Monday will be 2 weeks since Mackinley joined and left our family. I spent the last 5 months looking forward to as well as dreading her birth. Knowing that it would take her from us. And I spent a lot of time wondering how I would keep going. Would I spend my days crying, mourning the baby I no longer hold? Would I feel as though any instances of joy were a betrayal to her? How would I keep going? The morning after we had Mackinley I woke around 8am. Jared was still sleeping and our other 3 children were at his parents house. As I left the bedroom for a shower Jared asked me where I was going. I told him "I have to make a choice. I have to get out of this bed because if I don't I will lay here and cry all day." Just as that day consisted of making a concious choice to move forward so has everyday since she left. Each morning I have to chose to get out of bed and move ahead. Jared has helped me so much, when people ask questions and I can't muster the strength to speak he takes that burden from me.
We had the opportunity to go to a Utah Jazz basketball game this week. Being LDS we made sure to stop in at Temple square, before we came home. While we were there we watched a video about God's plan for families and the role and responsibilities of parents. This video is shown in different rooms that depict different life events in families. The second room we entered was a nursery for a baby girl, and it greeted us with the cry of a newborn baby. The second I entered I broke down, and the whole in my heart ripped wide open. As the video played it talked about how as parents we need to teach our children that they are childen of a heavenly Father that loves them, and that families are forever,and ho w much they are loved by their parents. While my heart ached fo the baby not in my arms there was a peace that came to me. It came as a testament to me that MAckinley knows she is a daughter of God and that he loves her, she knows her family is forever, and she knows how much Jared and I love her. The second I walked into the visitors center I felt her with me, walking with Jared and I in that holy place.
And while the days are rough, and sometimes the pain is so intense I can't even talk about her because it hurts so deeply, I will continue on. I push through the days and when I kneel next to my incredible husband in prayer to close our day the tears pour as if a dam has broken. Because I feel her near and long to hold her, I will keep going taking what seems to be 3 steps forward and sliding 2 steps back, because I know what I need to do to hold her again. And when the times are espically hard I say to myself the scripture I shared at her viewing. John 14:27 "peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto to you. Let not your heart be troubled neithe let it be afraid." I know where she is and i know she is waiting.
You are amazing and remain in my prayers.
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