Receiving Gifts

Well, it looks like I am in the bad habit of only posting on here for special events. And that last post- while accurate- was a bit depressing to leave hanging in the air for 10 months. I try to put our blog address on our Christmas card every year as a way of forcing me to write something at a very challenging season.  Madi absolutely loved Christmas.  She lived for it, she loved the decorating, the cooking, the parties- she loved it all.  She started getting excited about it right after Halloween and would always go through a slight depression when it was over. 

She loved everything about it, but giving presents was likely her favorite part.  Gift-giving was definitely her love language and it came out especially during the Christmas season.  She would plan out her presents for others in great detail, making sure she had enough money to buy what she wanted for them, taking care to wrap them carefully.  One year, when she was only 9, she knew how much I loved Hamilton (the musical).  I’d never seen it.  She knew her robust savings of $10 would not allow her to buy tickets, but she knew I also loved books and would likely really enjoy the book about the musical (which she’d seen at her friend’s house).  She didn’t have enough money to buy it on her own, so she convinced (coerced?) her siblings to pool their money and buy the book for me.  I was floored!  A group gift from a 9 year old, a 7 year old, a 6 year old, and 2 year old!  She was elated to see my surprise when I opened the book.  Giving gifts brought her so much joy!  I often felt guilty watching how deliberate and thoughtful she was about the gifts she gave because I am not really like that by nature.  She certainly taught me how much joy you can bring to others by giving good gifts. 

Since Madi has been gone, her gift-giving has continued (at least that’s what it feels like).  Before I lost my babies, I had a healthy skepticism about “messages from beyond.”  I thought it was really nice that people found comfort in little “signs” they saw around them, but the stories all sounded so… hokey and frankly not real. NOW, I have much different feelings.  If there really is a somewhere beyond and people who move there are still as close as they feel, how would they communicate with those they love?  What if the other side has some kind of spiritual “Alexa” that can send birds, rainbows, songs, or even people to those they love at critical moments?  Since Madi and Frederick died, there have been too many coincidental moments for me to ignore or pretend away.  I really believe that Madi (especially) knows what will get our attention and uses those things to help us know she’s still around.

I have so many stories of these occurrences - from little things  like hearing songs she loved to bigger things like the magnificent rainbow that stretched across my mom’s backyard on her birthday, right as we were there blowing out candles on her favorite ice cream cake.   I still think these stories sound a bit hokey, which is why I don’t often share them.  I used to talk about them all the time, but when I started to see the same slightly skeptical look in people’s eyes that I often had before, I realized how it sounded and I stopped talking. It really does sound strange, but the connection I feel is the real zinger.  It’s that same feeling I’ve felt in the past- like someone is standing behind my shoulder.  She just feels so close. 

One of the songs I have heard repeatedly at very interesting moments is the song, “Thousand Years” by Christina Parry.  Madi loved this song and used to listen to it a lot.  After she died, I started hearing the song a lot more.  I noticed it because they were in really odd ways (i.e. someone humming it, a violin street performer playing as I passed, one of my kids’ friends requesting to listen to it as we drove in the car, etc…).  I think the reason these instances stood out to me is because they came at moments when I was full of longing for Madi.

One night, I was laying with Anna as she was trying to fall asleep.  Anna looks remarkably like Madi did when she was four.  I will sometimes pretend as I’m holding Anna that I am holding Madi again.  I was doing that on this particular night and I thought in my head, “Oh Madi, I miss you so much.  What would I give to hold you again!”  Right as I thought this, the song, “Thousand Years” began to play on our Alexa. Tears streamed down my face as I listened closely to the lyrics, “I’ve loved you for a thousand years, I’ll love you for a thousand more.”  

Choosing to believe that my girl is still going the extra mile to send me gifts can be hard sometimes.  I mean, of course a woman who lost two children would look for ways to feel close to them still.  The first thought that comes to my mind after every one of these gifts is that same ‘ole skeptical, “yeah, right. Like every song I hear is coordinated by a dead child who is hanging around.  This is exactly what a grieving mother would want to happen.  It can’t be real.”  But every time I choose to believe, I feel fuller and lighter and a little bit closer to her.  I will never know if these gifts are real or not, at least not until I’m in the same place she is.  But how would I feel if when I see her again, she says, “I tried so hard to reach you, but you just wouldn’t listen!!!”

On our Christmas card, we have a picture (of course taken by the talented Dawn Wessman) that we took on the beach this summer.  That beautiful sunset (lasting for almost an hour) felt like a gift from Madi and Frederick, sent to comfort me during that really hard day.  It was our first planned family picture without our babies and I cried for the whole day leading up to them. We brought stuffed animal stand-ins for Madi and Frederick, but the sunset made me feel like they were actually there, surrounded us with light and love.

Receiving these gifts have made me more cognizant of how a loving Father in Heaven might also be trying to communicate with me.  I try to focus more, listen more, and pay more attention to things going on around me.  And I see things I never saw before.  I feel so much more connected to the love that my father in heaven must feel toward me because I truly choose to believe He sends me gifts to show me he is there and available.  This is especially the case this holiday season.  It has been really hard, but we have also received so many other-worldly gifts that we have felt comfort and peace in large measures.  That doesn’t erase the hurt, but it certainly makes it easier to breathe through it. 

Happy Holidays to all of you!  We hope you receive gifts this holiday season, too, and feel enveloped in joy and love.