Cradled by God's Mercy

As I reflect more on the first days and weeks that turned into months, then years of spinning upon the Potter's wheel, I thank him for cradling us in mercy, courage, and unconditional love.  What we could not do on our own, God provided.  It was not our strength, but His.  It was not our plan, but His.  It was not for us to understand; only HE could.  It wasn't the family we wanted to be, yet it was the family HE designed us to be.  Nearly three decades later, we are still spinning upon His wheel, grateful that He has kept us molded together by the plans in His Hands.  His ways are not our ways; His desires are very different from our own sometimes.  I am finally beginning to grasp that His desires are much more important than my own selfish desires.  As an innocent little girl long ago I would often converse with him during the moments leading to my eyes closing to sleepy dreams.  I asked him if I could be loved and chosen like He had chosen Mary.  Though I did not comprehend in my immature mind, my heart was sincere and His answer has been granted.  For many unknowns, He has loved me and chosen me in many similar ways to Mary.  It has taken the entire journey to realize that God was paying close attention to my little girl's deepest heart prayers.  He still knows the desires of my heart.  I know I've continually given it all to him year after year.  I am alive only because HE has cradled me in his tender arms of mercy the entire journey.  HE knows the final turn on the wheel for all of us.  I leave it all as an offering from my heart, and I place it into HIS Hands forevermore.  I'm learning the value and treasure of turning us into vessels of glory to water the souls of the thirsty He places alongside us.  <')))><

The Silent Cry

One of the things I will never forget was the silent crying Clay did while intubated.  His face was very expressive even when critically ill.  He was amazingly alert to be so physically compromised; just as he is still amazingly alert today.  For more than three months he remained intubated with numerous chest tubes necessary.  At five days old, he was rushed into surgery; more on that in a later posting.  At five days old, Clay had seven, yes 7, chest tubes in his newborn body. I was watching NY MED on television the other night and the doctor was saying that chest tube insertions are one of the most horrific medical procedures a patient endures.  Yes, my  baby had seven at one time; the silent crying shattered my heart each and every time I witnessed his cries of pain and cries for me.  It would be forever before I could cradle him in my arms in comfort and love.  God kept Clay here.  Jesus did the cradling when we could not.  Clay remembers Jesus very well; his faith and spiritual gifts cannot be comprehended.  To those who know Clay, it is clearly evident that God has done the molding and the shaping with Clay cradled safely in HIS HANDS of GRACE.  <')))>< 

 

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WHY? The Cycle of Self Blame

Having three very ill babies delivered in a four year time frame was brutal.  The fact that Clay came two days prior to the four year anniversary of Taylor's birth then death was excruciating.  Why God?  Why couldn't I have what my friends have had; normal pregnancies with perfectly healthy babies and all the hoopla that went with a happy outcome?  Three out of three attempts had all ended with fear and desperation.  God, why haven't I succeeded with a happy birth?  They have all been greatly compromised; what have I done wrong?

Then I remember and I decide upon an answer to the questions of WHY me God?  I certainly knew it was my fault.  The common denominator of all three outcomes was after all me, MOM.  Conception came easy and nearly immediately, though we were told the opposite would be likely.  I felt blessed that I could indeed conceive with no medical interventions or desperate heartbreaks of  enduring months or longer of non success.  Why could conceiving a child be so easy only to have my body attempt rejections at six months gestation? And then an answer begins to surface.  An explanation that must be the reason; an explanation that shouted from the depths that it was all my fault.

From before I could even begin to form memories, I was a victim of inappropriate affection.  It probably started out normal, but as time went on, this person began to bit by bit, step out of the boundaries of affection into the sickening steps of molestation.  I don't think he knew what or why he was doing these things to me.  Maybe I still enable him in my memories to this day.  I know he had a harsh life and he had lost much in his life.  I know he received little affection after those losses.  Everyone desires and needs physical touch and affection.  He was no different.  I knew he loved me and I loved him.  But with time his shows of affection became too intimate to be normal, yet I allowed it for years to occur.  This continued the length of my childhood years into adolescence; finally I had the strength and power to not enable the shows of affection that were inappropriate.  I would isolate myself from him where he could not find me.  I would always be certain someone was around us at all times.  

During my childhood, times were difficult for my parents.  I was the fourth of five children.  Back then I would say I did not feel loved for reasons that get very complicated.  But the truth remains that I often felt unloved and unworthy.  I did not receive the much needed affirmations as a child at the time.  My friends got gifts, had birthday parties, sleep overs, etc.  I did not.  At an early age, such things help us to understand we are loved and affirmed.  Because I did not experience those marvelous moments my friends so excitedly talked about, I began to internalize that I just was not worthy of the same experiences and displays of love they received.  I was less than.  Combine feeling less than, unworthy and add in molestation; it told me I was a bad girl.  I was bad because I allowed someone to molest me and of course, it had to be my fault that he did so.  I was bad because I did not have the same experiences as my friends did growing up.  I did not deserve the things they got to experience.  I felt unloved and unworthy.  I still had the immature mind of a child; to me, it was all because I had to be really bad to feel so unworthy or unloved.

Into my school years and teens, I poured myself into academics and pleasing teachers.  I was good at pleasing teachers.  They affirmed me; often I was called the Teacher's Pet.  It made me feel worthy to be a teacher's pet student; often I felt rewarded in ways I never did at home.  I never shared with any of my friends how I felt unworthy at home or that I was being molested, year after year.

