After Ten Years, A Podcast

I can't believe its been ten years. 

But I look around me and the signs are there. Four loud, sweet, messy, healthy boys are running through the halls of our home with their shirts off playing tackle football... inside. We painted Christmas ornaments just this week and the boys knew to make an "H" ornament for their big sister Hannah even though they never got to meet her. They're old enough to remember her story and old enough to know how to write the letter H. Years surely have passed.

And this year, I have a little something for you as we approach Hannah's tenth birthday. 

If you're new here, ten years ago my husband Kyle and I were expecting our first baby. Before she was born, she died. In the throws of grief I felt the need to write about everything that had happened, everything the Lord was doing, and everything I was feeling. I took to this little hobby blog as so many of us had back then and I started publishing what I was writing. Then it was my way to tell her story, our story, and to answer the question everyone was asking, “how can you go on?” The response to our story was incredible, I think the authenticity of my writing spoke to pregnancy loss in a way many had not heard before. I believe the Lord was able to use my words to convey what hope looked like in an impossible circumstance. 

The years have gone by and I’ve learned and grown a lot. But the words I wrote continue to minister to people in the wake of their own loss. Friends and family continue to ask for the link to share our story when those near to them experience loss. Dear friends who grieved with us ten years ago, have found their way back to the blog posts after experiencing their own loss, saying that those words they'd read so long ago now resonated in their hearts again.

So for Hannah’s tenth birthday, here they are. The written words from blog posts now in audio form, in my own voice. Hoping that they may be more easily shareable as the technology of the world changes. Praying that they still may provide true comfort to those who experience loss and provide an inside look into loss for their loved ones. 

If you'd like to listen along you can find the recorded stories as a podcast on Apple Podcasts. The show is called A Hint of the Hess House and the initial story will release all at once in 6 episodes. Eventually I'd love to add future episodes containing audio of the grief posts that followed Hannah's story, but that's only a dream for now.

     Apple Podcasts: A Hint of the Hess House Podcast

If you'd like to read the stories, simply follow this link to the Hannah Grace page on this blog. You can read the initial parts of the story and you can also find the grief posts further down on that same page already published.

To those who have been with us these last ten years, thank you. For those who grieved with us, I pray that the Lord used that time to draw you nearer to Him and the truth of His Word.

To those that have just arrived here and are new to our story, I pray you will be blessed by what the Lord did in our lives so long ago. I pray that you would find more of God's truth woven into our story than you could have imagined.

To those who've been sent here by a friend or family member because you yourself have suffered the loss of a child or grandchild, I am so very sorry. Know that I am praying for you now and I have been praying for you for the last ten years, that you would know the comfort of God during this time and that you would know the understanding and peace that can only come from Him.

Thank you. I hope you'll stay and listen.

Five Years

Five years. 

It is hard to believe it’s been five years when I remember it like it was yesterday. I could tell you more details about that day than any other day in my life. I could tell you more details about Hannah’s face than I could tell you about the wrinkles on my very own hands. When I can remember it so clearly, how could it be that five years have passed?

But then I look around our home and I see the passing of the time. There is a four year old boy that filled my arms only eleven months after Hannah died; he’s writing his own name and asking me questions about life that make me have to think and think hard. There’s a two year old boy that has the sweetest soul I’ve ever known in a person and there’s a six month old that brings more joy into this house with every day that passes. And they’re all mine, all her little brothers. Our home is bursting at the seams with kiddos and love and laundry.

The time surely passes.

Every day there is less remembering and more becoming.

As the years go by every day is less about remembering who she was and more about living the way God has called me to live because of her and my love for her. There is less missing her and more being a better mom to these boys because of her. 

I am a different mom every day because of her.

I still sit sometimes in her nursery in the oversized chair like I once did. The first time I looked around the room just a few days before she was born. I was so pleased. Everything in the nursery had come together so perfectly, everything was ready. I dreamt about who she was going to be and all the room would hold. 

A few days later we returned home from the hospital empty handed to our empty nursery and I sat in the chair once again. The room was a different kind of empty. I sat in that chair for hours in the days and weeks that followed just thinking of her, asking God a lot of questions, and praying for a number of things. I asked him to fill the room.

