I have been tasked by my bride with providing the latest update from our most recent doctor's appointment. Now, I don't yet claim to be a marriage expert, having barely reached the one year mark. However, I have discovered a key secret to this crazy venture: do what I'm told and with a smile on my face and flowers in my hand. So far so good; we are pregnant after all! So without further ado...
As we entered our now overly familiar doctors office we were prepared and even expecting the worst. Somewhere along the way we've grown into this tendency. Perhaps it's coping; perhaps it's cracks in our faith or both. Regardless, we had been praying for some sort of good news. Specifically, my bride had been praying for several things: that Margaret Anne's weight would still be on track, that her heart and kidneys would be without defects, and that her facial features would appear normal and measure correctly.
After enduring the typical wait, we were finally ushered back into the unnecessarily cold ultrasound room. By this time, Mary Michael and I were both simply trying to maintain our composure, sweating with anxiety. I had noticed that the machine they had us on was different than last time. In a vain attempt at easing our nerves I asked the tech about it. Her answer was priceless. We were on the "skinny girl" machine. It was a relief we all needed. Even pregnant, and despite her proclamations to the contrary, my bride was still considered medically skinny.
After a painfully long exam, Dr. Allen informed us that Margaret Anne was on track, or at least as on track as a T18 baby could be. Her weight, although low, was technically in the "normal range". Her heart was absolutely perfect. Her kidneys were pristine and her face, as evidenced on the 3D images, was measuring and looking good. She had hair on her head, 5 fingers on each hand and 5 toes on each foot! Dr. Allen went on to explain that our girl still had 99% positive T18 tests and that she was still at serious risk. However, there were no new complications with her physical development.
As you might be now, we too were wondering what to think about it all. I was even frustrated, not now knowing what to think! We were expecting more bad news, more positive test results, more evidence that our time with our girl was running out and drawing short. Yet, God through your prayers, His goodness, and even my doubts gave us a kiss of grace. I was prepared to yet again stumble out of the doctors office, fighting back the tears until I was safely inside our car. Instead, I sat looking at my wife so very, very thankful, repentant for my lack of faith, and rejoicing that the bride I married believes in praying, and in praying a very specific prayer.
Margaret Anne still has the markers and DNA blood tests confirming T18. Her little wrists are still bent. A new development is that her amniotic fluid level is slightly elevated. We remain at a very high risk (50% of T18 babies) for a still birth. However, today I was once again given the gift of feeling my little girl kick. Each of her movements is a token of God's grace to me. In the smallness of Margaret Anne's movements I'm reminded of the grandeur of our Creator. Each ultrasound is a chance to see the life with which God has entrusted to me.
Before going to bed each night I take time to press my face against Mary Michael's medically skinny belly and talk to, sing to, listen to, and feel my girl. These moments are so precious, as I realize this could be my only time with her. It's for time that I'm praying. Be it a lifetime through a miraculous healing or for hours after her birth, I just want to know her and hold her alive. I desperately want to bring her home to be her Dad.
It's in these deepest, selfish cries of my heart that I'm confronted by my own theology. Margaret Anne is not mine. My hope cannot be in the doctors being wrong or even God providing a miracle. The only hope we have is in the Gospel and the redemptive plan of God. She is a gift, entrusted to my bride and me for a time. The amount of time is not for me to decide. God is good because He is ontologically good, not because He seems to be good to me and grants me time.
I realize that I'm rubbing up against the already-not yet reality of God's redemptive work. With Paul in I Corinthians 15, I look back at the cross in repentance, faith, and gratitude for being set free from my sin and alive in Christ. Yet, I also look ahead to His returning with rejoicing and yearning when all things will be reconciled to Himself. Sin and its effects will be no more as creation is restored and death defeated. Trisomy 18 will be no more. I'll embrace a healthy Margaret Anne and I'll hold her and know her more fully alive than I even am now. In the shadow of Christ's throne my bride and I will worship the Creator alongside our daughter; her wrists stretched fully out in worship. Until this time, we hold on to the hope that is within (I Peter. 3:15). Restoration is just around the corner. God is good!
"When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: 'Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?'" (I Cor. 15: 54-55)
~ MDDIII
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