!”

When Jackson was born, everything changed. I fell in love with being a mom of three boys. God started showing me how wrong I was to think that my plan might have been better than His. I couldn’t have been happier being mom to my Monkey, Gremlin, and Trouble, respectively. And I love that we laugh. A lot. There was the time that Ethan colored himself and Luke completely with a blue marker in three minutes while I was on the phone. Later,when Luke was a toddler, he drank day-old cold, black coffee, straight from the coffee pot when my back was turned. And once, at two years-old, Jackson snuck out of bed in the middle of the night and we found him watching The Chronicles of Narnia with the sound turned all the way down and the subtitles on. Yup. All we can do is laugh!

Still, my heart ached. I didn’t feel done with our family. Brian and I lost a precious baby between Luke and Jackson and I found myself wishing that I could make some difference. I’ve always had a desire to adopt, but it never worked out. The doors just kept closing until, one day, one door stayed open. Foster care. It wasn’t what I planned. It was messy, complicated even, but the need was great. I brought it up to Brian and he was immediately in. I know it makes no sense to do this. I was only 29 years old when we started the process. We have our three boys, live in a house with only three bedrooms, and I’m sick. There were so many reasons to not do it, but God put it on my heart. The desire wouldn’t go away and when God asks you to do something, you can’t say no.

Right now, I’m a mom to four. We are on our second placement with a precious infant foster daughter. God gave me my girl. I might not get to keep her, but that is okay; God is bigger than the pain of goodbyes. If there is one thing I learned from my miscarriage, it is that I am going to make the most with all the time I am given with my kids, biological or not. They are all my kids. I’ve also realized that I don’t want to be normal. My boys are amazing; they love their foster sister and are incredibly compassionate. They’ve seen so much pain as they’ve watch me struggle with illness and they want to take care of their foster sister since they understand she has lost her biological family. They are so empathetic and are learning to serve God sacrificially even at the tender ages of 8, 6, and 2.

It occurred to me once as I walked into the social services building that I actually am on the mission field. I may not have been able to go overseas, but God brought the mission field to me. The psychology degree I hadn’t planned on getting was exactly what I needed. And I might not be using my voice to sing, but I’m using it to tell others about God. As a foster parent, I get to work with these precious, hurting birth parents and make a difference. Because of my pain and chronic illness, I am open with them about how I don’t have it all together. They know I understand and so they listen to me. I never expected my pain to be so important.