And so now, five years later, sometimes I sit in that chair and giggle just a bit. The room is full. It’s so very full that we’re looking into bunk bed options to fit all the kids. On an almost daily basis the floor is full of tiny pots and pans and Lincoln logs and monster trucks and books, oh the books! And every night my boys, my wonderful blessings, they dream and sleep in that very same room. It’s so very full.

Five years later and we still hope for the very best for our children. As a Christian we pray that our children will join us as we work to know God and to make Him known. 

And, oh how my sweet girl has already done both.

Without breathing a breath on this earth, more people know God because of her life and death. The Lord gave her to us as a blessing and in her life and death the Lord drew us, and so many, nearer to himself. As we continue to share her story, God is glorified. For what satan meant for evil, God has used for good. It is my honor everyday to be her mother.

Happy Birthday my sweet Hannah Grace. To God be the glory.

If you’d like to read the read the story of the life and death of our daughter Hannah Grace and the grieving that followed, you can find a number of posts here. I pray that as you read them, the Lord will draw you near. Her life and death have been a picture of the Lord’s favor upon us.

Calling

It's been a little quiet here because it's been so very un-quiet in my home. There are babies crying at all hours of the night, there are dance parties filling our kitchen, and there are squeals of delight filling our tickle fights and wrestling matches.

Our days start when the first kid wakes and I don't often really sit down until both of the kiddos are asleep. I stay up too late sometimes because it is nice to a have a few minutes 'to myself.' But if I'm honest I'm more sleep deprived than I ever imagined a sane person could be.

The days have been full. Our hearts have been full. But little is the time for writing or reading (anything more than Berenstain Bears and Moo Baa La La La). These are the days that belong more to them than they do to me and I consider myself blessed.

But I've been learning and wishing I could write everything down. We had a wonderful summer in the mountains and I was gifted a sweet book and few life lessons that taught me quite a bit more about my role as a mom.

I learned that being a mother can be my calling.

I learned that ministry with young children in the house sometimes looks more like wiping food up off the floor or getting a kid to sleep for the third time in one night. It looks more like running for adventure and getting dirty and changing clothes and trying your very best to get sand out of a 12 month old's hair. It looks more like working a little bit extra to teach your kids about Jesus and instill truth and discipline and show them God's grace.

It looks less like writing a blog that everyone loves or posting pictures that everyone 'likes.' It looks less like that casual yet put-together gal you see in the magazine with a Crew Cuts kid on her hip (like she doesn't get snot wiped on her shoulder every fifteen minutes).

I learned even more that they young years of motherhood may mean that you don't even get to serve in the places that are good. Sometimes you don't get to be the one to jump first to volunteer. You may not get to be the one to host weekly Bible study and you may not get to be the coordinator of the kids Christmas program at church. You may not get to be the listening ear to a friend in need because someone else is literally pulling you away with their sticky peanut butter and jelly hands.

And that's okay.

God has called us to make disciples and my disciples are just a little shorter than they once were.

Every day I need Jesus more than I ever imagine because I am all in. I am consumed by the diligent training of my people, the tiny people He gave me to raise up. Every day I am whittling my tiny arrows and praying that my quiver full will one day shoot straight for the Lord.

It's a holy calling to pour yourself out every day in love to your children. It's a mission to go to their little hearts every day and preach to them grace and love and justice and Jesus.

So the blog may be a little dusty and empty, my hair may have more dry shampoo than anyone's ever should, and I may even be looked down upon ever so often because I said 'no' to a very good volunteer position. But every day I tell my kids and my husband 'yes.' Every day I try my best to seek the Lord and his Word and know his will for my life. And today my calling is to be a mother.

And it's a holy calling.

Noah Bear: Six Months

Remember that baby that I told you I was going to birth in the mountains. Well he's here. And he's six months old. And well I never officially announced his presence because having a baby in the mountains and then moving states away with your newborn and your toddler all less than one week from the day you gave birth isn't exactly when you have the most free time.

The sleepless nights of the newborn stage while chasing a toddler during the "sleep when the baby sleeps" hours doesn't leave time for any sort of coherent writing. Someday I'll try to explain this to Noah like my mom explained my baby sister's empty baby book that had a few pictures in the box it was encased in. Sorry kid, there was more to do than to sit down and write every moment of your life. (Just to be clear my mom later finished my sister's baby book and she probably did a much better job years later.)

