Baby Giulianna arrived in a fury. The weeks leading up to her delivery didn’t seem fast—they stretched out like a summer sidewalk, long and hot. I spent them walking around Denver dilated to four centimeters, wondering what was taking her so long. But when it was finally time for her to come, it was fast and excruciating. Because it was my fourth time around, I assumed my body would know what to do. And it certainly did; I progressed too quickly for the epidural to take effect. I was in and out of consciousness for the hour following her arrival, glad she was my last because I would never want to experience childbirth again after that.
Because she was our fourth, I knew three times over how much I loved her. I knew what was ahead, a love that would change and shape me into a new woman. My experience pointed to the belief. And I trusted it to be true.
My experience also shaped my expectations for the weeks ahead. I knew my days would be filled with nursing the baby and few consecutive hours of sleep. And yet looking at my family’s calendar in the four weeks following Giulianna’s arrival, I noted two kids’ birthdays, my husband’s fortieth birthday, and school starting for a third grader and a kindergartner. I cleared my schedule of anything that didn’t have to do with those required events. I was going to be smart about it this time and let the first few months be about the baby and my family. Nothing else.
I sat on the chair in the living room, looking onto our front porch as I nursed the baby and scrolled through my emails on my phone. Despite my efforts to minimize, I was attached to the habit of checking my phone anytime I sat still. Through the large windows in front of me, I could see my three big girls playing on the porch. Every few seconds, one would press her face against the glass and cup her hands around her eyes to shut out the glare and make sure I was watching. “See me, Mommy,” their motions screamed to me as I watched through the window. “I’m still here, even though you have a new daughter to care for.” I smiled through my exhaustion to reassure each one she had a secure place in my heart, and I tried to ignore the fingerprints that were left with each nose-smooshing incident.
Gracie, almost two years old, was leaving a unique nose signature marked with a trail smear of boogies. She’s getting sick, I thought. I need to make sure she doesn’t touch the baby. The last thing I needed was a sick two-week-old.
I opened an email from Jill titled “Our Church Family.” Only a few sentences, short but shocking. Rachel had died the night before. The blood rushed out of my face. I felt my shoulders slump and the tears flow.
“Derek!” I called. There must have been a strange timbre to my voice because he rushed in the house from the back patio. I couldn’t get words out, so I held up my phone for him to read. He bent down and hugged my shoulders while I cried.
The girls came rushing in from the front porch. “What’s wrong, Mommy?”
How do I explain this? I thought.
“Mommy’s friend Rachel died,” Derek answered.
“You mean Jane’s mommy?” Genevieve asked. Her eyes widened as she thought of her friend from Sunday school.
“Remember how I said she was sick?” I asked through my tears.
Genevieve nodded.
“She didn’t get better.”
Genevieve turned and ran down the hall to her room.
I’d been out of the Rachel loop. While I was delivering sweet new life, Rachel was coming to the end of hers. She took a turn for the worse, with her last few days in a coma. The progression at the end went at the same speed as the rest of her cancer: fast and furious.
I was left right back where I’d been with Becca, asking, Why, God? Why this mom? Only this time, she didn’t just leave a grieving husband, she left two little girls. I was sure God would spare her. Her girls needed her. And not in a petty “I really need a bigger kitchen” sort of way. Their lives, their hearts, would be changed completely by their mother’s death. And she was such an incredible mother.
I felt the baby pressing down on my arm that cradled her and remembered only months earlier when Rachel wondered about having another baby. How was it that I came to have this baby, this new life, this blessing that I didn’t ask for, straight from the life maker himself, and she died? Another tragedy to add to the list of things I would likely not understand this side of heaven.
I was one big hormonal, wet, drippy mess. And my heart was broken. I called Cindy. I was sure she’d heard, but I wanted to make certain she knew.
“I was there,” Cindy said.
“What?”
“I was with her. I was with her when she died.”
“What?” My brain couldn’t get what she was saying. I was still in shock that Rachel had been as sick as she was, but Cindy had been with her as she moved from one place to the next. From this world to forever.
“After she died, I pulled her oxygen tubes out and told her, ‘You’re free now. You’re free from the pain. From the suffering. You’re free.’”
I pictured Cindy, her long blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail, using her training to release Rachel’s body from the tubes that tried to keep her alive. Second nature for a nurse to deal with the tubes, her years of practice kicking in, yet so against her nature, her understanding of how the world works, to watch a friend, a fellow mom, leave this world early. Cindy then went home to her family plus two little girls who had stayed for a sleepover.
“I pushed them on our swings this morning,” Cindy said, “and thought, She’ll never do this again. Rachel will never push these girls on swings again.”
I pictured Rachel lying in the hospital bed and wondered what that transition was like. Moving from the tangible to beyond. What was she experiencing now? Could she see her girls? Her husband? Was she in God’s presence? How did that feel?
The next morning we managed to herd our now family of six into the minivan and to church. I was grateful for an hour of Sunday school and nursery for my big girls, trusted care that gave me a break and let me sit in the sanctuary with the baby snuggled up. But it was more than the free child care. I wanted to be there. With my community of believers. My shared place with Rachel.
During the announcement time, Jill said Rachel’s family was coming to Denver from California and Nevada for the funeral. I thought of our basement with its three bedrooms, a bathroom, and a kitchen. The college girl who lived with us all summer had just moved out, leaving plenty of private space for a big group that wanted to be together. I told Jill after the service it was available.
A few days later, Jill brought over an air mattress. Kristi gave me extra towels. I bought snacks and drinks to stock the basement kitchen. I hadn’t been able to be with Rachel when she was dying, but maybe I could give her family a comfortable place to stay. I cried as I picked up toys in the playroom. Praying for God’s presence in that space in the days to come.
I knew nothing about the people who would arrive. I was only sleeping two hours at a time, and I could feel my throat starting to get scratchy. Had Gracie gotten me sick? It didn’t matter; I was alive and Rachel wasn’t. I could do this. I would do this. I would love her in this way. I made beds with the baby strapped to me in the bjorn.
Do what only you can do. My home and my heart had been positioned to offer this to her family. The “do what only you can do” was not only about cutting things out of my life, it was also about stepping up when it was time.