Being a mom is so much more than simply taking care of kids, making PB&Js for lunch and reading bedtime stories. Being a mom means giving of ourselves in ways that we never expected and serving God even when it doesn’t make sense. My journey wasn’t what I had planned, but it was what God planned and His plans have proved far better than mine ever could.

~~~~~

S.L. Payne, a Southern Californian transplanted to the South, lives with her husband, three biological sons and foster daughter. She is thankful for God’s faithfulness in her illness as God has used to it help her see Him in everything; the three boys have supplied the humor! She loves writing, photography and laughing with her family. She writes at Rest Ministries and on her website, www.uncommongrace.net, where she hopes she can encourage others to live in grace. You can follow her on Twitter @saralynnpayne.

The Story of My Miscarriage – Guest Post by Monica at Mommy & Love

I was haunted by the sound of the pause in the doctor’s room. I was there for an early ultrasound to hear my baby’s heartbeat. It would have been the very first time, but I left with nothing. All the excitement came and disappeared in what felt like a matter of seconds. I was left traumatized, shocked, and furious. It all caught me off guard.

I remember I wore a favorite, flowery dress that day to match my bright outlook on life. But my joyous mood had changed. I irrationally decided to hate the world, everything and everyone in it. I never anticipated miscarrying a child. Truthfully, I had never even anticipated having a baby in my early twenties, but once I found out I was pregnant, I fell in love with the idea. That love grew more and more intense as I discovered a whole new world of motherhood. Never before had I gazed so happily towards tiny little baby clothing, diapers, and nursery accessories. I was in another state of mind, all googly-eyed.

My pregnancy only lasted seven weeks, yet those measly three weeks of knowing I was pregnant changed my life forever. I instantly wanted to try again for another baby despite being in the middle of my college career. My boyfriend at the time, now my husband, was one hundred percent against the idea. The one person I needed to be there for me let me down and I felt alone. I was trapped in a dark cloud of emotions.

That day of bad news went by in a daze. The sun refused to stop shining and the birds continued to sing. The world couldn’t have cared less about my sudden loss. It continued as mine shattered and froze in place. Later that night, the physical pain was triggered and soon enough, I was experiencing full-blown labor pains. My body was cramping up repeatedly, preparing to reject the embryo unworthy of being called fetus. To make matters worse, the doctor insisted on having me collect the embryo once it passed so it could be sent to a lab for further testing. Can you imagine collecting an undeveloped embryo that was supposed to grow into your human child? I am very much in favor of medical studies, so reluctantly I did as they asked. I was fortunate that my loving boyfriend spared me and took care of that part himself.

A small amount of time passed, hardly a month, and sure enough, my sister, sister-in-law, and step brother’s wife both became pregnant at the same time. It was at that time that I should have sought professional help from a grief counselor. My world completely flipped upside down and my mind was plagued by pregnancy hormones. My relationship entered a state of turmoil and I passionately hated everybody in sight. I discovered the most bitter form of jealousy imaginable towards pregnant women and skipped all baby related events. It was unbearable looking at ultrasound pictures and watching baby bellies grow and protrude outward.

One evening, I was driving and talking on the phone with a relative only to discover that my cousin was also pregnant. To say that I threw a crying fit would be an understatement. I had a psychotic break-down. I could not see or hear anything, I could not even breathe. My rage was beyond measureable. That was by far the worst pain I had ever experienced at this point in my life. My boyfriend had me pull the car over and he took over driving once I had calmed down. It is shocking to look back at this period in my life to see how muddied up my vision appeared. I was the first person pregnant in both my boyfriend and my immediate families so babies were a very new and exciting topic those three weeks. I had desperately wanted my sisters to be pregnant with me because I thought it would be the coolest thing ever. Instead, I ended up without child and they all conceived as if to spite me.

Although the pain dragged on and on for over a year, there is a happy ending and moral to this story. I learned that many women experience miscarriages through no fault of their own. Roughly, one in five pregnancies end in miscarriage. It has been almost five years since my first miscarriage and I now have a crazy cute two and half year old daughter and a five month old son.

                    

I did end up having a second miscarriage in between those two full term pregnancies, but it was not nearly as tragic as the first one. I miscarried right at five weeks pregnant that second time and due to my first miscarriage, I was wary of announcing my news early again. Not many people in my life even know about that one.

I also learned that it does not matter how long you carry a baby for you to be affected by the loss. I was only pregnant for seven weeks when I miscarried the first time and it made for an emotionally draining and exhausting year of my life. I sunk into a deep depression that did not end until I became pregnant again. But, I am now happily writing about my motherhood experiences. I started blogging while I was pregnant with my daughter. Motherhood has been one gigantic learning experience filled with many beautiful ups and some scary downs. Overall, I realize how blessed I am to be able to raise children and show them a love never before imaginable.

~~~~~

Monica lives in Michigan with her husband, Bill and two children, Amelia and Oliver. She blogs at www.mommyandlove.com, shares her family’s journey through photos on Instagram and updates on the Mommy & Love Facebook page.

A Life Spent Loving Others – Mary’s Story

Mary was born March 12, 1980, the second child to Dan and Kathy. She became the younger sister and mentor to Leo-Paul (LP) and the older sister and friend to Tanika. From the very first moment of Mary’s arrival, she touched people’s lives physically and emotionally. At the tender age of 9 months while watching LP work with his speech specialist, she began mimicking the therapist through a two-way mirror. LP laughed at the sound behind the wall and then he too began to make the sounds that the therapist wanted to hear. Physically challenged from birth, LP learned to speak, walk and read following Mary’s lead.

When she was four, Mary’s family became a medical foster home for infants born to chemically-addicted parents. She became a voluntary consummate ‘mommy,’ changing diapers, diagnosing bottom rashes, redressing and feeding any baby that needed it. Burping them, burrito-wrapping them and singing them to sleep along with all her dolls and the dogs and the neighbor kids that routinely stopped in. By the time Mary was nine, she was carrying car seats and diaper bags and heading off to another hospital for another baby to bring home.
At 13 she met her sister Tanika, weighing only 3 pounds 11 ounces and measuring 14 inches long. Mary would soon call her “my shoe box baby.” Mary would take extra special care of this little bundle for the rest of her life. When she was fourteen Mary was the only person allowed to pick up and hold Tanika’s medically fragile twin sister, Tanisha. Tanisha lived in an infant hospice foster home and shortly after her visit with Tanika and Mary, Jesus moved Tanisha home. Mary held Tanika close to her for a very long time. She loved Jesus but she wasn’t ready to let Tanika follow Tanisha’s lead.

