Hard days & God's Mercy

I had my first appointment (16 week appointment) with my regular OBGYN doctors today since the diagnosis. Baby Girl's heartbeat was nice & strong. I actually had the appt with the doctor who delivered Bella. My practice has 6 women, and any of the 6 could be the delivery doctor. She had been filled in with the specialists findings and it was basically just a time for me to ask questions. I didn't have tons, just two really. One was "How often have y'all delivered a baby with Trisomy?" I knew it wouldn't be tons, but I was super surprised that she said, "Well, a couple of YEARS ago we had a girl who decided to carry the baby to term and made it to birth..." A couple of YEARS ago??? That is crazy to me. This is a huge, busy practice. I know that Trisomy is 1) rare 2) some decide to terminate the pregnancy and 3) many don't make it full term - but WOW.

Which leads me to the title of my blog tonight. I had a couple of hard days this week. I found myself, for the first time really, asking "Why ME??" Not that I'd EVER wish it on anyone... but why me? I know that may never be answered. But that on top of the worry of it all got a hold of me this week. I just didn't see how I was going to find joy in this pregnancy. How was I ever going to NOT think about my situation? It's on my mind 24/7. I was short with people around me, and I just wanted to sleep it away. "Wake me up next year," I thought. Though I know staying "busy" is a good way to keep my mind off of it, I also wasn't in the mood to be around anyone else. I was fine with the girls, but night time was hard after the day of worry had taken it's toll on me. (And don't worry a bit if you feel bad for not checking in on me. I'm more than likely to act like nothing is wrong anyway... I'm tricky like that :))

A blog of a husband & wife who went through this a couple of years ago has been so helpful. They reminded me that this is God's purpose in this little girl, no matter how long or short. I want to celebrate that, no matter how hard.

"Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." (Hebrews 4:16)

I love this verse and the promise it contains! The last few words could be translated, "...and find grace for a well-timed help." God's grace comes to us just when we need it, not before and never too late. That is why Jesus says not to worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow has enough trouble of its own, but God is already there and His mercies are new every morning, just when we need them. So how do we look into an utterly unpredictable future with, most likely, a great deal of grief and loss in it without becoming morose, self-centered, and depressed? How do we go on loving other people when we are scared and our hearts are grieving over what is to come? We preach Hebrews 4:16 to ourselves every day and fight the fight of faith in God's goodness and love for us. We approach the throne of grace with confidence! His grace will be sufficient and we can even rejoice in our sufferings because we have such and amazing God who will meet our needs at exactly the best moments.

That paragraph above is taken from their blog. Because I can't write that good, and I'm not good at paraphrasing. (Never have been, ask my parents and those darn book reports they helped me with.) And I think they said it just perfectly. I can't do this on my own, and God knows that. So why not just receive the mercy he's giving me?

So the past two days have been better. I know I'll have dark days in the future, but I also can come out of them confidently knowing I'm not alone and CHOOSE to see God's blessing in all of this.