Trusting God With My Child

No one warned me before watching the movie ‘Up’  that the introduction leaves you needing professional counselling. Or maybe it’s the writers’ intention to leave you processing it for hours as a distraction from the rest of the ridiculous/stupid/boring storyline. The rest of the plot follows an unlikely friendship between an old widower, a boy-scout and a flying house. You’ve probably seen it but if you haven’t, I’m not going to throw out a ‘spoiler alert’ because I wouldn’t encourage you to waste your time watching and quite frankly, my spoilers are all you need.

The wordless 5 minute introduction follows a sequence of scenes throughout the life of the old man, beginning as a young boy playing in an abandoned house with a little girl, who we see him marry as a young man, and ends with her death and an image of him nursing his grief. Honestly, my keyboard is a little damp just remembering it. The timeline is set to music, ofcourse (que more tears) and the unassuming watcher, especially the pregnant unassuming watcher who just wants to tap out of life for an hour, may find themselves in buckets of tears as we see the newly married couple paint a nursery, only to return from hospital with empty arms. They never have any more children. And at the end of the timeline, the old man’s arms are emptier than ever. 

I know, right?! Like I said, the rest of the movie is a snooze-fest but that introduction was so beautifully told and borderline traumatic viewing, it will probably stay with me forever. And evidently, with my 7 year old too. 

Later that night, bedtime was a cocktail of silly-dances and requests for water, tissues, teddy-bears, more water, and then a stern word from an exasperated father. As he danced around the bathroom with his toothbrush in his cheek and toothpaste splattering at my feet, I had a feeling Reuben was dancing around a brewing question too. As I was leaving his room and had one foot over the doorway, one foot in freedom and one in the eternal bedtime routine, I heard that familiar moan, “Muuuuum”. 

I braced myself. 

“Yes, honey?”

Here it comes.

“Is our baby going to die?” 

Yep, there it is. I gathered my thoughts while I gathered the pieces of my shattered heart up off the floor, wondering how to hold onto his shattered innocence. I mean, so far the baby has been perfectly healthy, except for a few alarming growth measurements, which turned out to be more about my body shape than our baby’s size. 

But I’ve been a mother long enough and I’ve worked with mothers long enough to know that we can’t take one single day of pregnancy for granted. From fertilisation to baby's first breath. We have no control over any of it. In some ways that’s freeing, but anyone who has lost their precious baby will tell you sometimes there’s far more comfort in control. It didn’t seem fair to tell my first baby about miscarriage and why some other babies don’t make it. Some day he’ll have lots of wrestling of his own to do, with a good God in one hand and not-so-good suffering in the other. But ‘some day’ doesn’t have to begin now, does it? 

Through bated breath, I told him about how some babies don’t make it. I assured him that, so far, our baby was making it. But if not, God would hold us tight. The next morning he was VERY invested in how my appointment with the midwife went and later as we walked along Hillsborough Lake he silently pulled me by the hand away from the water’s edge. He wouldn’t let go until he could trust that I was going to walk on the other side of the path. When I asked him why he was so worried he confessed, “I know you can swim but the baby can’t and I don’t want it to die”. Guess who got an extra big ice-cream at the end of the walk? (I did too).

***

Beside a banner that read, ‘Baby Shower’, I watched Reubs dive headfirst into a box of nachos. So far, our surprise ‘Big Brother Baby Shower’ for him had gone down well, complete with a new cape, skittle flavoured slushies (I know - that was a ‘daddy’ job), free donuts from a new sweet shop, too much pizza, a movie night, puppet shows and a (failed) living room sleepover (due to too much pizza). It was just the three of us, partly because of lockdown, but mostly because we needed this moment together. We needed to make a big deal out of being his parents before he watches us become parents to someone else too. We needed to take a moment to savour our ‘threeness’, which hardly ever looks this extravagant and delicious, but is still equally as savourable. Reuben saw a baby shower on Cbeebies months ago and he never let it go. Granted, it was aimed at a toddler preparing for a new sibling and I think Reubs just loves any excuse for a party. Which is fine by us because we love any excuse to celebrate him. 

I’ve spent every sleepless night of the last 10 months (40 weeks isn’t 9 months, okay? It’s a looooooong 10 months) worrying about how Reuben will be affected. Honestly, I melt my own head.

The closer we get to bringing another baby into this messed up world, the more I want to shelter our first baby from heavy conversations, worries, changes, hurts… or basically from growing up. 

When it was just us, I worried about how single parenting would affect him. When Paddy came into our lives, I worried about how sharing me would affect him. When he started to see Paddy as his dad, I worried about how being adopted would affect him. When I got pregnant, I worried about how the age gap would affect him. On the surface I was wishing that he’d have that closer sibling relationship, but under the surface in the ugly part of my heart, I was wishing that we had a more conventional family or straightforward story. Despite the fact we look very conventional and nuclear on the outside these days, the consequences of our not-so-straightforward journey still weave themselves through our daily life. 

Most of my concerns culminate in one giant fear that I’ve messed up my kid with my choices. Sometimes my concerns are irrational, and Paddy is quick to tell me so, but sometimes they are warranted. And those are the ones that come to life in my mind at 3am. 

Last night, after Paddy was snoring in 2.5 seconds, I was still awake a few hours later, trying to pray my heavy heart away. I said all the ‘right’ things to God, I asked all the ‘right’ things and I recited all the ‘right’ psalms that usually give me the much needed peace I need to fall asleep. But the little equation I had concocted for myself didn’t work. I should know by now that x+y doesn’t = God doing what I want him to do. I rolled over for the 200th time and adjusted the pillows between my legs and behind my back and behind my head. ‘UGH’, I grunted and heaved myself out of bed. Shuffling into the living room, I smiled at our wedding photo on the wall. Paddy and I are laughing on a bouncy castle while Reuben is lying in a heap, unable to get up because we keep jumping. Who am I to question the story God is writing for Reuben?, I thought.

What if all of these experiences are integral parts of the person God is creating him to be? What if they are forming his character but I just don’t have the eyes to see it? What if they change how he treats others? What if the hard is leading to the GOOD? I’m so quick to want the easy way out, to expect the worst, to forget how God has a habit of bringing beauty from ashes. I need to keep reminding myself that these are not my babies in the first place and I need to keep reminding Reubs that he doesn’t have to protect anyone because he’s sheltered under the wings of the ultimate protector.

Believing in this for yourself is one thing but believing in it for your child is a whole other heartbreaking ballgame. But I’d much rather hand him over to his Heavenly Father who is in control of everything, than try and be his heavenly mother who has zero control over anything. “He’s yours, Lord”, I whispered as I filled up a glass of water, “You’re God and I’m not”. Being a mum is heavy enough. I thought as I climbed back up the mountain of stairs. Literally, my pelvis is SO heavy right now.