At 16 years old, Mary’s parents divorced, but that did not hinder her spirit. She was a cheerleader to all around her. She coaxed, prodded, pulled and harangued many people out of some of life’s deepest ruts. Two years later, in 1998 at the age of 18, she started doing foster care on her own while attending nursing school and became one of the youngest licensed foster parents in the state of Oregon. Over the next thirteen years, she would become a caregiver to more than forty children but ‘momma’ to only thirteen very especially loved babies of all ethnicities and all manner of health and drug-related problems. Her heart was always ready to love just one more little one. She was an encourager, inspiring babies who could not feel, to live and learn how to love. God blessed Mary with the gift to love those among us who are difficult to love.

After receiving her RN license, she continued doing foster care and began caring for the elderly and mentally challenged as well; the population pushed away from society. While physically caring for her patients, she also prayed mightily over them. She encouraged them and listened to their life stories. Every life mattered to the Lord and she wanted even those lost within themselves to understand how important they were to Jesus. She sang daily their heart-songs to Jesus.
God also blessed Mary with the gift to share Jesus with anyone needing to know Him prior to their earthly departure. One woman that Mary became especially close with asked her to pray that God would take pity on her and allow her a small place in Heaven. Mary assured her that Jesus already had her mansion built and that He was just waiting to bring her home. That evening, Mary’s friend moved into her mansion built with Jesus’ own hands.

Woefully, Mary had her own health problems. For years she had suffered from genetic endometriosis and ovarian cysts and the doctors had told her she would never be able to conceive her own baby. But when she had a miscarriage early on in her marriage, she was devastated. Not long after, in 2003, at only 23 years old, she was diagnosed with HPV and had to have a complete emergency hysterectomy. They would have never found out about the cancer if it wasn’t for that precious, lost baby.
Mary had also contracted a rare strand of bacteria during her second year of nursing school, which began to attack her vital organs causing sustained damage. The mounting health problems forced her to give up working as an RN. However, Mary’s joy and enthusiasm for helping others did not end, and so she worked more creatively at being a better foster mom to medically fragile infants. Her patience was limitless and her zeal for life inspirational.

In December of 2004 Mary picked up a two-day-old boy, Baby “J,” from the hospital with the intent to adopt. He was a drug baby, so she knew he would suffer from many developmental issues and probably have to have years of therapy and special education. Mary took it all in stride. She loved him as if he were her own flesh and blood. Two years later and two weeks away from signing Baby “J’s” adoption finalization papers, Mary’s husband abandoned them. After that, the state determined that as a single parent she could not adopt any child, but as a top-notch foster parent she would be allowed to keep “J” in her home as a foster child until he reached the legal age of eighteen years old. If he were allowed to stay in one foster home for seven years, permanency might be ensured. Her hope fervently changed to emergent prayers.
Mary kept and raised her boy and for the next four years he called her his momma and she called him her son. In fact, one time in mental health therapy, “J” was told that Mary was not the mom that carried him in her tummy, but he didn’t like that. He told Mary later that it made him mad at God because he loved her and wanted to have come from her tummy! Mary reassured him that she loved him with all her heart and that she couldn’t love him more if he had come from her tummy.

Just three months prior to his 7th birthday, in September 2011, after a state-induced whirlwind adoption process, “J” was placed in his “forever home” 2500 miles from where he had lived and grown up with Mary. She only got to say a quick goodbye before he was taken away by what seemed like the perfect family for him. Under the guise of an open adoption, the state caseworker told her she had to wait six months before contacting the adoptive family. Later, however, the adoption worker told Mary the family said there would be no more contact, ever. Mary’s heart was broken and she felt betrayed by the adoption worker, the state caseworker and his new family.
Months went by and then a year without any update on “J” from the adoptive family or his caseworker. Mary continued to grieve the loss of her son and wrote this to a friend:

“I know God will give me answers in time or when my time ends. I know eventually “J” is going to grow up beyond their control and want to seek out answers to those questions they could not answer, but that I can. So I’m praying that someday he will return to me with memories and we can be reunited.”

