all i need

Well, SHOCKER...God is good.  

Bear with me through this overly-dramatic-but-true-to-where-I'm-at post.

When we found out my mom had cancer, I left university and moved into the Cleveland Clinic with her.  Those days before her death--though awful in many ways--gave me precious time with her, and gave me witness to her walk with God in a way I hadn't previously experienced.

I saw her suffer, and saw her response.  She wasn't just my mom anymore, but a child of God, living out her battle before Him and with me watching from the bed-side. 

Perhaps her biggest struggle was being absent from the side of her children, a pain I couldn't really understand until these last few years of being a mother.  

Mom had NEVER been absent before.  She was the ever-present, ever-serving, ever-cooking, ever-giving, ever-helping, ever-praying mother...and suddenly she was locked up in a tiny respirator room, reduced (or so she must have felt) to the ever-praying mother.

And sitting there beside her, I heard one prayer over and over: God, I can't be there for my children.  I can't be there.  It breaks my heart.  God, I wish to be the one, but I cannot.  Send someone else, God.  Use someone else, God.  Put someone there, there when they need them, being what I should be, doing what I should do, fill my place, Lord, with someone else.

As heartbreaking a prayer that must have been for her, I heard it over and over again, and I have been touched a thousand times since then to feel God answer her prayer despite her now-continual absence. 

Quite unexpectedly, this morning was one of those mornings.

After a rather sleepless night next to my Lily girl, praying her continually into His hands, we all woke early, had breakfast, all getting ready for school, etc.  I was in the back room getting ready before I planned to attack Lily's hair, somewhat intimidated by the task of smoothing and braiding and clipping all her tresses in the Haitian style.  Nervous.  Rushed.  Trying to trust.

When I heard Lily unexpectedly laughing from the other room, I peeked down the hall, anxious to get started on the task.  And there, I saw her seated in my desk chair, a towel around her, Noel and Gertha (whom I didn't even know were here) both an hour early for work, bent over her, working on her hair and fussing over her uniform.  

"What are you guys even doing here at this hour?" I asked, and they looked confused.  "Everyone knows we have a ti-moun going off to school today!" they said.  "Of COURSE we're here!"

And so there they were, with a child they greatly love, loving me by loving her, and giving me the very family that I needed on my first child's first day of school.  When it was time to get in the car, Noel swept away with Sofie, and Gertha climbed in with me..."so you don't have to do it alone," she told me matter-of-factly.  

And she looked so adorable.  Even when I left her, sitting on her bench surrounded by other blue-ribboned beauties, she looked lovely and calm and BRAVE.  The first song they sang was her favorite little Haitian song, and Lily jumped right in...I felt the Lord calm my heart, reminding me that He knows Lily better than I do, and will meet her needs.  

I mean, she is so brave!  She went off, away from her mother, away from home, for her first day of school, alone, in a class full of kiddos speaking her second language, with a teacher she'd never met, at a big old school she's only been to twice....

A friend told me that no matter how hard it was to see your child face some of these independences, when they DO it, you are SO incredibly proud, and I am.

Noel and Gertha, our family, with Lily.  

And Sofie, who didn't care, as long as she had clips.

So I stayed with her until the mothers were all asked to leave, and she held my hand..."Don't leave me!"  But the moment she saw all the other mother's had gone, she let my hand go.  "OK!  You can go now!"

Sweet Gideon.  As petrified as he was about heading to school today ("I think I might run away from the classroom and hide in a bush!" he told me yesterday) he was such a great big brother, holding on to the girls, looking all old, and being strong for them :)

Now, Lily has been retrieved, brought home and is sound asleep, completely exhausted, and while her ridiculously perfectionistic mother had so hoped that she would have had the best day of her life, she made it, she never did cry, and she was content when I picked her up.  

She also says it was no fun at all, that she was too shy to talk to any of the other children, and that she never wants to go again.

Ah, my heart.  This mothering thing is ridiculously hard and overly emotional.

But He is good, and gave me family right when I needed it, gave my Lily everything she needed, and (again, shocker) just continues to be and provide what we need, when we need it, even that which we thought could never be.  

I am so grateful, and so small a mother, before Him.