Quote from 'Home" by Marilynne Robinson

"Her father told his children to pray for patience, for courage, for kindness, for clarity, for trust, for gratitude. Those prayers will be answered he said. Others may not be."
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I had meant to put a blue carnation on the table this last Saturday, in remembrance of my little (too little) boy's "birthday".

Instead, last Thursday we made a manic, middle of the night, emergency dash the the hospital, in hopes that next year we will have a birthday celebration and not remembrance. I have been here in the hospital since then, and was not at my table Saturday to place his flower.

I am trying to be steady and brave. I am trying not to focus on the scary part--there will be increased likely hood of the "ifs" that come with risking your heart on a child anyway.

I am looking around me and only letting myself think it went so well this time; my daughter has a chance. I am trying not to dwell on the anger of knowing maybe had we figured out then what we know now, my son would have had a chance too. But last Thursday night was not the first time I have felt I had to put the memory of the boy I lost aside to focus on the girl I need to save. When they told me what was happening to her, and that is was likely what had happened to him, I had to be glad of the findings and move forward, when I wanted to cry and ask why no one had thought of this when he may have been helped too.

I am humbled by the stories of other mothers --to think they have the strength to go on and hope when their babies are smaller, weaker, or their child is sicker, and suffering over and over--Because of them, I am trying to be only grateful for the few extra weeks of safety the discovery and intervention gave my new child, for the few extra days the antibiotics gave her time to stay and grow, for the technology they have to sustain her when she gets here, for the little ones who came before her and taught her doctors what to do, and for her strong little heartbeat that hasn't wavered on the monitor since they started watching it Thursday night.

In a few days, there will be a new person on this world that will have as much of my love and worry as my first daughter does. It's hard to imagine there could ever be another person to enter this world that could make me love that hard again. I can only imagine how it will feel to have my heart become that much bigger.

I am amazed. I am blessed. I am trying to put Grateful before Terrified.