On Friday March 9, Sadie arrived at 12:34 PM. She has navy blue eyes, and dark hair, and she is all around perfect. She is a very laid back and relaxed baby, but she knows what she wants and insists upon it. She really hates having her diaper changed. She likes to work her feet out of the blanket, and she will frequently wiggle a hand out too. Most people say she looks like her beautiful young mother, but I think she just looks like Sadie. Perfect. A blessing from God, a gift from God. A gift only God, who knows us so well, knew we needed. The best kind of gift, a surprise.
On the last day of September in 1981, a third little boy joined our family. We named him David. He came along during a time of great stress for our family. Finances were really tough, things were wrong in our marriage, I was very unhappy and lonely. Then I found out I was pregnant. We really did not want another child. We had two sons we struggled to provide for, and one more seemed just beyond our ability to cope. And then he was born, and they put him in my arms. My husband and I looked at his perfection, and fell in love with him, knowing we could find a way to make our family work, and from that moment, God began to heal the great rift that had formed between us. We had been married five years, but after the birth of David, we found ways to fix things that we had never thought of before. The funny thing is, they were all small ways, nothing major or life changing. The one I remember most is that I started getting up to have coffee with my husband before he left for work each day. It was usually our only time alone, a peaceful and precious start to a hectic day.
Sadie was a surprise gift to her parents as well. Like her father before her, she made her presence known to an unprepared and unsuspecting young lady about 8 months ago. David and Alex were surprised, jolted, afraid. But they rose to the occasion, of course. Alex’s mother was a lady of great courage and even greater faith, a devout Catholic who lived her faith with an everyday dedication that she brought alive, infusing her children’s lives with the richness of her beliefs, her faith. Alex and David chose life for Sadie, and so here she is, a perfect young lady with unlimited potential. A blessing, a gift, one for our whole family and the world.
If you have done me the very great honor of reading this post to the end, I ask that you take a moment and join me in a prayer for all who experience unplanned pregnancy, that they will seek the healing hand of love and help in their time of need, that someone will find them and help them say yes to that very precious choice they have to make. I also say a prayer for those mothers and fathers who did not choose life that first time. My you accept the forgiveness that God offers, and may you heal and grow and make your choices with wisdom and love. While my heart bursts with love and joy for Sadie, it also mourns those whose mother and father did not choose life. I grieve for those babies, just as precious as our own Sadie. I give great thanks to God for all his wonderful gifts to us, most especially those that only He knows we need.