1.17.2006

Goodbye Miles

I write this post with much sadness, but not without hope, and not without love and peace in my heart and all around me.
Yesterday we lost our little baby. I really had a feeling it was a boy, and it was too small to tell, so we named him Miles as we had planned for a boy. He was very small, too small in fact. I was 19 weeks pregnant, but he was only the size of a 13 week old fetus. Something was not right, and so we are thankful that he did not have to suffer and that it happened now for us and not later. We are grieving this loss, and as we have never lost before, we don't know how long it will take or what the days ahead hold for us emotionally or spiritually. However, we have been so blessed and overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support from our family and friends all across the world, and it has been precious to have tears of grief joined by tears of gratitude and love for the support we have.
God has not been absent in this, and even though I don't understand why he gave us this life to begin with, since he knew what would be, I am comforted at the thought of Miles knowing no life but one with God. We felt God's grace and presence with us strongly as we faced the day yesterday. My labor went very quickly, just as we prayed it would when the nurse told us it would take 8-12 hours. God knew how much we could bear and he gave us an amazing doctor who I loved, and will love seeing again, wonderful nurses, and the easiest and quickest labor I could have had. There will be many confused prayers of anger and of despair in my future, but I am sure that this will only make my faith stronger and it has already made our marriage stronger as this has pulled Jason and I closer than we've ever been before.
We are so thankful for our friends and family and so comforted that we don't have to grieve alone. We have much hope and we know that we will get through this and pray we come out stronger through it in faith, hope and in love.