3 weeks ago, grief was unchartered water to me. My toes had never touched her volatile, always changing currents. Now, my body is fully immersed in her angry territory. Most of the time she bears down on my chest just enough to convince me I am drowning. Sometimes she lets up enough to let me see the the light. The smell of a baby, the finding of a binkie, hearing my baby girl shriek baybee!, baybee! brings another tsunami I do not feel I can withstand. She will not own me forever. I know God will not leave me in her unpredictable hands for eternity. I am His. His purpose for my life is not to worship the loss of my child. But I will grieve and mourn unapologetically. I will cry at random. I will be sad when I should be happy and be happy at times where perhaps you think I should be sad. This will be an ongoing battle, (some call it a dance), between an angry ocean we call grief and a girl whose hope is in her Savior.
Many of you are so sweetly reaching out asking how you can help? What can you do? Please pray. Pray that Chad and I would continue to grow close to one another, that our family would stand united. Please pray that our souls would find rest in our God’s perfect Holy nature. Please pray that our lives would be glorifying to Him. That we would be vessels for His good use.
Also practically, please talk about our baby, Christian. Don’t pretend he was never here. We have 4 babies. One is with Jesus. We miss him terribly and right now our biggest fear is everyone will one day forget he was here, and this was all for nothing. What a miracle he was. From conception to his birth. We had a healthy baby for 26 days! This was a miracle not to be overlooked. I beg you to help us make Christian’s life count. Make it matter for God’s kingdom. I would love to talk about him to anyone at anytime. Please encourage me with anything you remember about him or any way His life has impacted yours or anyone you know. Sweet friends, I beg you, please do not let his story end here. Thank you for your prayers, love and sweet reminders of God’s love for us.
Lastly, I am not posting all these posts to FB. If you want to follow the blog, you can do so, anonymously by going to the upper right hand corner and “subscribing”. I think they email you when I update or something like that. If it gets too depressing you can always unsubscribe too.
7 Comments
Thank you for posting this Michelle. I think people tend to not know what to say so for fear of upsetting someone say nothing at all. Sometimes people, myself especially, need to be reminded that silence is sometimes more upsetting. We continue to think of you, Chad, and all 4 of your babies. Hugs.
Thank you Shelley, big hugs to you friend. xo
We are praying for you! I know God will not leave you in your grief, keep hanging onto the hem of his garment… I requested prayer for your family at my church and somehow through people who love your family and friend of a friend, had already heard and passed it along all the way to Lake Elsinore and were covering you in prayer!
Thank you so much for asking for prayer, we are breathing by His mercy. Truly. Thank you for keeping us in your prayers and reaching out.
I had a “Christian” moment just the other day! Please share with Chad too. š I was planning on telling you this in a card because I have something to send you (that’s a whole other story!) but after reading your post, now felt like a good time. I was sitting on a plane trying to relax when the flight attendants decided that the walkway where I was sitting was a perfect place to have an extra long chat while they were serving drinks. Just when I was about to give them a look, it happened. With my eye closed and my head resting against the seat back, a very light and gentle “mist” as Chad called it from a fizzing soda can splattered across my face as it passed by me. Christian, I thought! It completely stopped me. I just had to tell you that Christian is alive and in my heart! Even in the most unexpected places! Love you guys! Be looking for a little something in the mail next week š
I shared with Chad and this made us smile. Thank you for sharing Christie. xo
I always think about the night we kept texting and laughing while you were thinking of names and I pushed for Christian because it sounded like a big, handsome, rugged guy (based on personal experience.) I was so excited you chose that name. I have always loved it but Christian Christensen would produce chuckles throughout his life if we ever used it. Like poor Tom Thomas and John Johnson. š