The lights in our corner are off and the curtains encircle us in an effort for privacy. I curl up in the recliner and hold my baby tight as I try to fall asleep.
But sleep is difficult to come by.
The constant beeping of monitors rouses me each time I finally drift off, particularly when the beeping comes from the monitor directly above my head. There is the relentless sound of nearby tracheas and the wheezing of a little boy’s cries as medicine upon medicine is administered. Nurses hurry about and a doctor tells a set of parents that things are looking grim for their son.
I hold Aubrey close and nurse her again. Her coughing and unsettledness mean she wants to be with me around the clock. I don’t mind. Tonight especially I want to feel her warm breaths and her tight grasp around my finger.
It is a surreal world here in the pediatric intensive care unit. Even harder and more spiritually oppressive than the neonatal intensive care unit. I don’t like being here.
Why, God?
The question surfaces before I can quiet it with comfort from the Word. All I can think is that I don’t want this. I don’t like it. I don’t like being in an ICU on New Year’s Day. I don’t like being familiar with cardiologists and nurses and hospitals. It's hard to appreciate the compliments I receive about my knowledge of Aubrey’s heart and condition. I don’t want to know.
Yet in the very turmoil of my heart, in the midst of feeling overwhelmed and sorrowful and angry and confused, He is with me. He doesn’t wait until I pull myself together. He responds to my fears and meets me in my sadness.
The words of a Psalm, increasingly familiar and written on my heart, come to mind. I urge my reluctant tongue to speak them aloud and the whispered truth washes strength and hope and promise over me again:
The righteous cry, and the Lord hears And delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, But the Lord delivers him out of them all. He keeps all his bones, Not one of them is broken.
We are not alone. Aubrey is held in the palm of a great and might Hand. And once again, He is bringing health to her body right before my eyes.
This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him And saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear Him, And rescues them.
O taste and see that the Lord is good; How blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!
Oh, dear Brietta, my thoughts and prayers have been with you often as you walk through this. I pray mostly for unfaltering peace and strength for both you and Daniel. We love you dearly and wish we could do so much more!
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad that you are back home. Is there anything that you need? (other than a full night's sleep in your own bed, that is!)
ReplyDeleteI was really starting to get concerned about you and Aubrey since you wrote that last entry and then disappeared for a few days. I began checking your family members' blogs to see if anything was going on, but nothing was written so I assumed everything was fine and ya'll were just engrossed in holiday festivities still. Thank you for updating us! Praise God she's responding to the medication and you're out of the hospital! I've been considering another hospital birth, but when I watched a documentary last night about a woman who needed surgery I started to break out into a nauseated sweat! I hate hospitals. Yuck.
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