Choosing the Pretty One

These are the moments that have made up the last two months of our lives. As the Lord has taught us, I have been writing. It does me so much good to put into words what the Lord is teaching me or what I am feeling as we go. If at times it sounds like I'm preaching to you, it's more than likely not the case; but I had to write it to preach to myself. To have something to read and remind me of what this was like, when I feel as if I've made no progress at all, it helps me to read about the past. When I forget the goodness of the Lord, it helps me to read of his blessings.

If you'd like to read more about the story of our Hannah Grace click here.

December 19, 2013

Yesterday we went to the local funeral home to make arrangements.

No one should ever have to plan a funeral for their baby. No one should ever have to think about life without their child. I’ve thought about writing a book and calling it ‘Life After Death,’ for many reasons. It could be about how odd it is to have a baby die only to later give birth to her. She died and then she was born. It could also be about how our daughter now has true life with the Lord after her death. Oh the assurance of knowing she is with the Lord. My greatest fear in becoming a parent was the chance that my child may not ever know the Lord. That is no longer my worry for our Hannah, for she knew Him instantly. But the book could also be about my life after her death, we have to pick up the pieces and carry on.

But one thing I’ll never forget from that day in funeral home is when they asked us to pick out a casket for her. Oh, no mother should ever have to do that. They showed us a beautiful white casket and then another casket that would be less costly. And all I could think was that a mother chooses a crib for her baby to lay; a mother chooses a crib for her sweet precious baby.

Not a casket.

But there we were, a young married couple eager to be a family and we already had a beautiful crib in her beautiful nursery. But we were picking out caskets because that was the only place she’d ever lay her head again. I had researched the safest cribs. I picked out the sheets. I read about the safety of the pack-n-play and I even got it set up in our room. I read pages and pages about all the places she’d lie and sleep. But nowhere on the ‘must-have’ list and the registry recommendations, no one mentioned caskets. It’s because no one is ever supposed to pick out a casket for their baby. For their 8 pound 3 ounce 21.5 in long baby girl.

And I looked at both of the pictures of the caskets and I cried, they only had two choices in the baby-sized caskets. I had researched everything, but I had no facts, no recommendations, no data about which casket was best. We were making all the decisions and I honestly wanted to pick the pretty white casket for our baby girl.  I wanted to have a beautiful casket for our baby girl who would never wear a beautiful prom dress, who would never have a beautiful wedding, who would never even wear anything nice. But I was sure the pretty one was more expensive, and the funeral man explained that of course the pretty white casket cost more. And I didn’t know what to do.

Then Kyle reminded me. We had a group of families, families that we love dearly, that heard about Hannah and banded together to pay for her funeral. And I never understood why people give money to people who have lost loved ones, it’s not like the money could bring them back. But at that moment I understood. Because less than a week after you hear your baby’s heartbeat at a very normal doctor's visit and after you finish every detail of your baby’s nursery, you are not ready to figure out what casket to buy. You are not ready to believe what has really happened. And you are not ready to decide that maybe the inexpensive casket would be okay because it ends up in the dirt where no one would see it anyway.

But instead, because of families who may never know how much it truly meant to us, I got to pick something beautiful. Something that in no way compared to how beautiful our daughter was. But something beautiful all the same. There we were in that room surrounded by all of those families when decision-making got so tough. We sat in that room supported by my parents who so patiently waited outside, so that even in the chaos, we could step up and be parents and choose what we wanted for our Hannah. And we sat in that room with all the people praying for us, and the Lord heard, for he was there with us too.

So we chose the pretty one. I am truly grateful.