I discovered I was pregnant with our second child almost immediately. I think I sensed when I became pregnant with her. I told Rob, my husband and he said, "Already!" A home pregnancy confirmed my suspicions. At the time, our daughter, Jordan was just turned 2. I couldn't wait to give her a sibling. I dreamed of having a girl, another sweet girl to raise and love. I dreamed of having a boy, a miniature of my husband. Either way, I just wanted a healthy baby. Right from the start though, I felt there was something different about this pregnancy. Instead of gaining weight in the first trimester, I was losing weight. The midwife at the practice I went to did not seem worried, so I put it in the back of my mind. My due date was set for June 26, 1999. Once I made it through the first trimester, what could go wrong? I was so innocent.
February 3rd, 1999 was a day that changed my life forever. I was 19 weeks pregnant and we had a routine ultrasound scheduled that day. Rob took off half a day from work to go with me. On the way over we made silly bets about the baby's gender- I said "boy" and Rob said "girl". The ultrasound started out routine enough. Rob was asking the tech all kinds of questions and I was saving mine until she got through the "boring" stuff. She poined out perfect hands and feet to us. She couldn't find the gender. Then the ultrasound tech's face became more and more strained as she stared at the screen and took tons of pictures. I noticed her pictures were centering around the head, but that couldn't be the head- it didn't look right. "Don't think about it, your not a professional!" I told myself. Then she sent us into one of the exam rooms to wait for the doctor. I didn't have a doctor's appointment that day. The doctor walked in and came right to the point, "Your pregnancy is not compatible with life. The baby's head and skull are not formed correctly. The baby will die either before or shortly after birth." Stunned, we just stared at her and then I started crying, and Rob had tears running down his cheeks. This couldn't be right?! But after a full day of ultrasounds and specialists, the verdict was in. Our sweet baby had a neural tube defect called anencephaly, which is a condition where the brain and skull do not form correctly or at all. In our case, only the brain stem was present. The doctor gave us our options. We could induce labor early, hope the baby was born alive and say goodbye. Or, we could go to term or until the baby passed away, induce labor and say goodbye. For a variety of reasons, women carrying anencephalic babies usually do not go into labor on their own unless the baby has passed away. It was the worst day of our lives. We had this tremendous decision to make. We spent the evening talking and crying with family and friends. Everyone had an opinion, but nobody had an answer. The pastor of our church encouraged us to pray and that he would pray that God would show us the right thing to do. Being too tired to pray for anything, my husband and I drug ourselves upstairs to bed.
The next morning, I woke early and went downstairs. I fell to my knees and cried out to God. I said, "This is too much to bear, Lord!" He gave me two scriptures: "Cast your burdens on the Lord, and He will sustain you. He will never permit the righteous to be moved." and "There is a way that seems right to a man, but the way is the way of death." I got the message. I gave my baby over to the Lord, for the first time but certainly not for the last. I put my hand in the Lord and trusted in His sustaining strength which was sufficient for me every day. The next 23 weeks were very difficult. My times with the Lord were very intense. My husband and I prayed for our baby to be healed every day. We had people in our church and friends and family across the country praying for our baby. Thankfully we had very balanced leadership in our church, and they constantly reminded us of the Lord's sovereignty in all of this. This baby belongs to God and I knew that He would take care of her in either outcome. So many times I felt like Abraham when he placed his child on the altar- having to put all my dreams, desires and expectations to death. There were many days that I told the Lord, "If you could just get me through today!" I often wondered, if my baby died, would my faith hold up under the strain. |
