sweet hurting november december....

today is monday.

today is any other day. in the life of me. a mom. wife. daughter. sister and friend. 

today is a time where some might be decorating for the holiday season.

it might be cheery and fun and lovely. evoking tradition and merriment.

for some though, it might be the most painful of days...how to muster up joy when your heart is breaking.

how to pull this stocking out of the box and put it up, knowing a little five year old girl won't be opening it christmas morning.

i use to think it was so cruel that our daughter died a week after thanksgiving, my favorite holiday. that she died so close to christmas, a beautiful JOYful time of the year that i love and hold dear to my christian heart along with easter.

i used to get mad at years past that i was supposed to be full of merriment and joy like so many in the midst of these glorious grateful seasons, all the while, my heart was broken in two and i was dying inside. i just plain didn't like it or think it was fair. why not some other time of the year, God? where i didn't have to hurt so much at such a special time.........

i started taking down my give thanks things. and remembered these people that live close to my heart that filled our house this last week....

and i gave thanks. for them. and for a season that reminds my heart to give thanks period.

  and then today...as i pulled out her stocking. and her ornaments. 

and the ornament pic of me with her in my swollen belly.....so excited to meet her, yet the picture was taken only days before we would lose her....

as i took out these little girl treasures, i cried. i always do each christmas since she's been gone and i put her things out. i miss her so. i want her to be here. i cried. and i swallowed tears. and pain.

five year old deep down invisible pain.

and then i began setting out my nativities.

   

and my heart swooned at the baby jesus that laid in the manger in my entry....he came to make all sad things untrue. i put out my ornaments of seasons past, and i smiled with each one that came into my tear filled hands. i made little areas of holiday joy for our boys in their rooms, in the bathrooms and even in our room.

 i set up my bulgarian nativity given to me by my mom, the sweet nativity that was handmade by bulgarian orphans, many disabled, that she met on her recurring mission trip there. and i prayed for them and thanked God for them. and marveled at their craftsmanship.

i purposely hung lights around the little homemade treasures so that the Christ birth picture could shine glorious in the room. my heart began to fill..maybe not so much empty of the pain, but fill to the brim and over, atop the pain...with a joy that only comes from a steadfast and creative and loving good God.

i smiled through tears as i realized that God in his kindness actually allowed me to enter into my grief stages in the MOST special seasons so that my heart would cling to and long for and remember those SPECIAL season reasons. from the very first christmas without her....it's almost as if he knew my gray-hurting-heart would need the extra color of reds and golds to lift it from the fog. as if he knew my sad looming heart would need the loud songs of carols and hymns playing all around me to remind me to sing. as if he knew my shaking faith and hurting heart would need to literally see baby jesus before my eyes in a manger to remind me of his redeeming love that would conquer death at the cross. it's as if he knew my heart needed to be wrapped in THANKSGIVING (of him) and Christmas SAVIOR birth in the midst of my deep heartache season.

i found myself thanking him. thanking him in a most morbid and unnatural and weird to many way, for letting me grieve. for letting me grieve and hurt IN the most special times of the year for me. not so unfair at all maybe. but letting me be so sad NOW, in november and december, so that my heart would be so lifted and so focused on my "Hope seasons that i claim in my girl's life and death" that i would remember and recall where my Hope comes from. why he was born at all....that he would let me not have to go too far to look for him or feel him in this painful season-Season. it's as if he knew my heart. and what it needed. and he did. and he does. praise HIM!

we will celebrate and miss our baby girl, five years in heaven this friday. our home will be decked and blessed with color and lights and her name will be adorning stockings and ornaments all about our family tree. this is love. that she can somehow be celebrated in such a sweet season for me. that her name is a part of our traditions and celebration and while she may not be here on earth, i feel she is all about me, as i see her name. in such a painful week, i see her name and initials dancing before me. and this i know is a gift from God. to see this and feel this grace, to know this sweet mercy. because my flesh would scream something else if i wanted it to....yet, today, HIS grace allowed me to see something deeper and more beautifully helpful and gracious and merciful. something that i called sweet today. amidst my tears and my heaven groaning and heart aching, i called my pain sweet. it drew me to my Lord and i thanked him for being there. for never leaving me alone. not even in november and december.