Grief

"Grief is like a drunken houseguest, always coming back for one more goodbye hug."

I've never had a drunken houseguest, (my poor guests are offered milk or water!) but this stinkin grief thing is annoying. Every once in awhile I just start sobbing. And now it's sitting on me and won't get off. This drunken houseguest is bringing all his friends back too, from my other miscarriages, to my brother Noah being in the NICU, all the way back to my brother Zebulun's stillbirth 15 years ago. It's like a sad scrapbook that's sitting out on the coffee table. I keep putting it on the shelf and someone keeps getting it out again.

Normal

I went to see my doctor for a check-up on Tuesday. The miscarriage was complete with no complications and he sees no signs of any problems that require future intervention. I did ask for some blood tests which he agreed to although we don't expect to find a problem there either. It is hard to accept, but miscarriage is normal. Even recurrent miscarriage is normal. Research shows that even after 3 or 4 miscarriages most women will go on to have a healthy pregnancy without any intervention. Do we plan to try again? Well, there is something about having a miscarriage that makes us want to fight all the harder to bring another life into this world. To do that we have to get back on the roller coaster, but hey, that's normal around here. It's hard for us to say that we "plan" to have another baby. Early in our marriage we asked God to give us children as he saw fit, and then began waiting on him to give us a baby. You could say we have experienced infertility at various times, but on the other hand, we have two children and we were serious when we put our family in his hands. Even when we make decisions regarding our family, God is always reminding us that he is the author of life. He gives and he waits to give, he takes and he gives us himself.
In the reading that I have been doing since the miscarriage, I have been awed by the mystery surrounding the beginning of life. I had no idea that we know so little about why life begins and why it doesn't or why it ends so quickly. The sovereignty of God is nowhere more vital and powerful than the sacred beginning of the smallest embryo. This intersection of the physical and spiritual is holy ground, the miraculous "normal", that we take for granted... until it's gone.
Of the three miscarriages I have had, this one was the hardest. I don't imagine they get any easier, and I realize that if I do become pregnant, I could go through this all over again. But it's just as likely that I could go on to have a healthy baby. And we're back to the sovereignty of God. I cannot trust in statistics, no matter how favorable they may be. They tell me nothing of the story of my life that God is writing. I have no idea whether we will have more children, and I will not pretend that I am in control of it. I have been reminded of the fragility of life, and my place in the hands of the Creator.

Healing

As the song says, I am being held. By love and prayers and really tight hugs.
I am healing, but I am not, as someone told me, "amazing". You might like to know that I too screamed at God in the night. Those words that came when I could not form any others, when anger was my first and all encompassing emotion. But as I came to the moment when my baby slipped away I felt the grace of God melt all of that anger into a sad acceptance. I don't know how He did it, but I know it wasn't me. He gives life, and He takes it, and he caresses my rage into gentle tears. He takes my chin in his hand and gently turns my head.
My girls are beautiful. They are happy and full of the promise of spring. They are muddy and sunkissed and stomping the last pile of snow, barefoot in bikinis. They are giggling in the bath and ask "Mom, what is that animal with a squarish nose that likes to go in the water sometimes, but lives on land? It's a something-bara". "A capybara.", I said. "Yes! We are capybaras and we have to wash our fur now." They are playing baseball and floating boats and drawing fairies and birds. All is right with girlhood at this glorious moment of spring. This, too, holds me.

Another Heaven-Birth

Last night we lost another 9 week baby. We don't know why, although we hope to get some kind of medical answer in the future. As we grieve we covet your prayers for our healing. Right now it seems like a reoccurring nightmare. This song could have come straight from my heart. Take some time to listen. (I double posted this on my other blog so no one would miss it.)

Held by Natalie Grant

Two months is too little.
They let him go.
They had no sudden healing.
To think that providence would
Take a child from his mother while she prays
Is appalling.

Who told us we'd be rescued?
What has changed and why should we be saved from nightmares?
We're asking why this happens
To us who have died to live?
It's unfair.

Chorus:
This is what it means to be held.
How it feels when the sacred is torn from your life
And you survive.
This is what it is to be loved.
And to know that the promise was
When everything fell we'd be held.

This hand is bitterness.
We want to taste it, let the hatred numb our sorrow.
The wise hand opens slowly to lilies of the valley and tomorrow.

