Three weeks ago on Wednesday, March 1st, Tannan and I found out some super exciting news…

We were pregnant!

To be honest though, I knew a couple days after becoming pregnant that we would be expecting another little one. We had been praying for this moment for awhile! We knew with Marcus being the age he was and with my wedding schedule only allotting for a certain period of time off, this was great timing!

When we saw the positive pregnancy test we were overjoyed! We were so thankful and excited! We sat down on our bed right away to pray over our child and the pregnancy. I have had a few girlfriends go through the tragedy of a miscarriage and I had some anxieties about it.  I knew we needed the Lord to protect this baby and see the pregnancy through to full term. I’ve always known we aren’t guaranteed or have a “right” to a healthy pregnancy, but we were trusting and hoping that the Lord would give that to us.

We could hardly wait until Marcus woke up the next morning to tell him. Tannan sat him down and I got my video on my phone ready to record him. We asked him if he wanted to hear the big news and feeding off of our excitement, he happily said “yes”! We told him he was going to be a big brother and that there was a baby in mommy’s belly. We asked him if he was excited to be a big brother, if he was excited to play with him and if he was excited to meet him. With each question, just another resounding yes. I know he’s only two, but I do like to think that he somewhat understood what we were saying.

I continued to have a few different symptoms, but overall they were pretty light. When I was pregnant with Marcus I actually didn’t know until I was 18 weeks along… another story for another time…

We started to tell a few friends and family the good news! Everyone was so excited with us and for Marcus to become a big brother. He’s definitely at that age where we are seeing the need for him to have another friend around the house that he can play with and grow up with.

As we told everyone, our hearts began to sink into the news. And truthfully, all it took was those first few days that I really felt like I was pregnant for me to let my heart escape into the hopes and dreams I was starting to have with growing a family. I was excited to see Marcus love on a little brother.  I was excited to go through the “baby-stage” again as Marcus has definitely reached little boy mode now! I was excited for another little one to learn the love and joy that they would bring to this family like Marcus has already brought to us.

Tannan and I had a gut feeling it was going to be another boy. Tannan had been praying for a boy for awhile. And the pregnancy felt the exact same as when I was pregnant with Marcus! Even though we would have been SO excited and blessed by either a son or daughter!

Unlike the last pregnancy though, this one felt so real from day one. With not knowing for so long last time, it all felt so rushed by the time we did know! We had to buy a house, a bigger car and get all these things lined up before Marcus was born… and we only had about 4 months to do all that!

With this baby, from the very beginning we knew what to expect. We knew the love we would have for him right when they entered this world and even before as he grew in my belly. Tannan began greeting me, Marcus and the baby when he came in from work and we would constantly be reminding Marcus of the little one that was on the way!

Everything seemed so perfect and so perfectly a part of the great plan we had conjured up in our heads and hoped for.

Last Friday night, March 17th, 2017 we went into the emergency room here in Goshen to find out a couple hours later that we’d actually never be able to meet our little one here on earth.

I was a mess.

I have experienced hard news before but nothing in my life so far that made me feel so alone and like I wanted to retreat from everyone and everything.

As Tannan and I sat there in the ER room and then through the series of tests they did, it felt like everything was spinning out of control. How could the baby have died, just like that. All the hopes and dreams started to slip through our fingers and it felt so hopeless because there was truly nothing either of us could do about it except sit there and take in the news.

The days that have followed have been a rollercoaster of emotions. Thankfully, within moments we were being surrounded by friends that were willing to process this with us, but obviously nothing truly takes the pain away.

I don’t think anyone can fully understand this situation unless they have endured it themselves (just like with anything in life really). I totally get that it’s harder for other people to relate to. No one experienced our baby like we did, so it’s harder for others to feel the loss with us. It makes sense that miscarriage is often a lonely path because it feels like you’ve truly experienced the death of a son or daughter, where most see it as an incredibly unfortunate circumstance that has happened to you in your pregnancy. With that said though, we have been SO blessed by friends and family being a huge support system and sending flowers, meals, hugs, texts and messages throughout this week! Each one is so special and means more than we can say.

But the weight of the loss is still heavy.

I find myself one minute questioning why this happened, and then the next minute being in complete peace that the Lord has some plan for this. Even still though death isn’t suppose to happen. It wasn’t what He had intended when He created this world…

Over this year I’ve had the privilege of being a part of Bible Study Fellowship at a local church, and through that I have been able to dive into the book of John and learn more about the character of Jesus. I’ve learned how He cared for His disciples and for His mother. I’ve learned how He healed the blind and raised Lazarus from the dead. But my favorite part I’ve been reminded about Him is the compassion He feels when we hurt.

There are times when I am tempted to think God is removed as he makes these life altering decisions without a care as to how we feel about them. Well in the story of Lazarus, we learned that Jesus was submitting to God’s will to wait to go to him until Lazarus had passed because God wanted Jesus to have a bigger purpose. He wanted Him to raise Lazarus from the dead to help strengthen the faith of those surrounding the tomb. But Jesus felt the death of His friend and felt the weight of the sorrow the people mourning there were feeling. He wept with them. He didn’t just say, “Hey, wait a second, just wait until you see what I do… it’s going to make this all better.” He sat there with them in that moment and wept with them… EVEN THOUGH He knew exactly what was about to happen. Whoa, I don’t know about you, but that was SO comforting for me to hear.

Jesus takes time to be with us in our moments of sorrow… EVEN WHEN He knows that His will is in full effect and everything is going to be worked out for good.

I have honestly struggled the last few days with the fact that we prayed in faith that God would protect our child. We asked that the Lord would provide a healthy pregnancy, that we would be able to live and laugh with our baby boy (or girl). We trusted that God is big enough to hear our cries and powerful enough to even stop the inevitable. As I have battled with these thoughts, I was listening to a worship song and one lyric jumped out at me and stopped me in my tracks….

“He is worthy of our trust!”

Over this last week, I have struggled with trusting God with my heart because I feel like He let us down. I’ve struggled to know if He really heard us or just ignored us. However, I recognize that my foundation is built on a solid rock that is not dependant on the amount of faith I have, but on Whom my faith is resting in! Through the demonstration of Christ’s love for us on the cross it reminds me of the truth that He is worthy of our trust. Jesus is worthy of our praise, our adoration, and our lives!

I don’t have all the answers, this is all so new to us, but I do have one thing right now…

Hope.

I have hope that Jesus is who He says He is and because of that I can trust Him. I have hope that He feels with me and is present with me in these moments that feel lonely. I have hope that our Savior mourns alongside of Tannan and I even when He sees that His will is in full effect. I have hope that someday we’ll be able to share with others how the Lord saw us through this trying time and used it for His glory and our good. I have hope that the Lord will expand our family and that we will cherish this next life all the more. And I know that our little one is in such a better place than we are right now, which gives us a great amount of peace!

I truly can’t explain the depth of thankfulness I have for knowing Jesus during this time! He has given us hope and peace that defies what I know we should be feeling right now. He is good and true and even though we mourn, we trust and know that this world is not our home… and for that we’re thankful, because let’s be honest, it’s a tough place!

Trials like these have me longing and looking for the day when He will wipe every tear from our eyes and death shall be nor more. Neither will there  be any crying or pain! The former things will have passed away and He will make all things new!

“May the God of hope fill you with all
joy and peace as you trust in him, so
that you may overflow with hope
by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
– Romans 15:13