My Unexpected Healer

As you all know, it’s been a couple crazy years for us. We’ve experienced job insecurity, financial loss, broken relationships, adoption delay, and an unexpected third child – and that’s just in our personal lives. Add to this the ongoing injustices done to black, brown, queer, and/or female bodies in our nation, and I find myself reeling from hurt and pain, anger and rage.

How easy it is to live in love towards one another and yet it seems so hard for so many people, myself included.

Dealing with the heaviness of this broken world and the upheaval of our lives in the past couple years, I have found that the one thing that has been healing to me through all of this… has been Judah.

The one thing I didn’t want became the one thing I needed.

Judah… has become my unexpected healer. Who would have thought?

When the world overwhelms me and I get worked up about everything, I look down at Judah and just for a moment, everything’s okay; everything’s all right with the world.

I can’t imagine having gone through the past year without Judah in my life.
He’s the one thing that’s grounded me. He’s the one person who can get me to laugh and smile. He’s the one thing that reminds me there is beauty left in the world.

He has been my greatest surprise, in more than one way.

He has no idea that he is the best thing in my life even though he was unexpected and unwanted for quite some time. He’s what I ended up needing and what I ended up wanting. And I am so, so grateful.

*~*~*~*~*~*

This post is true to my experience. But I want to put a disclaimer here saying that this is not the experience for every woman who finds herself with an unexpected and unwanted pregnancy. It might be tempting to say to someone you know who’s unexpectedly pregnant and not wanting the pregnancy, “Everything will be okay once baby is here!” And while I absolutely believe in that sentiment, that’s not always the reality for some women.

I happened to be married to an amazing human whom I knew would love and take care of our unexpected child. I happened to be in a home that is ours and that we’re able to afford every month. I happened to be married to someone who makes enough income so that I can stay home with our kids. I happened to be healthy and have a good distance in age between my children. I happened to be in a very stable marriage, family, and home environment. So having an unexpected pregnancy was doable, possible. But that’s not every woman’s story.

I share all that as an encouragement to be careful whenever you’re dealing with a friend’s unexpected/unwanted pregnancy. She doesn’t need answers as much as she needs your ears. She doesn’t need cliche phrases as much as she needs your love. She doesn’t need you to tidy it all up for her as much as she needs you to sit with her in the tension of it all.

Pray for her, yes; support her in any way that you can. But also allow her to have her journey; give her so much grace and then some more. Let her walk this journey as she feels led, and may you love her through it, no matter the outcome.

And if you’re not able to love her through it because of the choices she will make, then give her space so that those who are able to can walk the rest of the journey with her. She needs options but not opposition. She needs support and not shame. And she needs her own timeline… to make the decisions she needs to and to find the healing she’s searching for. It may take her 3 months or 3 years to heal. That’s okay. She can have all the time she wants to find the healing that she needs.

Thank God there’s no deadline nor one straight path to hope and and to healing. And that no matter where the journey started and where it takes its course, it can always, always end in healing. Always. Hope awaits us all. Let us walk with each other until we find the hope we are searching for.

[Image: Brisan]