(Chorus)
This is what it means to be held.
How it feels when the sacred is torn from your life
And you survive.
This is what it is to be loved.
And to know that the promise was
When everything fell we'd be held.

Bridge:
If hope is born of suffering.
If this is only the beginning.
Can we not wait for one hour watching for our Savior?

Pocketful of Hope

Yep! This is what it looks like! Our 8 week Belly Bean! We have known for awhile, but were waiting for this ultrasound to find out if the baby is healthy before we spread the news. Everything looks great and there is only a 5% chance of miscarriage now. For more details check out my baby blog at Pocketful of Hope. You might want to read the posts in order by going to the bottom first, if you want to catch up.
Acadia is doing pretty well right now. We seem to be avoiding the extremes and are just dealing with the regular stuff. She developed a new coping strategy: chewing ice cubes! Sunshine, bikes, the tire swing, and an emerging yard are really good medicine for any kid!

Brushing Off the Ants

It's very quiet in my house right now. Which is why I'm still up and have the desire to write. I love nighttime quiet, but not morning quiet. There is a difference. At night the silence feels like a blanket settling over me, a tent that gives me a place to think. In the morning, it feels like a blanket weighing me down with a heavy, sleepy promise that the day can wait just a little longer.
One of the reasons I am enjoying this quiet is that Acadia is quite frankly driving me nuts with her constant motion and sound. She's so squirmy and fidgety and nothing is right. It's like being next to a person with ants crawling all over them, you really would like to run in the other direction! Sounds are too loud (or too quiet), the stuff sticks out of the sandwiches too far, her teeth feel like something is stuck in them, her pants are too loose or too tight, her hair is too frizzy, her skin is too itchy... you get the point. Of course I'm supposed to fix all this immediately, but without speaking. I can only say about 5 words before she cuts me off and talks loudly and rapidly over me so that I will not finish my sentence and thereby say something that she already knows. Heavens, it might be redundant, unacceptable to her, or completely uneccasary and we can't have extra words floating about willy-nilly in the air. Sigh...tonight she told me she feels awful all day long and that she needs more attention from me. So I promised it, but right now that is really not what I want to do.
But tommorow I will get up (with a giant heave of the morning heaviness blanketing me) and start again. And the Grace will be there, that is my comfort. I will brush the ants off my daughter, the cobwebs from my mind, and the snarls out of fine blonde hair. I will read and pray and ask Him what my kids need from me today, and for the grace to let go and give it freely, as I have received.

Safe in Grace

I had a meeting with Acadia's doctors at the hospital today. The latest and most significant development is that she has developed hyperthyroidism. This is most likely a result of being on lithium. Statistically 12% of patients on lithium develop hypothyroidism while a rare 2% develop hyperthyroidism. Some studies I've read suggest that withdrawing lithium can cause this, and we did withdraw her lithium for about 6 weeks before adding it again.

Because hyperthyroidism causes symptoms such as anxiety, erratic behavior, nervousness, irritability, or panic attacks; this could be contributing to or causing some of her difficulties right now. So this is the first thing we will be treating.

Acadia will be in the hospital for at least two weeks. I was able to take her out for an hour today and we went to the mall. She did well, but she seems a little bit on edge. Today she got a roommate. It will be good for her to have another girl to hang out with. She's not doing school right now and kind of bored...she even asked me to bring in her math book!

Our family is relieved to feel safe again. Acadia is safe where she is and in an environment that she can handle. Lily is free to build forts without having them destroyed, Dan can cook in the kitchen and have the knives out on the counter, and I don't have to keep looking behind me to keep from being hit or hurt. Without living in that environment for two weeks you cannot know the relief that we feel to out of it. Instead of feeling sad or scared that our daughter is in a psychiatric hospital, we have peace and hope for her recovery. That is God's Grace in the ups and downs of life.

