Life and Love

Life is Hard. 

It brings pain, hurt, struggles that we would never choose, that we would never desire to walk through. And yet they come.

Love is Hard.

Love can lead to some of our deepest hurts, can be devastatingly painful as we experience rejection, separation, and loss.

To live and to love is hard. 

And yet life and love are simultaneously the way in which we experience many of our greatest joys, our greatest happinesses, our greatest blessings that we will ever have on this earth.

In the wake of Loran Ruth's passing from this life and into eternity, I have wrestled with what to write, what to share with you. About those twelve hours, about the funeral, about the days following... Craig and I have spent much time together these last few days, reflecting, weeping, praying... and these two things keep coming back to me: life and love. So very costly. So very rewarding. So very beautiful.

Life. Its what we begged God to give our daughter: a life.

As we laid awake, night after night following Loran's diagnosis, we prayed for our daughter. She would kick her little foot and squirm around and Craig would lay his head against my belly to listen to her heart beat and we would pray. We prayed many things, but we had one specific, consistent request: that the doctors would be wrong and that God would somehow mercifully allow Loran Ruth to be born alive. We prayed that He would graciously give us a few minutes to see her breathe, to see her look up into our faces, to feel her hand wrap around our fingers. Just alive. We just wanted her to be alive. We knew that sustaining her life was something only He could do, and  we didn't know whether it was in His will to grant it, and we trusted Him to do what He knows is best.

But we asked. Oh, how many times we asked.

So when Loran was born, and they wrapped her up and laid her immediately on my chest, there was only one thing that went through my mind: "She's Alive! Thank you Jesus, You answered our prayers and She's Alive!!" And so began Loran Ruth's life... a life filled with love.

Love. Its what we have for our daughter: deep, unconditional love.

We loved her long before we had ever seen her, ever known her. Before she could ever have done anything to earn our love, or the love of anyone else, we loved her. It was love that motivated us to pray for her from the beginning of our knowledge of her existence. It was love that motivated me as her mother to care for my body as best I knew how while I carried her. It was love that prompted us not to induce early, to continue carrying Loran full term, despite her "fatal" prognosis. It was love that moved us to enjoy each movement, each beat of her heart while she was in my womb. It was love that prayed for her continuously. It was love that got me through a natural labor and delivery, since it was her best chance for survival. It was love that filled our hearts as we heard her cry and looked into her precious face when she came into this world. And it was love that she was surrounded by each minute of those 12 1/2 beautiful hours she spent with us on earth.

As we sat next to Loran's grave a few days ago, my heart was broken. It ached for the world to know that even though I don't have my baby, I am a mother. That I gave birth to the most beautiful baby girl. That I sacrificed for her, cared for her, am proud of her. That I did everything I knew how to love her, that I would have done anything for her, would give anything not to be separated from her. I wept knowing that I would gladly have traded my life for hers, if she could have lived.

And in that moment, I sat in awe of the love and sacrifice of God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ.

As His child He loves me. Long before I had the capacity to love Him, He loved me. I couldn't give up my life for Loran, couldn't lay down my life so she could live. But Christ could, and He did. He chose to give His life up for me, so that I could live. What a deep, selfless love.

And I also marveled at the sacrifice of the Father. My heart is broken at the separation between me and Loran as a result of death. Death is a product of the Fall and it separates, divides in a way that God didn't desire for humanity at Creation. I would never choose that separation, never choose for death to separate me from my daughter, from my love for her. But God did. He CHOSE to send His Son to die, knowing that He would be separated from perfect, eternal love of the Trinity. For me. He did that for Me. Wow.

I don't know who reads this, I mean I know some, but I am sure that there are people reading this that I may have never met. Because of that I want to stop here and make sure that you know that you can experience this love. The love I have for my daughter is nothing in comparison to the love God has for His Children. The love that YOU can have if you commit your life to Him, surrender to His Ways, His Love. And His Love is AMAZING. It is what has carried us through this painful time and will continue to carry us. It give us hope, it gives us strength. It can be trusted, it can heal, it is more powerful than you can ever imagine. If you want to know more about this love, feel free to contact me at mesheahardeman@gmail.com, and I would love to tell you more.

Life is Hard. Watching my sweet baby girl's soul depart from her body was hard. Leaving my baby girl in the arms of a nurse who would carry her away from me was the hardest thing I have ever done in my life.

Love is Hard. Loving our baby girl fully means that her absence is very real in our hearts, in our lives. Loving her deeply means that we miss her with an ache that pierces our soul.

But we would do it all again. We would help give Loran Life and we would give her our Love. Life was God's gift to her and to us- a sweet beautiful 12 1/2 hours of life, of feeding her, touching her soft, smooth, pink skin, of hearing her cry, feeling her little hand wrap around our finger... And Love was our gift to Loran. We honored Loran's life by loving her as completely, as deeply, as fully as possible.  Her life was spent in the arms of a Mommy and Daddy who loved her, surrounded by grandparents, aunts, uncles, brother, cousins, friends who loved and cherished her.

So though life and love are often hard and painful, the blessings and moments of joy are completely and utterly worth it.

Loving Loran Ruth was completely and utterly worth it.

Here are a few pictures of Loran Ruth Hardeman's sweet life :)

 Mommy and Daddy watching Loran suck on her little fingers. 

We used to watch her do this on the ultrasound!

Sweet little Loran sleeping :)

Mommy loved to look at Loran Ruth and she would just stare right back :)

 Loran was holding Daddy's finger while the nurses did some testing. When he moved his hand, she reached up to grab hold of it again... she sure loved her Daddy!

 Loran and her Me-mother 

 Loran with her Papa and Nonnie

 Mommy was so proud of Daddy and loved to watch him hold Loran Ruth and take care of her :)

 Pastor David came to visit Loran Ruth soon after she was born... 

He sure loves babies!

 Aunt Jen and Aunt Marsha were there to love on Loran Ruth and take a million bazillion pictures of her! Thank you for making sure we had all those memories to cherish :)

Loran Ruth Hardeman

The most beautiful blessing I've ever been given :)