His Plans

Have you ever thought that God knows you way better than you even know yourself? There have been four times specifically where God proved that He knew me better than I knew me.

Baby Mildenberger #3

I told Drew the day Evelyn passed away that I would never be able to make it though the infant stage again. You see, I am a very anxious person, even before I had a reason to be anxious. What made me more anxious before having Baby Mildenberger #3 was that our pediatrician told us that siblings of babies who have died from SIDS are more susceptible to SIDS. I thought I would be a wreck every single night, that I would never be able to fall asleep because I would be too worried about whether or not the baby was breathing. There was no way I could live through it.

But as the days and weeks after Evelyn passed away went on, I felt the fact that our family was not complete on my heart more and more. I still was not sure I could handle that infant year, but I could feel my heart opening up to Baby Mildenberger #3. So, through much prayer, I accepted that God would carry me through my anxieties surrounding Baby Mildenberger #3 in just the way he carried me through everything with Evelyn.

And carry me through He has. I feel like my pregnancy brought out the most anxiety when it comes to Samuel and his well being. However, once Samuel was born, God has calmed my anxieties. Now, they are not completely gone, but I am not the wreck I thought I was going to be, thanks to God.

Timing

Once Drew and I had decided we were going to start trying for Baby Mildenberger #3, I was obsessed with the idea of giving birth in the month of April. The reason for this is two-fold. First is my job. I thought I needed to have my baby towards the end of the school year so I could use the summer vacation as my maternity leave, this way I would not have to take as many unpaid days. But if this were truly the reason, I would have gone for the end of May.

The truth is that I wanted to give birth in April was because I had myself convinced that if I gave birth in the month of April, I would not be as sad each year when the anniversary of Evelyn’s death came around. I would have to be happy because we were celebrating the new baby’s birthday. It is funny how grief can make you rationalize the silliest things.

When that month passed with a negative pregnancy test, I was crushed. It was a major stumbling block that I almost took as a sign that there would not be a Baby Mildenberger #3. From this point on, I left it up to God. I remember showering one day (am I the only one who talks to God in the shower?!) and telling God that I was not sure what His plans were for my family, but that if Baby Mildenberger #3 was His will, let it be done.

I am so glad that God knew me better when it came to this. He knew that we needed the end of April into May set aside especially for Evelyn. It is her time, and I love we have that time to celebrate her.

A Numbers Game

This one is going to be tough to explain. Numbers are my thing. They have a lot of meaning in my life, and math has always come easily to me. It is one of the reasons that I am a librarian. Who else read that last sentence and now thinks that I do not know what being a librarian means?! Ha! I wanted to become a librarian because math has always come easily to me, but reading? I have had to work at reading. Even as an adult, unless I am reading a book written for elementary aged children, I make a practice of whisper reading to help me comprehend what I have read. I also google the pronunciation of words because I do not know how to say them when I read them sometimes. So as a teacher, I liked teaching reading because I empathized more with the students who had to work at reading.

Alright, enough about my career choices and back to the story... Numbers have a lot of meaning to me. For example, I have always kept the volume in my car on an even number. Not really sure why, I just have. I feel better when it is on an even number.

So it comes as no surprise that numbers play a significant role in my brain with my children’s birthdays. When Katherine was born, I thought it was so special that when you add the month and the date of Katherine’s birthday together, it equals her birth year. How often does that happen?! Then when added together, Evelyn’s month and date also equals Katherine’s birth year. That was special to me too.

But then when Evelyn passed away, numbers and birthdays suddenly had a different meaning. You see, Katherine was born on an odd date and Evelyn’s birthday is an even date. So in my anxious, grief stricken brain, even number birthdays were not so good. I thought I needed Samuel to be born on an odd day for my own brain to accept it. I even had planned an induction for an odd day. I told people it just worked out that way because I was too embarrassed to admit my true reason, but I was given two choices, and I picked the odd day on purpose. I was sure it was going to all work according to my plan too because as I always said, “My babies do not come out on their own. They need to be forced out.” I was overdue when Katherine and Evelyn were born, so my odds of giving birth before my due date were not high for Samuel, so all was going to go according to my plan, right?!

Well, as always, God had his own plans. My water broke two weeks before I had planned on being induced. This was definitely not the way it was supposed to happen. But at least my water broke on an odd day, Samuel would be born on an odd day is what I told myself when we were on our way to the hospital at 9:00 am that morning. Turns out Samuel was ready to take his sweet time too. As the afternoon came without much progress, I began to worry that Samuel might not be born that day. I started to ask my doctor what might happen if I go into the night without enough progress. Her relaxed, “we will worry about that in the morning” attitude had me nervous. I thought to myself that there might be a possibility that Samuel will be the next day, an even date.

