Folding Dreams, Packing Promises

The title of today's blog entry is so simply stated and yet so profoundly accurate. Today I did fold dreams and I did pack promises. Today I stumbled into a wall of hurt and a barrage of pain and loss. Its amazing now how in a split second my day can be transformed from great, hopeful, uneventful to tragic, heartbreaking, gut wrenching pain. Its amazing. I can get through the entire day without feeling like a part of me is missing and then in another breath I am broken and bleeding on the floor.

Today, just like the days previous, I woke up with joy in my heart but a tired mind. I decided that I would just clean up around the house. I cleaned and I cleaned with a new determination, as if I was trying to wipe away the world or something. It was crazy. Then it was time to fold up the clean clothes and put them away. This normally is a very mundane task and one that is as easy as pie but today I decided to take it a step further. I'm not just gonna put the clothes away but I'm going to clean the drawers out and fold everything in them. Don't ask me why, it was just something that I felt needed to be done. If I had known what was to come I probably would have decided against it.

FOLDING DREAMS
Who would have thought that folding clothes could be so dramatic? Not me for sure. Today I folded mine and my husband's clothes and finished them up easily. I decided to check the next room to see if there were any stray clothes in there that I might have missed and sure enough there was a bag filled with some clothes that we never put away after the last wash. I went through the bag and started folding mindlessly until I can upon some of my maternity clothes. Each one I folded brought back a memory. The green blouse I use to love to wear reminded me of the day when Marquin and I took photos in the store with him holding my pregnant belly. The black blouse with the glitter on it reminded me of when I was emceeing at the Youth Alive conference and I was telling the crowd how great it is being a mother to be. I remembered how the black polo shirt was my favorite because it was the only one that didn't show how much I was sweating. Then there was the simple little brown shirt that I wore when I first felt him kick. Such memories made it hard to not cry, made it hard to breathe, made it hard to stand. Who knew folding clothes could be so dramatic?

After folding the clothes it was time to clean out the dresser drawers to put the clothes in. This is where I stumbled across Malik's first and second ultra sound photo's. My heart stopped for a second as I remembered more. I remembered how excited Marquin was to hear and see that it was a boy. I couldn't help but smile in the midst of my tears just in remembering how happy we were and seeing that big silly grin on his face. It was as if we were told that we had just won the lotto. One thing I also remembered about that day was how I was slightly dissappointed that it wasnt twins. Ha! Just to have one child now would make me more than satisfied.

How is it that I can miss someone that Ive only known for 8 months, someone that never looked at me or saw the light of day? This pain I feel can not be describe. This pill Ive been given is hard to swallow. Im tired of tasting my tears. I wish I could wake up and it all be a bad dream. It feels like Ive been cheated out giving this excess love that I have been growing and gathering for him for eight months. There is no Malik to recieve this love, this love that breaks my heart, this love that makes me ache for him, this love that is indescribable, this love that runs deeper than deep, this love that wont let me forget him. This love that leaves me longing to see him, hold him, just to smell him again.

I can't see for my tears. I can't feel for the pain. I thought I was getting over this but I guess Im not. I need more time.

PACKING PROMISES
At the end of it all I had to put the clothes away. I had to be smart about this and put all of the clothes that I won't be using for a while at the bottom of the drawers and the others to the top. I was putting away or packing my promise. I was packing the promise of pregnancy which is life at the end of the cycle, not death. I was packing all of the hopes and dreams those clothes signified. I was packing the truth that I was no longer pregnant and there was no baby to show. Oct 13th, 2008 was to be the day that Malik was to have been born to Marquin and I but instead it was Aug 29th, 2008. He was not alive when he came but he added life to ours while he was here. I will never forget our son. I will never forget our joy. One day I will unpack those maternity clothes again and the next time we will see our promise and he/she will live to tell of the Glory of our King.

I Have to Believe

I've been struggling within my heart and my mind, trying to digest the notion that the loss of my son has a 'good' purpose. That God allowed our son to be taken for some greater good that is not yet been made clear to Marquin and I, and to be honest that has been the toughest pill to swallow. Its hard to not feel slighted and robbed. I ask God, why did you let us carry him for such a long time only to have him not live, especially for a pregnancy that never had a problem one day, especially for a child that was always so active? What is the purpose of this? I know God DIDN'T take him from us but He did know it was coming, so why no warning? I think I would have preferred a miscarriage over a stillbirth. Time builds relationship, connection and hope. Time strengthens the bonds of love and increases the probability of greater hurt, but time also heals. I know we will heal but I wish I knew the purpose. I wish I knew why and for whom this is all for? Is this all for us alone? Then I am reminded of the scripture below and in this mornings darkness I found light. This scripture reminded me of His promises and His design to bless us beyond what we can imagine, to increase us in our faith in Him and strengthen us to overcome any test.

How do you go through something like this, such as a stillbirth where 50% of the time there is no explanation for your child's death, and not have the Father to lean on and to cry to? How do you survive the hurt and the emptiness? How do you ever manage to smile again if the joy of the Lord is not inside of you? Joy is so much more different than happiness. Happiness is lived in the moment but joy is there in spite of the moment. I thank God for His word because it is through this that my faith is made stronger. I have to believe that weeping endures for a night but joy comes in the morning. I have to believe that this too shall pass and I have to believe that this tragic event in our lives is being worked out for our good. I Have To Believe, if not I would probably curl up and die. I have to believe in God.

(The Message Bible) Romans 8:18-39

18-21"That's why I don't think there's any comparison between the present hard times and the coming good times. The created world itself can hardly wait for what's coming next. Everything in creation is being more or less held back. God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead. Meanwhile, the joyful anticipation deepens.

22-25All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it's not only around us; it's within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We're also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.

26-28Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

29-30God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him. After God made that decision of what his children should be like, he followed it up by calling people by name. After he called them by name, he set them on a solid basis with himself. And then, after getting them established, he stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun.

31-39So, what do you think? With God on our side like this, how can we lose? If God didn't hesitate to put everything on the line for us, embracing our condition and exposing himself to the worst by sending his own Son, is there anything else he wouldn't gladly and freely do for us? And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God's chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us!—is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ's love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture:

They kill us in cold blood because they hate you.
We're sitting ducks; they pick us off one by one.

None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I'm absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God's love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us."