the grays and pinks

It was morning, but not that early. And, still, his eyes could hardly stay open. Not from being sleep deprived, but because he didn't want to look at what was before him...
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Georgia Gray? Sandstone? Silver Pearl? ... Oh, how to choose?
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Those are all stone colors... For headstones that is.
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Yesterday morning, D spent a few hours back at a funeral home he has been "frequenting." Is that weird to read? It's weird to type. But this is life. Well, the ugly side of it anyways.
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It is a roller coaster. So much so, that D actually got in his car and drove straight from the funeral home to meet me and the mid-wife for an appointment yesterday. Talk about highs and lows...
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Hope is a hard thing. So is trust...
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I mean, I hope (and pray) for the best... I trust regardless. And in simple things that is, well, simple. With this, it isn't.
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From funeral homes, to mid-wife appointments, to tentative burial plans... My head is spinning. Yeah... Trust is hard... Hope is too.
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Yesterday when we met with the mid-wife she checked April's heart rate... It is still in the 130's. I am still 2cm dilated. And... You ready? ... I have grown.
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Meaning, they stopped measuring me early on, because, I wasn't growing, or well "expanding" like I should have been. They explained that April's cells were not healthy enough anymore, and eventually her growth completely stopped; so did mine. My belly stayed small. But a few weeks after they told me she had stopped growing, I asked them to still measure me... You know, just in case. And every appointment they have done so, and every appointment there has been no change. Yesterday though, there was change. Subtle, yes. But change. Growth... Not something this pregnancy has seen any of in the last 3+ months.
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The Dr.'s don't have answers. And I guess I am beginning to wonder what it all means myself. A heart rate that goes up and up, and then stays up, when the Dr.'s said it would surely just get lower. A belly that is showing growth, when they said that wasn't possible...
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I'll tell you what's not possible - To not catch a glimmer. To not hope for the best. I went to Target earlier tonight, and while I usually avoid the baby stuff all together, I not only went past that section, I stopped. I wanted to buy April little socks and little dresses. I wanted to rush home and paint the office walls pink, and trade my bulky desk for a perfect little crib. All of this good news as of late, makes me want those things so much more. I guess you kind of get to thinking that new "options" are on the table. But are they, really?
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I mean, what is the deal, God?
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Are we on the very brink of a miracle? ... Are You healing April? ... Should I stop looking at shades of gray stone, and start looking at shades of pink? ... Oh, it is scary to dream about the miracle, when you are trying so hard to prepare for the fall.
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You see, when your world is shaken, and your heart is broken apart, and some nights you can't even see the computer screen in front of you, through all the tears, well, then you know grief. And let's not sugar-coat it; it sucks.
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And like I said, trust in the midst of grief is hard. Trust in the midst of the the unknown is hard.
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But something I am more and more convinced of daily is that we were created with the intention that we would be together forever. We were given all of these deep and powerful emotions; love and compassion and memory and desire... The very things that enable us to maintain relationships forever. We have these things.
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So what happens when time is cut short? When life is taken? When death occurs?
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We grieve.
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Naturally.
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We question.
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Naturally.
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We want answers.
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But what if the grief that we feel is that proof that we were never meant to be apart? And that longing, that heart break, that "homesick-feeling"... What if that is the proof that we will be together again?
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I mean, we look for answers. We look for God. We look for certainties, because everything is so out of sorts.
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But what if the grief is that proof?
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Proof (through our pain, and our unanswered questions, and our longing) that this cannot be it. That life was not meant to be this way. That this was not God's original design? What if our pain is the very proof of the very life to come?

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What if the grief is actually part of the hope?

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I've said it before, and I will say it again... I know this world is not our home. That becomes clearer to me every day. This world just can not be it...

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Some days that is hard to cling to... Other days it is all you've got.

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But all days, my hope and faith are in Christ. And that grief along the way? - Oh, it still sucks. Kind of like my stone choice - "Blue Pearl," two words I never want to hear together again...

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Sigh.

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For now, I grieve in gray, and hope in pink, and know that regardless, when I am home, and I mean really home, I will see that the pains of this world were used by God, very intentionally, to make me exactly who I was supposed to be... Even if it sucked while I lived it.