So, I told my doctor that my niece’s birthday was the next day, and I did not want to impose on her day with Samuel’s birth. While this was true, it was not at all why I did not want Samuel born the day after my water broke. It was all about the numbers. The next day was an even day, and even days were no good. I still could not admit my reason to anyone but Drew, so I had him text my brother in-law and sister in-law to get their feelings for our children sharing birthdays. Maybe they would say no, then I could have a reason that Samuel needed to come out before midnight, right?

Nope. They reacted like normal humans, and said it would be super cool for the cousins to share a birthday. My bluff was called, but I was still anxious and needed to be talked off the ledge. So, who do you call when you need to be talked off a ledge? Well, I don’t know about you, but I call my mom.

My number sense comes from my dad. He is a numbers man just like I am a numbers woman. While my mom is not terrible with numbers, they are not necessarily her thing like they are for my dad and me. So when I called my mom to tell her the real reason I did not want Samuel to be born the next day, I was really just looking for someone to tell me it was going to be okay. But God knew I needed more than that. You see, He used my mom to calm me down and give me a special meaning for Samuel’s birthday too. After I explained my reason, without even thinking, my mom said, “Okay, what happens when you add tomorrow‘s month and day together?” (she actually said the numbers, but in the interest of privacy both for my son and his cousin, this is how I will tell it). When she said it, she was more saying it to herself as if she was adding them together in her brain because she knew how special it was to me that Katherine’s added up to her birth year. I immediately gave her the sum and it clicked: When you add the month and date of Samuel’s birthday, you get the day he was supposed to be born (the day I had planned to be induced).

I can’t really explain it, but a wave of relief washed over me. It was okay that Samuel was going to be born the next day, an even day, because Samuel had his own special sum just like Katherine did. God gave that to me because He knew how much it would mean to me. He had a plan, and I wanted me to know that it was going to be alright. Now that I am able to think somewhat rationally, I am happy that Samuel and Evelyn have a special numbers connection too in their even birthdays.

Celebrating Evelyn

KGBI, the Christian Radio station I like to listen to, recently had its fundraiser. As a part of their fundraiser, you can donate a certain amount to the station to become a day partner. This status allows you to pick a day and your message will be read on the station several times throughout that day.

I felt God putting it on my heart to become a day member. I thought about it most of the fundraising week, and then I had the genius idea of becoming a day partner for the anniversary of Evelyn’s death. I was struggling because I had a plan for Evelyn’s birthday, but I had no plans for the anniversary of her death. So I thought that this would be a great way to mark this anniversary.

When I called the radio station and became a day partner, I asked for this day as my day. Well, in this day partner program, only one person can be a day partner for each day. By the time I called, it was already taken. So without missing a beat, I asked for Evelyn’s birthday. While I was bummed I did not get what I originally wanted, I was still happy we would be able to celebrate Evelyn on her birthday with this day partner message.

A wonderful staff member at KGBI helped me write the message that would be recorded by one of the announcers (is that was you call radio personalities?) and played on Evelyn’s birthday: Today, Emily and her family remember her daughter, Evelyn’s, heavenly birthday. God has comforted Emily with music through Christian radio ever since Evelyn passed away. One of the many songs that God has used to give Emily comfort is ”The Other Side,” by Colton Dixon. In Ephesians 5:19, we are reminded of the power of Christian music. “Speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord.” Emily hopes you are singing along with her today.

It was the perfect message, and I could not wait to hear it. The morning of Evelyn’s birthday was a CRAZY morning for me this year. It was a Monday, and I did not sit down to even check my emails until 10:00, but when I could, I put KGBI on to see if I could catch my message. I eventually caught my message, and it was even more beautiful and special than I planned. I LOVED it! God knew that Evelyn’s birthday should be marked with something special like this. He put up the ‘road block’ when I thought my plans were better, and I could not be more thankful for that.

So, even though these four things did not turned out the way I thought they needed to or the way I planned, they turned out the way God planned. He showed me along the way that these were the right plans, and He gave me comfort when I needed it to know that these were His plans. He knew exactly what I would need, even though I did not.

Edit: This was not an easy post for me to actually post. It was easy enough to write, but to actually post it was hard. It reveals a lot about myself that I do not want to admit, but I KNEW it was God’s will for me to post it. I wrote this post about a week ago, but I did not post it right away like I have some of my other posts because I was to nervous to share the inner workings of my mind. So I did what I do, I prayed about it. I was in the shower listening to KGBI and thinking about this post, and I told God that I would post it if He wanted me to, He just needed to show me that He wanted me to post it. Then my mind started to wander. Suddenly, something brought me back to reality. It was the song God used to comfort me the day the Evelyn passed away, Thy Will by Hillary Scott, I knew right then that He wanted me to post it.

So here I am baring it all. Be nice and enjoy :)

-The Blessed Mourner