Mary did not foster any more children after “J” was adopted and her health began to quickly fail. She was devastated and heartbroken on the inside, and even though she knew that “J” was where God wanted him to be and the family was a good match for him, she confided in her mom quietly that she felt her life was over. She had no energy to date again or make many friends and she was lonely. What she didn’t realize is that through the thousands of people that she touched, she had more friends than many people would gain in a lifetime. Mary’s heart-warming spirit encouraged veterans, the disabled, first responders, medical personnel on all levels, patients waiting for care, patients exiting care, surviving family members of newly departed loved ones and people from sea to shining sea. But she still prayed daily that God would send her a good friend and He answered that many times over as she rekindled old friendships through the internet.

Mary’s health continued to deteriorate with each passing week. The bacteria had compromised her entire immune system. She developed Crohn’s and Sweet’s syndrome in her GI tract and pseudo tumor cerebrii in her brain which began multiple types of seizures. By the middle of 2013, Mary’s lungs weakened to the point where she was getting pneumonia ever couple of months and her kidneys were functioning only at a 20-30% rate. Her liver, pancreas, gall bladder and spleen were enlarged and she could not stop vomiting. The doctors could not seem to diagnose her worsening condition. The disease continuously ravaged her already scarred young body over the years, requiring multiple hospital stays, serious surgeries and demanding test after test after test.
Her struggles were grueling to say the least, but her words were always uplifting for those around her. She would pray for the first responders that were urgently called to her home. She would pray for her family, hoping they would forgive her this ‘one last time’ for making them rush her to the ER when her heart wouldn’t stop hurting. She prayed for the nurses, doctors and technicians and that their jobs would be a little less ‘crazy because of her illness this time.’ She talked to God all the time.

In mid-November of 2013, she was finally diagnosed with Atrial Septal Defect (a hole in her heart) and while she awaited more testing and the possibility of another surgery, Mary was near bedridden and had to have daily supplements of IV fluids and oxygen. She insisted on staying in the comfort of her own home, demanding that she not return to the hospital. Her family knew that under no circumstances were any resuscitation methods to be made if she slipped quietly away from them.

Although she was getting weaker and weaker, she still made the time to email a dear friend from grade school who was grieving a miscarriage. Feeling her friend’s deep pain of loss and the hopelessness of having to pick up the pieces after everything is said and done, Mary wrote this to her:

“I seem to miss my babies first thing in the morning. They are on my mind at noon, around dinner and then again at bedtime. They are the last thing I think of before I go to sleep and the first thing I think of upon waking. Each year seems to get better, but the pain doesn’t seem to go all the way away. Grief is so complicated. I can’t wait to get to Heaven to ask the Lord why He allows our Angel babies to be taken back to heaven and ask Him if we can touch them, hold them and smell them.”

On November 17, 2013 at 12:33 p.m., Mary, our daughter, sister, family member and friend solidly grasped Jesus’ hand and walked Heaven’s distant road home. She left a legacy reflective of a life filled with love for the Lord, a willingness to help no matter the chores because it meant doing ‘as Jesus would do if He were here.’ She left memories of her ability to laugh loudly, heartily and unashamedly. She left memories of her skill to sing off key, on key, or just forget the key and sing out loudly. And, she left us with the memory of her smile; her bright, enthusiastic, encouraging, dreamy and ‘you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me’ smiles. Mary believed smiling broke through armored, tough exteriors and she proved that action correct more times than not. How can you not smile when twin dimples and blue eyes are flashing you?

                       

Mary grew to become the woman Jesus wanted her to be. Her life lesson is twofold. First, her pain-filled illness was God’s rendering of Mary as a Masterpiece. The pain drove Mary into His open, embracing arms. He nestled her there, spoke loving kindness and mercy over her there, healed her a bit and returned her back to us. He honed her as only the Maker can. And secondly, her mother’s heart loved first her babies, but also that same heart loved the disabled, the hard-wrought, the lost and the found. Her mother’s heart beat with life for all connecting with her. Be rendered to God. Connect love with others’ heart beats.

