It was supposed to be our only family vacation of the year. We were on a gorgeous lake, in a mansion of a lake house, with friends. I was newly pregnant and thinking that since I had conceived only two weeks after my previous miscarriage, that this one would stay. My sister had once conceived just weeks after a miscarriage and had twins 8 months later. I was elated.
But that week went from bad to worse. Since I was pregnant I declined all sorts of bad foods, drinks, and did not ride the jet skis I had been looking forward to. I skipped the long horse back trail ride I had wanted to do with my two oldest...which meant they had to skip it too. And then, one night while miniature golfing, my body began to let me know something was going very wrong. I felt hot and then cold over and over. I felt clammy and dizzy and nauseous and had a head ache all at once.
The next morning I found out from my OB that my progesterone, which had been taken four days earlier but no one had bothered to call with the results, was critically low. We spent and entire day of our vacation dealing with a huge battle at the pharmacy in town, spent over $100 out of pocket for the prescription, and a day later, Abel went home.
Alleluia Abel...Praise the LORD, a breath.
I sat on the bedroom floor with my knees drawn up to my chest, rocking back and forth and sobbing. I had just woken up and when I went to the restroom...well, Abel was gone. My family was already all up and eating breakfast with our friends on our last day of vacation and I didn't know what to do...go out and announce to everyone I was miscarrying? Try to get my husband's attention and take him back to the room to tell him?
Instead I just sat there in the room crying until he came in to get dressed and found me there. By then the name had come to me. Alleluia was because the hymns I kept singing to comfort myself all seemed to have "Alleluia" in them (especially "Alleluia Song of Gladness, LSB 417) and I knew as one who grieves with hope I had to cling to "Alleluia". I chose Abel because I suddenly felt at the same time so angry and hopeless over this third loss of the year that for the first time I found myself really thinking on the story of Cain and Abel and my heart hurt for Eve...this woman who believes so strongly in the promise that at the birth of her first son she declares him to be the LORD, only to have her one son kill the other. When I looked up what Abel means it seemed even more fitting.
Today my husband carried in a box from the mail as I busily prepared lunch. "What's that?" I asked. He smiled and handed it to me...I smiled back. I always smile when cards or packages from her show up. Why? Because it's not only a card or package, but it always shows up so humbly with no previous announcement, it's just there so sweetly with beautiful handwriting and even packaged with such great care.
I immediately stopped lunch preparations to open it, wondering what I was forgetting that a package was showing up. Inside the package was a small cellophane bag with two sprigs of white silk lilies. I was completely stumped. I opened the card and before I could even read all the words my eyes fell on his name, my little Alleluia Abel. She remembered. This sweet friend and her husband, whom my husband and I had asked to be his Godparents before we lost him, first sent a crucifix on his due date and now, in remembrance of the week of his pregnancy and home-going, lilies to adorn his cross with as we all look forward with such hope and joy to our reunion in heaven.
Now this cross is on a prominent wall in our living room, just above my and my husband's wedding photos, and I stare at it blooming in all its hope and feel as eager as a child on Christmas Eve. Abel! How I long to see you, touch you, and as a mother, rejoice in our reunion in Christ's Heavenly Kingdom. I love you my son.
And to my dear friend and sister, you are a sweet pearl of a friend, your thoughtfulness and love remind me so dearly of the love of Christ. Thank you.
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