Code Green

We hospitalized Acadia yesterday. We went to the hospital intending to do an intake eval for the day program. It had just dawned on me the day before that Acadia Hospital (the private psych hospital in Bangor) has a day program for kids that I could try to get Acadia into. On the way into the appointment she screamed "Help!" for 30 min. I think she sensed what was about to happen. We got about 20 min into the eval and the clinician said "I don't really need to go any further. I can tell you right now that she should be admitted." When Acadia heard that, she bolted. She opened the door and started running down the halls. The clinician pushed the button on the wall. "Code Green in the Access Center!" 15 people appeared out of nowhere and 4 of them restrained her. They were very calm and quiet, and only spoke a few necessary words. They used her name and asked her to calm down. Even with four people holding her she was still trying to bite, kick, and get away! I thought "Wow, I've been doing that by myself, and it's actually a four person job."
So since we were at the hospital when this happened, they immediately started the process (with my permission) for admission. I was relieved to have avoided the whole emergency room scene this time. I even felt a bit sly for having found the back door in to the system!
After we got her a room, Mom and I left. She threw a fit and had to be restrained again, but eventually she calmed down. We went to meet Bekah and Evan at the mall and I got a little baby therapy before we headed home. Dan and I packed Acadia's bag and got her a happy meal and went back to the hospital. We played a game and got all her stuff put away in her room. I read "The Stinky Cheese Man" to her. When we left she started in again, but I don't know yet how things went after that. We plan to go visit again this afternoon.
I feel so relieved to have her in the hospital. I knew I was tired and getting depressed and feeling trapped, but I feel all of that melting away now that I know she is in good hands. I was very impressed with the hospital and the staff, and I feel like she really needs to be there to get the intensive care that she needs right now.

God complex

We tried to go to church this morning, but we never made it out the door. Acadia had her morning episode and that pretty much took away any thoughts we had of getting to church. She has been having 2-4 episodes per day now. These are mixed states of surging energy and dark thoughts, which usually results in screaming, crying, hitting herself and others, and raging through the house making huge messes. Other times she is just irritable or hyper and silly. The most disturbing thing right now is her fixation on trying to figure out why life is worth living. She also has this heightened spiritualality or as Dan described it this morning a "God complex". When she is upset she starts talking (or yelling, or crying) to God and asking him to do things or answer her questions. It's strange, I want her to pray, to reach out to God in the midst of her struggles, but this is not quite right. She was frantically searching her Bible this morning for verses that tell parents not to torture their children. She was praying that we would stop being cruel to her and that God would help her show us how wrong we are. She keeps telling us to do what God wants us to do. Then she sits there and screams that she is doing what God wants her to do. She wanted us to go to church so that we would learn something.
Since all that blew over, she's been okay this morning. She has these hours of being calm before she explodes again. We've decided to keep her at home unless she tries to injure herself or someone else, or unless the episodes get closer together again.

To Whom it may concern

I sat there while you spoke to her, trying to figure out if I was really hearing those words. You did not yell. If you had I would have jumped up and blocked her ears. I would have used my body as a shield against the arrow coming at her. But I didn't know until it was too late. Words cannot be gathered up and put back again. They are arrows that sink deeply in the heart. That makes them especially hard to forgive. When they hurt a child, they are hard to forget.
You are an adult. She is a child with mental illness who has been suffering more than she ever has before. Dan and I have been painstakingly rebuilding the house of cards that is her emotional stability. Trying to show her that we love her unconditionally and yet have standards for behavior. Rewarding her progress with praise and encouragement. She was doing well today. Really only two episodes with many hours in between. She was struggling this evening, but she was pulling through. She ate dinner at the table. Do you even know what it took for her to be able to do that? When you asked her to stop saying things over and over, she did. When I asked her to log off the computer, she did. She was frustrated, but she did what she was asked to do with no fighting. That was huge! When she let out a short scream, it was like a pressure valve allowing a burst of steam to escape, so that nothing explodes, so that the situation doesn't become dangerous. She was calming down, when you walked in and spoke your piece..and she went to pieces.
She blames herself. She thinks that if she were never born, you would still be here and we would all be laughing and playing a game together. That we would all be happier without her. She hates herself, wants to die, wants to know why she should keep living. Thinks she can't do anything right. Won't listen to a word I try to say.
Her tears burn my heart. I can't stop the arrows she aims at herself, anymore than I could stop the ones that come flying.
But why? Why do they fill the air over the head of my little girl. She is sick. She doesn't mean to be, she is not manipulating, she is not pretending. Why can't thinking adults just understand that!
Sometimes all I can do is write. When she is finally done for the day, I take all the outrage and pour it through my fingers. I don't have the energy to do anything else with it.