Mary is whole, healthy and perfect in eternity. She is in heaven holding her angel babies and every other angel child up there. She is singing praises with the saints and dancing with her Savior. Her amazing, selfless personality is there blessing everyone in the next life.  And we, her family and friends still on earth, rejoice in the fact that we will one day see her face again. She will be there by Jesus’ side as one of the first to welcome us when we journey home as well.

~~~~~

In loving memory of Mary Jo Lippincott, March 12, 1980 – November 17, 2013.
To see her memory slideshow, please click here.

The Bitter Irony – Guest Post by Lizzi of Considerings

For the longest time, I was adamant that I didn’t want to be a mother. I had a horrible, tough childhood, subjected to victimization in a home ruled by depression, lies and the idol of marriage. Marriage was something which God had joined together, and no man, or woman, or child, should EVER try (or hope) to tear it asunder. Divorce was the vilest dirty word. And so, in our ways, for 12 years, my sister and I were daily sacrifices on the altar of that idol.

I determined that I would NEVER have children, because my experience of being parented was so hurtful, so poor (not in *all* ways, but in many) and so confusing, that I genuinely thought I would have nothing to give a child. In addition to which, LOOK at what parenting turned you INTO! Because with childish egocentricity (emphasized by the insistent message that I was a burden; something to be put up with and dealt with – never someone to be cherished or enjoyed) I assumed that somehow, part of the responsibility for that toxic home lay with my sister and I. I mean, it MUST, right? We were there, after all, being demanding and requiring input and attention, and getting things wrong and mucking things up and being in the way…some of the blame must be apportioned to us. And I never wanted a child of mine to feel that way for turning me into such a horrible person, and for ruining my home.
But I got a job working with children and gradually my heart unfroze. I realized the full extent of how horribly wrong my frame of reference for family life was, and on the day my sister announced her first pregnancy, I cried bitter tears of regret, because as the older sibling, surely it was supposed to be my turn first?

Yet marriage and children (I know not everyone feels the need to tie any knots before getting knocked up, but as a committed Christian, I wasn’t prepared to do it any other way. Which makes my story that much harder, I’ll admit) was not forthcoming. So I waited until I found the chap who had a touch of destiny about him. The first time we met, my gut told me “He’d be a good husband and a good father.” As I got to know him, I could see myself growing old and content with him by my side. And when he proposed, once I got over the surprise, I didn’t have a second thought about saying a joyful “Yes!”

If I’d known, would I have done things differently? If he’d known, would he?

You see, my dear Husby turned out to be sick. Sicker than either of us realized or anticipated or would fully know until three years down the line, when we received the official word that there’s no point trying for a baby anymore, because we will never be able to conceive naturally. We will (hopefully) be offered one shot at fertility treatment. And then we’re cast loose to figure out how to live our lives.
And in the meantime, to make matters worse, our marriage has been plagued by this sickness and its associated challenges, for its entirety. Three years of absolute hell; of suddenly having to manage a spouse who had succumbed to that dread beast, depression. Who often didn’t want to be alive by the end of the day. Who claimed he loved me, but rejected me on several very intimate and very painful levels, as a result of seeing the world through the dark cloud of mental ill-health.
His sickness also pervaded to other parts of his body, resulting in two miscarriages for us – the bitterest pills to swallow, that our first two children – our Neverborns – might be our only two. And each time I allow myself to think about that for too long, it absolutely devastates me and leaves me bereft.

In the time since, the gates have slammed down, one by one, on our options for parenthood. We can’t foster or adopt, as the depression has us (rightly) disqualified from their eligibility criteria. We can’t afford private fertility treatment.  And we have some of Husby’s sperm frozen, so why would we waste our one shot on donor sperm?
This is our final chance to realize our fragile, shaky, precious dreams of becoming parents to a live child, and it sucks beyond belief to know that the success rate for the treatment we might get – the BEST treatment – stands at 16%.

The irony of those miscarriages is strong. And each month when crushing disappointment claws at my heart as I realize that no, I’m not pregnant. Again. It is only balanced by the knowledge that at least I’m not LOSING another baby. Because there is no more profoundly painful feeling I have ever encountered than knowing that my body – designed to protect and nurture and grow – had been unable to hang onto my child. Or the knowledge that each of my tiny babies were defective, and were never going to grow beyond the point they reached, and so just gave up; zipped up wrong – abominations to be disposed of and expelled.

No pain EVER equalled this before.

And so I face life as an Invisible Mom – potentially forever. No one will see my children. I’ll never get to hold them close or smell their hair or kiss their scraped knees better. I’ll never shout at them or get kicked in the face by them, or embarrassed in restaurants by their behaviour, or have my heart broken when theirs is.
I’ll get to sleep in on the weekends. To do precisely as I want, when I want. With two incomes, I’ll be able to buy myself nice things, and enjoy them without risking the ruin of little fingers. I’ll be able to drink without worrying that I might need to be sober if one of the kids had an emergency. I won’t have to pay out for schooling fees or worry about bullies. My life will be my own.

And I’d trade it in a second.

Lizzi is a deep thinker, truth-teller and seeker of good things. She writes her thoughts on her blog Considerings. You can also find her on Facebook at her Considerings page as well as on the group Invisible Moms Club.