It seems to me that my birthday brings a heaviness upon my heart and mind. Last year as I turned 24, I found myself lying on my bedroom floor in my wedding dress sobbing, feeling lost, alone, and defeated. I felt depressed. I was not only single but divorced and I still wasn’t a mother. This wasn’t where I wanted to be or where I thought I’d be. I had made no remarkable advancements in my life, leaving me feeling crushed and depressed.
As it is once again my birthday tomorrow, it would seem that this year has brought similar feelings, but for different reasons. I have much to be joyous about. The most important is that I am finally married to a truly good-hearted and loving man. Together, he and I have made much progress and I feel much more whole and put together.
This year is also different because I am technically a mother, but not in the way I ever thought I’d be. My heart and arms ache to hold and love on a child of my own. In addition to this, the worldwide pandemic of COVID-19 has stunted the growth of my business, forcing me to remain in my office job.
And so, once again my birthday is just around the corner and I am not where I thought I’d be. My husband held me as I cried last night and shared my hurts and disappointments. He didn’t say much other than he loves me and he knows it hurts and knows it’s been so hard. In my yearning for relief, I asked him to give me a blessing which he willingly and lovingly gave.
The blessing I received offered counsel, blessings, and comfort. Among many things, I was told that I have yet another lesson to learn from all this before I can be truly healed and once again become pregnant. Last night I felt frustration amongst my gratitude.
“Another lesson? Have I seriously not learned enough?” I wondered. There have been lessons in compassion, empathy, loss, the far-reaching powers of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, eternal families, miscarriage and its different forms, what it is to be a grieving mother and parent, deeper understanding in the love and pains which God feels, service, gratitude, and more. What else is there to possibly learn from this? I’ve realized that God is the one with all the answers and even though I don’t believe I still have mine, I have learned several things just today in my yearning to be made whole.
After coming home from work today and grabbing a bite to eat I sat down and prayed. I told Heavenly Father that I don’t believe the pain of losing my daughter Adlee could ever truly go away. There will always be a sting in my heart that she is gone. I cried as I told Him I don’t know how to do it all but that I am trying and I need His help. I can’t possibly do this on my own. With that, I began to read General Conference talks from April 2020.
President M. Russell Ballard’s talk, Shall We Not Go On in So Great a Cause? really spoke to me. I’ll be honest, I initially began to dread reading about the story of Joseph Smith. I know how the story goes, I’ve heard it a million times and even taught it countless times during my mission in Armenia alone. I knew I just needed to push through. I couldn’t skip anything. There is something God needs me to learn and I’m not going to miss it.
As I read I learned something I never knew, which surprised me. Did you know that Hyrum, Joseph Smith’s older brother, was told in a blessing that he could choose whether or not to live or die?
“Thou shalt have power to escape the hand of thine enemies. Thy life shall be sought with untiring zeal, but thou shalt escape. If it please thee, and thou desirest, thou shalt have the power voluntarily to lay down thy life to glorify God.”
Can I get a mic drop? God gave him a choice. And so, I began to think. We are so often taught that the children who die so young or the babies we never get to raise were simply too pure for this world. We believe that their precious hearts have no place in this world and there is nothing this earthly life could possibly teach them because they are already that good. If they’re so good, would Satan not work “with untiring zeal” to take their spiritual lives? To attempt to lead them astray? This lead me to wonder …
I wonder if, like Hyrum, my Adlee was offered a choice: to come to earth and live a mortal life or to pass on and go to heaven. I wonder if she knew that with her loss would come the eventual realization and understanding of the love, mercy, and power of God and Jesus Christ. I wonder if she knew that with her death would blossom beauty in my eyes: the beauty of God’s great love and plan, that through Christ little children are saved and remain pure and in that likeness, we too can be saved and just as pure with daily repentance.
I have no doubt Adlee loves me and my husband. Yet I wonder. I wonder if maybe she saw a bigger and more important picture when I could not. She knew this was not the end and I wonder if she knows something I have not yet learned, that my own child is wiser than me. I wonder if she knew her loss would help secure her family’s place with her in heaven and she knew that even though it would hurt me so deeply and so badly … she still knew we will get to raise her and be together forever.
I wonder …
As Joseph and Hyrum’s mother Lucy heard in her mind their voices say, “Mother, weep not for us; we have overcome the world by love”, I too hear my Adlee telling me this. She overcame the world by the love of Christ because through him all children are saved. Did she know? She must have known? How could she not have known?
And so knowing all this, I wonder … was it her choice? Because I think it was.
Sources:
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2020/04/12ballard?lang=eng