Our Noah Bear came into this world with a bit of surprise and a lot of expectation. Camp had ended and we waited for his arrival. Since Lincoln was born an entire month early we expected Noah to be early too, but Noah would prove to take his own sweet time. Eventually a little "worry" on a ultrasound would cause me to be induced and our Noah Bear entered into the world.

His first days were crazy. We stayed in the hospital longer than we had planned. Noah went "home" to our cabin at camp with a rolling oxygen tank that he absolutely hated. We had a fussy baby whose fussiness we would later come to find was due to a tongue tie that made him almost starve for the first few weeks of his life. My parents flew to meet us in Colorado where Kyle packed our entire summer cabin into our minivan and drove home while I, Lincoln, newborn Noah and my mom and dad all flew back to Texas.

The next few weeks were a blur of doctor's appointments. Bilirubin this and tongue tie that. Hearing screening here and VLCAD check there. For about a month I thought to myself "what have we done?" and then the dust settled. (Well also the tongue tie was resolved and Noah could finally be the milk drunk happy baby that "everyone else" had.)

And then I was able to clearly see the new little baby we had been blessed with. Noah Bear is a joy. Everyone remarks about how happy he is, his toothless grin can light up a room. He is so very "chill." While Lincoln wanted to be swaddled and coddled, Noah's favorite place to sleep was unswaddled on the living room floor. Fussy baby? Oh, then just lay him on the ground.

Noah has a peace about him which is so very funny because it's one of the reasons I named him Noah. Noah means rest or comfort or peace. And I remember going back and forth about names and thinking that I would love to have a name that meant peace. As I was driving to one of my many doctor's appointments something on the radio mentioned the name Noah and there it was. I felt like the Lord had given me such a great peace throughout my pregnancy with Noah, and now here he is: a model of peace.

It's funny how I probably know him best of anyone, but how I often feel like I don't know him at all. After having Lincoln around for almost two and a half years I know him so well. I look at Noah and I long to know who he is and who he will become. I see so many differences between he and Lincoln and I want to see how that plays out. I wish I had the time to just sit and stare at him like I did Lincoln but that's not our reality. Noah may get a little less of me but that means he gets a special love that Lincoln did not know, that of an older sibling. The way Lincoln loves Noah is a big love and the way Noah's face lights up when he sees his big brother is remarkable.

Noah Bear,

You are filled with peace. You are filled with joy. You are squishy and your smile is contagious. You can roll over and hold that head much better than your brother could at your age which is probably why you won't have to wear a baby helmet like he did. You have no scar on your forearm because medicine has improved so much in the short time since Lincoln was born that you had a different test for VLCAD. Truth is, Lincoln's biopsy results, his scar, gave us more information about you. Your sister Hannah also helped you. The doctors in Colorado were so concerned about you because of Hannah's stillbirth that you got biweekly check-ups and one of those checkups was what led to your induction. We'll never know for sure, but it's possible that weekly ultrasound caught a placental bleed that could have meant your demise. I like to think it was a way God let you sister be a part of your story: her death possibly saving your life.

I cannot wait to know you. I cannot wait to hear the thoughts that I can read deep in your eyes. I cannot wait to see where you run, how you explore and how you grow to bring more joy to those around you. I pray for the day you know the Lord and I pray you know that His love is the best love you'll ever know. And that's saying something because I love you a lot.

If it matters: you weigh 18 pounds, you have a larger than 95th percentile head just like your brother, you can roll over and you can sit up for about three seconds. You started eating avocados about two days before you turned six months old and you cannot seem to eat food fast enough. Your brother and your Daddy make you smile the most and you seem to love me too. You are calm, peaceful, and I love you. Feel free to sleep through the night anytime you want, for now I'll take you sleeping nine hours straight and I'd love for you to learn to nap the way you did when you were a newborn. The "just lay him on the carpet" trick doesn't work quite like it used to but we love you just the same.

Also sorry your six month "photo shoot" was me taking pictures of you laying on your bother's trampoline in a random onesie. You'd been six months old for about a week and I never seemed to find the time to make 'perfect.' These pictures are a picture of our life right now, you're smiling but we aren't winning any awards on Pinterest or anything. But hey, you're a boy, I'm sure you won't mind.

Happy Six Months my Noah Bear. Where did the time go?

Love always,
Mom