Only Yesterday

It was only yesterday that I held my breath, needle piercing my back. And the breathlessness continued, because I knew, KNEW, that whatever happened from that point forward would change our lives forever. It was only yesterday that I was wheeled into surgery, feeling nothing but the elephant feet on my stomach as I was ripped in two. In every sense of the word. Because before the surgeon made that cut, I was whole. ONE. And after that fateful incision, part of me breathed life on her own. Outside of me. And she cried. She CRIED. The little, spindly, wonderfully beautiful part of me cried. Something that the doctors could not, would not, predict. And I cried, too. Great, salty tears. Because her gasps and tiny mews of outrage meant that, whatever else, this small three pound, eight ounce girl, was breathing. 

It was only yesterday that I watched the nurses scurry around that little life, probing, poking, warming, weighing. It was only yesterday that I watched my husband leave my side, first to put his head between his knees and breathe raggedly into a paper bag, and then to follow part of his heart, over to that being who, though diminutive, commanded so much of the room's attention. 

I did not get to hold her then. Just touch her small face before they laid her in that incubator and whisked her from the room. And as I was sewn back together, I felt the absence. Part of me was missing. It stayed missing as they wheeled me to my room. It was a new room, not the room I had lived in for two weeks, praying and crying and reflecting. A new room for recovery, for new thoughts of the future. But it was empty. No tiny cries throughout the night. No awkward fumbling as first-time parents attempted feedings, changings, rockings. I would wake, groggily, from a medicated sleep, to see Stacy's place empty, knowing that he was pulled by forces impossible to resist. To a room downstairs marked Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. His heart was there, too.

It was only yesterday that I made the grueling walk to the NICU myself, the muscles that had been cut screaming at me in indignation for the abuse I was putting them through. But I had to get there. To know that it wasn't all a dream. That I was a mother. That a part of my heart was truly beating outside of me. That the absence I had felt the night before was real. 

She wasn't placed in my arms, yet. That was for another day. But as I laid my hands on her, through the openings in her warm hospital cocoon, I felt what had been missing. And love threatened to drown me. Others, perhaps, saw a tiny, scrawny, all-arms-and-legs baby, with tubes coming out disagreeably from nose and head and arm. I saw a beautiful, miraculous human life that--incredibly--God had entrusted into our care. It was overwhelming. It was awe-inspiring. It was love. 

What was only yesterday has turned into weeks, months, years. I didn't believe it would. Not at the time. I remember, as only yesterday can, one of the nurses imparting her wisdom: to enjoy even this time, even the hard, the difficult, because one day soon it would be a distant, treasured memory. I didn't believe then. Not in the midst of isolettes, gavage tubes, and kangaroo care. Not while passing those big, healthy babies in the hospital halls on the way to our own "Special Care Nursery." I didn't believe when we finally carried our newborn home, weighing a scale-tipping 4 lbs, 2 oz. Nor did I believe as we placed that small, swaddled body in the too-big crib her daddy had so quickly assembled. I didn't believe in the year that followed, with physical and speech therapists. With dietitians. With a delicate immune system that made for an endless round of Pedialyte, sleepless nights, and doctor visits. 

I didn't believe. And still, it happened. This morning, I awake to find the girl no longer dwarfed by her first Easter bunny. No longer fragile, and small, and doll-like.  I awake this morning feeling a bit like Rip Van Winkle, wondering where my yesterday has gone. For here is my girl standing before me, growing ever closer to womanhood. I look at her, still overwhelmed and awe-inspired. But now, seeing those yesterdays, I thank God. I thank Him for the privilege of raising Hannah Elizabeth. I thank Him for all that she has become. Her yesterdays, added bit by bit, have culminated in the today. And that little bit of flesh, blood, and soul that once was has grown into both philosopher and artist:  drawn to Beauty, searching for Truth, and pained by Injustice. This is my daughter.

Our lives changed forever sixteen years ago today. And the breathlessness I felt in the beginning still hits me at times. At how fast she's growing. At how soon she'll leave. At all the mistakes we've made. At how wonderful she is. At how much I love her. So on this, my daughter's sixteenth birthday, I stop…and take a breath. I will myself to enjoy this "here and now" with her, to remember each precious yesterday, to pray, on my knees, for each unknown tomorrow. I pray that the meaning of her names will take root in her life. That she might feel and live the "Grace" God has so freely and wonderfully given. That He will "consecrate and set her apart" for a work that's larger than one life, one lifetime, that's meant for a coming, eternal Kingdom. And I pray, too, that she, during these painful teenage years, would become deaf to the lies that seek to tear at her and destroy her, telling her she's not enough. Good enough. Smart enough. Pretty enough. Lovable enough. Gifted enough. That she will see the beauty that God has given her, both inside and out, learning to trust His Truth over the world's lies.

Yes. I remember. As only a mother can. The day that my heart left my body. Sixteen years ago. Five thousand eight hundred forty-four days. Each one a gift from God. And may I have the wisdom to treasure each coming day with my girl. Because someday, very soon, I will look back on this, as only memory, and say, "It was only yesterday…"