Life and Loss

I took a spontaneous blog and Twitter break starting last Wednesday. It's been a week full of a lot of emotion, and I wanted to focus on the here and now. It's been refreshing!

I'll start at the beginning. I apologize if this is all over the place.

Last Wednesday, my cousin Rachel and her husband Jared invited us out to dinner with them. Rachel was due to have her baby any day, and it was so nice to spend an evening with the two of them pre-baby. I had a great time catching up with them, and was so happy that evening.

When we arrived home from our dinner, I received some terrible news. Candice, a woman and friend from church who had been having complications after the birth of her daughter a few days before, had taken a turn for the worst, and was not going to make it.

I couldn't believe this news. I begged and pleaded with God to perform a miracle and save this precious woman, as I'm sure countless other people did. However, an hour or so later, I found out that she had passed away.

I was in shock. I could not stop thinking about it the next day. I had spent New Years Day with Candice's family along with a few others. She took us on a tour of her new home and excitedly showed us where the nursery would be. Also, I had seen her at church just a couple of weeks before and everything was perfectly fine. I'm still in denial that she's gone.

It really puts everything into perspective. Life is so fragile; a gift that can be taken away at any moment. Thinking about this makes me want to spend more time with my loved ones. It makes me realize that my problems aren't nearly as big as they seemed just a few days ago. And it makes me see what the important things in life really are. I praise God for this reminder.

Candice was married with a 5-year-old son, and her newborn daughter who was born a few weeks premature, and is still in the hospital. I am so thankful that Candice is in a much better place, away from the pain and suffering of this world. But I really feel for her husband and children. They could use a lot of prayer.

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After this tragic news, I woke up on Friday morning to the news that my cousin Rachel had had her baby! A little girl named Elin Rose (pronounced like ee-lynn...long "e" sound :-)). What a blessing after the difficult days before! I had the chance to visit this sweet baby in the hospital on Saturday, and it was such a giant blessing! What a miracle new life is! Again, what a blessing it is to have life!

There's my sister Julie holding baby Elin, and my Aunt Beth in the background holding my other baby cousin Hudson who was born just a month ago :-)

To say that the past week has been an emotional roller coaster would be an understatement. Seeing death and new life all at once has changed the way I've looked at things in the past few days. I have learned a lot in the past week, and things have really been put into perspective for me. A little break from the Internet was very nice to try to reconnect with the people I love most in the world.

I'm going to close this post with the verse that was written in Candice's room at the hospital. I thought it was so fitting as Candice was a beautiful, Christian woman who always seemed to follow the Lord with all she had. Luke and I were in a Bible study with Candice and her husband a couple of years ago, and they were a great example to us.

"Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints." ~Psalm 116:15