Such a Wide Freedom

Everyone’s grief is unique and your stage in the process of healing as a Hope Mom might be such that this post is not an ideal read for you right now. I want to make you aware in advance that I am writing about my pregnancy after loss. Most of all, I desire that this post give hope of the freedom that comes with inviting God into grief.
With love,
Lianna

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There is a baby growing inside of me today. My husband and I are in disbelief. We are 15 weeks along in this pregnancy and our daughter, Noelle, whom we lost at 42 weeks, would have been two years old in three short months.

As I grieved the loss of my daughter with the Lord over the past nearly two years, I thought that I would be doing it for Noelle and myself. I would learn how to accept healing from the Lord and, then, be healed. I would learn that healing is not a step beyond loving Noelle, because moving toward God cannot mean moving away from anything good. Instead, healing is only putting her in better hands than mine, His. So, in His hands, I would learn to take joy in Noelle as she is now: full, complete, and residing in heavenly glory. And I would learn to incorporate her into my life here too, because she is, of course, a part of our God-given family.

In a sense, we have reached a kind of end to our earthly grief. It is not the end of ever again experiencing that sharp pain of missing our daughter, nor is it the end of longing for our daughter. Rather, it is a resolution to the fundamental questions of grief through Scriptural truths. This is where I have arrived in it:

1. My longing for Noelle is good (Ps. 127:3)
2. Her death is not good (Gen. 3)
3. God can miraculously bring good from not good (Gen. 50:20; Rom. 8:28)
4. On earth I have His comfort amidst my love-filled longing for my daughter (2 Cor. 1:4)
5. My daughter is a part of my family even though we cannot see her (Ps. 127:3)
6. Noelle is joyously with the Lord, belonging not to me, but Him (2 Sam. 12:23)
7. She resides in the place where just as she has, and most of all, I will join Him—who I also have now (Ps. 34:9; 1 Thess. 4:13).

Now, 15 weeks along with a new baby, my husband and I wonder aloud if our children will look similar. We talk about how we will tell this new baby about his or her big sister. We marvel that now, we have babies, children, and siblings. We devise how to possibly divide our wall space so that we can put up as many hangings about this new baby as we have about Noelle. We create ideas about how to portray Noelle as part of our family in the family pictures we will take when the new baby comes. We long together with words of missing Noelle and wishing she could be here to do all of this with us. We anticipate together our new baby. In disbelief, we remind ourselves that, Lord willing, this pregnancy will result in a baby to kiss and hold for longer than a day, one who is alive in our arms.

I talk freely about Noelle and all of the realities that surround her: our longing for her, her present location, her part in our family, and our future with her; I talk freely about a new baby with excitement and joy all his or her own.

So, the work of grief has had multiple returns. Not only has it been for me and for Noelle, it has also been, in a way, for this new baby too. I wouldn’t have imagined it then. But now, I can thank the Lord for the gift of moving forward not only with the truths and comfort I have known, but with their practical result in my life: such a wide freedom.

This post originally appeared on the Hope Mommies blog on January 20, 2015

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Lianna (@liannadavis) is wed to Tyler and mom of two dear daughters. She is author of Made for a Different Land: Eternal Hope for Baby Loss (Hope Mommies, 2019). More of her writing can be found at her website.

We would be honored to share your story as a Hope Mom on our blog. On Saturdays we feature Hope Moms’ stories in order to showcase God’s faithfulness even in the midst of such deep sorrow. If you would like to have your story shared on our blog for this purpose, learn more and submit here.

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