I learned to push it out of my mind once the molester died and I got older.  The threat had left.  I went on to college and found the love I so hoped for.  A young man had become smitten with me; how could I have gotten so lucky?  His family fell in love with me.  His mother doted greatly on me; I was the daughter she had always longed for but did not have until I became a constant presence in their home.  We married and soon after marriage, we moved to the mid west to start a life and to build our own nest.  It took time but finally I fell in love with Tulsa, Oklahoma.  Our lives were full.  I conceived quickly, rather miraculously said the doctor.  All was wonderful until at 26 weeks I began labor but did not know it was labor.  We were moving into a home we had just completed building the very next day.  I was filled with joy and anticipation.  My mother in law and brother in law were in route to Tulsa from SC.  So excited were my inlaws as this would be their first grandchild in the family.  They were bringing a station wagon laden with baby gifts and a cradle that Dad Falls had lovingly worked on as well.  The excitement was sky high; a brand new house and a new baby coming soon.  Yet, the excitement came to a sudden halt.  A friend had suggested I be checked out as I was feeling "different" than normal.  I was actually in full labor and was dilating at six months.  We went to the hospital and they tried everything they could possibly try to stop the labor.  However I was too progressed into labor and dilation that nothing worked.  The decision was made to take me into an emergency Cesarean delivery.  Everything was spinning like a vortex around me.  I delivered a little boy, Taylor Monts Falls weighing 2 pounds and 2 ounces.  He was 14 inches long and very premature.  He was whisked into NICU and I did not even get to see him.  Within 24 hours, Taylor died of extremely premature lung development.  Fred's mom and brother arrived and I felt like a huge disappointment.  My emotions were all confused.  I was in a state of complete shock.  As I began to process all that had happened I also formulated the reason it had happened.  I had been a bad girl.  Because I had been a bad girl, molested in childhood, I did not deserve a baby.  I convinced myself it was all my fault and it was what I got for being the bad little girl.

When Brandon arrived less than ten months later, he too was sent to NICU in the same hospital.  I managed to maintain the pregnancy to 36 weeks with lots of medication and trips to the hospital to fight off labor.  This time at 26 weeks I was educated about what a contraction was and how it felt.  I immediately went for medical help.  Brandon spent a month in that NICU.  God blessed us by allowing Brandon to thrive after that initial month of hospitalization.  Finally we experienced joy as we had never experienced before, yet I still internalized the blame on myself because of course, I had been the bad little girl.  That surely was why I again almost lost another son.  I was the common denominator.

So when Clay arrived suddenly saving my own life that Sunday afternoon in Boulder, Colorado we thought at last I had made it to a safe place and that finally we would have a fairy tale ending.  It wasn't to be.  Had we not gone to the hospital that afternoon, within an hour or two at most, my uterus would have ruptured and very likely both mother and child would have died had that happened.  It was precariously close when they took me into yet another emergency c section delivery.  We knew the baby was big.  Everything indicated he was healthy.  But for reasons unknown to this day, at some point after his delivery, his lung ruptured.  Then hell broke into our hopes and dreams.  He was not expected to survive whatsoever.  I was okay, but the baby who saved my life, was now in the fight for his very own.  Again, it had to be my fault because for a third time, I was the common denominator.  I had been a very bad little girl and this was punishment for being the little girl who was constantly molested.  I was at fault.  Somehow as a little blonde haired toddler, I asked to be inappropriately shown affection that happened before I can remember the start.  It had to have been my fault.  Because I had been bad, my baby boys all came into the world severely compromised as punishment to me.  The cycle had started and the cycle would take years to resolve itself.  The self blame turned into self punishment and over the years I acted out in ways that self punished.  Certainly I needed to find ways to be punished because I was the guilty one who needed to be held accountable for the WHY?  It all had to be a result of being a bad girl who deserved punishment.  If from no one else, I deserved punishment of self.

"We've saved you, but we don't think your son Clay is going to survive!"




Visiting hour & I am on full display to all the friends and families who have experienced GREAT joy but Clay is not expected to live.

status: EXTREMELY CRITICAL

"Don't be afraid, this is a big, healthy baby. Everything is going to be what you've hoped for. "

Mother's Day; One week before Clay's emergency arrival





Sunday, May 12, 1985 in our back yard, Boulder, Colorado



Under Contruction~ Shaping a Place to Share Lessons and Treasures From My Vessel Named Clay

On Sunday, May 19, 1985 in Boulder, Colorado, God orchestrated events to save my own life through the cessation of fetal movement of my third son named Clayton Alexander Falls.  This was the shattering end of my third birth experience in a four year time frame, beginning with the unexpected loss of my firstborn, Taylor Monts Falls on May 21, 1981 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It was the eve of our highly anticipated move into our first real home.  Taylor, lived a short number of hours after birth, but forever left a single tiny two inch footprint before blossoming wings on May 22 to dance among moonbeams and stars.  Brandon Montgomery Falls followed nine and a half months later on March 7, 1982, spending his first month in the same NICU where his brother died.  Then after much joy, a job loss and a relocation to Boulder, CO, I was determined to have a final healthy, normal birth experience.  It wasn't to be.  This is the beginning of a story including how Clay saved my life then suffered severe consequences of a torn lung soon after his birth that shattered all our lives, hopes and dreams in the blink of an eye.  God has cradled me in Hands of Grace in a way that leaves the profound mark of the Potter upon me, our family, and those we meet.  He has shaped us into vessels of His Glory by His purposes and plans.  The journey has been long and hard.  The potter's wheel has often spun out of control and severely off balance, yet in all things, we have learned that HIS HANDS have held us the entire voyage, transforming us into the beautiful vessels He has intended for us to become.  To God be all the glory as we've learned to live our lives in the hands of His Amazing Grace.