Oceanside Healing

River's service was on Saturday. Leading up to the day, I was dreading it. My stomach would hurt just thinking about it. What was my problem? After all, Spencer and I both thought it would be a good idea--that it would bring us closure. As I found myself in a movie theater on Friday night, trying to do something "normal" for my friend's birthday, I realized I was more afraid to say goodbye than I thought. When the movie was over and I realized it was 12:15 am on Saturday morning, I found myself overwhelmed with the reality of what was to come.


My mind now goes back to that Tuesday at the hospital. The day they took her from us and sent her precious little body to the morgue. What a frightening word: morgue. I thought that was the day I said my goodbye...the day I cried harder than I ever have in my life, silently begging her to take just one breath, make just one subtle movement to prove this was all a bad dream. I thought that was goodbye. 
I figured a memorial service would be easier to deal with than that horrible day at the hospital. I thought it was more to give others a chance to pay their respects. I was so wrong. Saturday was all about Spencer and I. We were the stars of the show, so to speak. This time we were the ones sitting on the front row. We were the parents everyone was staring at and talking about. It was us. Our daughter is dead. 


During the service, I felt a peace running through me. It was strangely natural. With each symbol of love expressed from the stage, I felt my heart melting through the sadness and being filled with a warm calm that I have been longing for since the moment I found out my dear River was in Heaven. I found myself singing. I was singing! This has not been something I've felt like doing as of late. Anyone who knows me knows how out of character that is. It was amazing to lift my voice to the Heavens again. I felt as if I were truly praising our God, something I have also been having a difficult time doing lately. I've said this before and I still hold to this: I am not angry with God and I do not blame Him for what has happened...but, at this point, I've been having a difficult time communicating with Him. It's like when you think you know your best friend better than you thought you ever could and then He reveals something about Himself that changes your friendship forever. It's not that you're no longer friends but that your relationship has drastically changed and you're unsure how to talk about it. That's how I feel. I feel like I am discovering things about God, wonderful, terrifying things about God, and I don't know what to say or how to act upon my new knowledge. During this time, some song lyrics come to mind...


"I don't know what to say that hasn't already been said,
I don't know what to write that hasn't already been read, 
I don't know what to play that hasn't already been heard,
So, here's my song...You write the words."


I long for the Lord to write the words to my new Life Song. He knows me best and can see the depths of my heart. He knows how my story ends and now... I do, too. It ends with peace. And then it begins anew with eternal life in Heaven with my Savior, Jesus Christ. I caught yet another glimpse of that on Saturday. My first glimpse of Heaven was looking at my daughter for the first time. Her perfect face, so full of wisdom and love--it was breathtaking. I felt as if God Himself lay in her still body and shone through with a radiance only He could possess. I felt like Moses when he came down from Mount Sinai, his face shining like the sun because He had seen the Lord.
My second glimpse of Heaven was at the beach. After her service, my family and I made our way to Hug Point to have a private ceremony for River. (Hug Point was the last beach trip Spencer and I made while she was still living inside of me.) Spencer and I took some of her remains and lovingly placed them in the sand near a majestically beautiful rock. This rock had sentimental value to us. It was a place that looked out at the "climbing rock," a rock Spencer had climbed since his childhood. His family had raised him at this beach and he held special memories there. It was also the rock he and I went to back in high school, when our love was just blooming. At the young age of 17, we spent the day together in the sand and sat on a soft, crimson sheet, against that rock, watching the ocean and drinking in the world. 


As we two knelt down in the sand, I watched as my husband began to dig the tiniest hole. His fingers moved the soft earth gently in order to give our daughter the perfect resting place. When he finished, we prayed to the Lord and gave thanks for our darling River. We each took turns placing our small portions of her in the ground. The image of sewing seed came to mind. How amazing to know that the Lord knit her together in my womb, fearfully and wonderfully. When we were ready, we called our family over and, one by one, they began to spread delicate rose petals on her oceanside grave. As I watched each petal fall on her name I so lovingly wrote in the sand, I felt a peace that passed all understanding. My baby girl had finally been laid to rest in the shadow of our Rock. 


For the rest of the day, we basked in the warm sun and played in the glimmering ocean. It was a day I will never forget. A day that brought healing in a new way. 





"A wonderful Savior is Jesus my Lord,
A wonderful Savior to me;
He hideth my soul in the cleft of the rock,
Where Rivers of pleasure I see.

He hideth my soul in the cleft of the rock
That shadows a dry, thirsty land;
He hideth my life with the depths of His love,
And covers me there with His hand,
And covers me there with His hand."