Our little ones in November 2005 with Santa; our little ones (w/ big sister) in November 2007 with Santa
Take Me Back
Lisa and I cried for a few moments this morning. It was two years ago that we said goodbye (for now) to our precious little girl Emily. It is hard to relive those moments when our hearts were breaking within us. Most of all, we just miss her. And during this time of year, different triggers take us back.
And it's difficult to be taken back...to there. But it's also difficult not to be.
Whenever we put together one of the Project Seahorse packets and send or deliver it to one of the hospitals, a part of us gets taken back to our own NICU days. Whenever we hear the story of someone currently in the NICU, we're taken back. Whenever we get a response card in the mail from a Project Seahorse recipient, the description of their own child's struggles takes us back once again.
And as hard as it is to go back there, there are still a few pieces of our heart that we left there on that NICU floor. And so it's probably good that we don't wander too terribly far away.
Let me try to describe it to you...
--there are tender moments there that we shared with baby Emily
--there are moments there of holding Benjamin close to us when his brother and sisters were too sick to be held
--there are touch-and-go surgeries and ventilators and resuscitations and brain bleeds there that Danielle somehow overcame
--there are victories there--in eating and breathing and temperature and weight gain--that Casey finally began to experience
--there is a 1 1/2 year-old big sister there, our anchor, who takes great joy in seeing pictures of her siblings and saying their names
--there are doctors and nurses and therapists and custodians and receptionists and parking garage attendants there who somehow have become family
--there is a type of prayer being prayed there--a prayer of faith and urgency--that will most likely never be prayed again for these ones
--there is a grip experienced there when holding our little ones close to us that communicates love and desperation and longing and possibilities
--there is a connection there with something far deeper, far more important, than anything else that we get to experience in the "daily grind" of life
Oh no, we would never want to go back. We relive enough of it as it is. But neither do we want to get too far away...from those moments when we knew what really mattered, and when we saw clearly that a child simply needs the constant loving touch of his mommy and daddy.
--by Phil Roberts, written November 23, 2007 at 11:13 p.m.