THIS TIME LAST YEAR....

well....it's superbowl sunday and it brings back memories of last year at this time.
during the game i got up to go to the bathroom and all of the sudden my water broke! (or as andrew told all his friends the next day 'my mom's pipes broke last night!)
it brings back both such great memories and extremely difficult memories. i remember that i kept thinking that nothing could happen to ben (yes, we knew that he was a boy). i remember that it was only 3 short months prior to that that we went into a hospital for an entirely different reason - seth's accident. i remember that when we were in labor greg and i kept thinking it was 'playing out' the same way as seth's hospital stay. we went in one day, and left the next day. we went in on the 3rd and left on the 4th. we went into the hospital 3 months prior and left empty handed and broken hearted. last year at this time we left the hospital with ben in our arms and joyful....but still brokenhearted. i remember when the nurse was getting us ready to leave for home with ben that i just completely lost it. i should have been happier than i had been in the last 3 months and yet here i was just trying to get through the moment of seeing us leaving the hospital with no seth. how can such an amazing, beautiful, and life changing event be so heart breaking?

fast forward to today....and all i can do is weep for our son that isn't home with us here. all i can do is feel my heart breaking all over again. it's strange how you can just 'feel' it coming on. tears just under the surface. crying over nothing at all. why can't i just praise God for what He HAS given us - a beautiful son in ben? why do i look at ben and think that he'll never hear seth's voice, or play with his older brother, have seth teach him his basketball tricks, or even argue with him? how can i keep seth alive to ben and lydia? how can i keep seth alive for me and greg and the other kids. that's what i struggle with now....just how am i suppose to live in the present and yet still keep the past alive?

the other day i was so weepy because i kept thinking that we don't talk about him anymore. seth's name doesn't come up in conversation nearly as much as before. i just want to hear his name - hear the kids talk about him. remember the fun or annoying or silly things that he did. how do i know that the kids are doing ok? are they just moving on and grieving ok? is it healthy not to talk about him as much? it feels almost like seth dies again just a little bit each day when we don't talk about him. i was really down about that when the next morning luke and andrew were arguing whether or not the mittens that andrew was wearing were actually his. then i hear luke say 'no they're not, they're seth's not yours!' i heard his name!!!! i heard the boys say his name! my heart soared. such a gift from my Father - one that he just knew my mom's breaking heart needed at that moment. what amazingly beautiful gift.

so....it's almost the 4th - ben's first bday and 15 months since we had to say goodbye to seth. i think that our doctor who delivered ben said it in the most beautiful way. after ben had been born and as he was handing ben to me he said '3 months ago today you had to say goodbye to one son. today you get to say hello to another'. another goodbye where seth is concerned - another hello for ben. i love both of them dearly...more than i could ever put into words. and maybe, just maybe the birth of one will heal my heart from the death of the other. thank you Lord for both ben and seth - thank you for blessing my life with each and everyone of our children.