Enough love

'...that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.'
Ephesians 3:17-19

It's taken me longer than I wanted to get round to jotting down some thoughts on how God helped me through my time in hospital with Livia and those early days. That's partly because life has been a bit mad since getting home and also there is so much I could put that it's hard to start!

Firstly I feel I should say that there was never a time when I worried for Livia's future or really about the infection she had. I think God reminded me of his faithfulness and I trusted in his supreme authority to get us all through safely. As well as this she never really seemed that poorly, even with all the tubes sticking out of her! It felt like most the tests were just precautionary and not because nothing major was wrong.

The hardest part of our stay in hospital was being apart from both my girls. I have only ever been away from Chloe for less than 2 days and one night, so suddenly being apart from her for nearly 6 days was really difficult! I would sometimes talk to her on the phone and she would get tearful and ask when I was coming home which made me so guilty, especially as there was nothing very wrong with me. I felt bad that our families were having to give up so much time to look after her too - I'm very bad at 'imposing' ourselves on other people.

Whilst I was on the postnatal ward I was mainly just sitting around, reading or watching tv. I went to see Livia in SCBU often but it's a really weird environment with lots of other parents standing around cots and the wires make it difficult to interact with your baby so I didn't stay for long periods of time. I was also having to express for Livia but could only ever manage to produce a few ml so they had to top her up with formula through a tube to her stomach.

This made me feel really useless as I felt I couldn't do anything for my daughter. I got upset a lot when J wasn't around as it felt like our family was all split up at a time when we should be together. Thankfully I have lovely friends who sent me verses and encouraging messages to lift my mood.

Here are some of the verses that helped me:

In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety. Psalm 4:8 (applicable for all my family even when I wasn't with them, God was).

1 I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?
2 My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.
4 Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade on your right hand.
6 The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.
8 The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore. Psalm 121:1-8

The verse at the start of this post from Ephesians helped me to see that even when I couldn't provide love and security for my children by meeting their needs and physically being there, God had more than enough love for them. He also had more than enough love for me when I was feeling so useless.

The final reassurance God gave me when I was feeling low was in reminding me about a picture I had shared in church the day before I went into labour. It was of Jesus going off with his disciples in the boat, the storm descending on them and Jesus calming the storm. God spoke to me about how Jesus doesn't stop them from setting out in the boat even though he would have known about the storm. He goes with them into it and it's in the storm that he gets a chance to show his power and authority. So, God was prepared to all that was happening in hospital and I just had to trust him and let him show me his goodness and power in that place. This was very reassuring when we didn't know what would happen next.

There is so much more I could put, especially about the emotional upheaval of eventually coming home but I think I'll have to save it as it's naptime and I want to try and get a sleep before the girls wake up! I'm very thankful for how God has used this experience with Livia to show me that I can trust him in every circumstance and when I can't be there with my children, he is watching over them.