God always answers ...... In HIS time!

Anyone who knows me, knows how strongly I believe that everything.......and I mean everything, happens for a reason.  When really "yucky" things happen, they will tend to lead to something good, and it is up to us whether or not we SEE the beauty in it all, and give all of the glory to God!  I also think that, as hard as it is to do sometimes, we just need to trust God in everything.  Oh, there are plenty of stories in my life that I could tell that have brought me to believe this as strongly as I do, but today, I can tell you for sure that He always answers... Always! 

On January 11, 1991, my daughter, Jacquelyn Ann, was born.  She was born with a very severe case of spina bifida and anencephaly.  Her neural tube never closed, and therefore, she was born without a brain.  Everything about her was perfect, except that the entire top of her head was missing.  I did not find out until close to the end of my pregnancy that anything was wrong with her.  I had told the hospital at Loma Linda that I wanted to donate any organs that I could.  While I was in labor, there was a baby waiting for corneal transplants, but later the social worker came to tell me that there was a California law that no organs could be donated from a baby born with a neural tube defect because they just knew so little about what causes the defects.  Then, they asked me if I would donate her to the neonatology museum at Loma Linda University Medical School.  That helped things make sense for me, so I said yes. 

I let them take pictures and slides of her for the medical books.  They said it was the worse case of anencephaly they had ever seen.  I have even since then been back to see her in the museum.  We also took part in a 10-year study to learn more about neural tube defects, with the March of Dimes.  What they learned in this study is that a lack of folic acid in the mother can cause it, as well as extreme temperatures (like saunas or hot tubs).  So, over the past few years when I see commercials on TV telling women to take folic acid at the beginning of their pregnancy, I have been able to think privately that, that was why MY daughter died, so that they could learn things like this.

One day 8 years ago, while driving down 16 Mile Road, my cell phone rang.  I answered it, and it was my mom telling me to hurry home and turn on the Life Time channel.  When she told me what was on, I turned onto the shoulder of the road and drove illegally, probably a half mile past the entire traffic jam just to get home.

There was a story on about a baby born at Loma Linda Hospital with a heart defect.  They actually knew he needed a heart transplant before even being born.  There was also a mom in Vancouver, British Columbia who had a baby born with anencephaly.  The baby was still alive.  What you have to understand about these babies born with anencephaly is that they do eventually die.  They feel no pain because they have no brain.  So, they flew her from Vancouver to Loma Linda University and after much controversy, finally decided to do the very first organ transplant from an anencephalic donor, right at the hospital where my daughter was, based on studies we participated in!  I felt like a small piece of a very big puzzle.....

At Fort Irwin, I met other moms & dads who had lost their babies to similar situations, and also to SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome).  We had a small suppoprt group we started called "Mending Hearts."  We wrote our stories to share with moms and dads who would, unfortunately, join the support group even after we left there.  At the end of my story, I wrote something that I truly believed, but re-reading it now, I had no idea how very true what I was writing was.  It said, "Someday, God will heal the crack in creation that gets into things and breaks babies, and someday he will heal the crack in our hearts.  Yes, Jacquelyn, we share our story for your sake, and for our sakes, and for their sakes, and for God's sake."  For as someone I do not know has wisely said, "All sorrows can be born, if you can tell a story about them."

Jacquelyn would be turning 20 this January.  It took God 12 years to answer the question I asked Him over and over and over, "Why MY daughter?"  But now I have 2 beautiful boys, Rory & Ian, and God is using them like I had never imagined in my wildest dreams He would.  It is so evident to me now, that Jacquelyn left because they were coming.  And someday, we will all be together again!