HATE.......

Woke up the other night, and the thought came to my mind...... "My child has died"....... It made my heart stop,it made it hard to breathe,like it was the first time I ever heard that. I HATE not being able to shake this feeling of helplessness.....of overwhelming sorrow. I HATE that when people ask me how many kids I have,I hesitate. 5.... I have 5....... I hate that I have to explain. I dont want to leave him out......I HATE that he would have been 3 next week,and I cant hold him. I HATE the cemetary!!! I HATE that I have to go there!!!!! I HATE driving passed that stupid place. I HATE that I feel guilty for not going to the cemetary more. I HATE all of the thoughts of WHAT IF! What if I was more faithful, would god have put me through such a hard trial? What if I have been a better person? What if I had been a better mother? What if I had checked on him sooner? I HATE that I am not a better mom. I HATE that I cant make my other children enough to be happy and whole again. I HATE that I have to go through these "anniversaries" for the rest of my life.....I HATE that I will never have full peace for the rest of my life on this earth. I HATE that I am forgetting him.......the memories seem so long ago. I wish I could fast foreward through this life,watch what happens and skip through the emotions....I HATE this dreadful feeling!!!! I HATE that I have to keep on going. I HATE that I cant just sleep the days away, where my mind can be in peace,forgetting what has happened. I envy the people I work for. they are old and their journies are almost done. This life is hard.......it is to long.....and its making me BITTER!!!! I HATE that I feel ungrateful for what I have. I am so blessed,but the sorrow sometimes(like right now) covers up the blessings. My heart hurts so bad that I cant see the joy.........but I do know its there......C.S Lewis wrote when his wife dies "Am I grieving in circles? or dare I hope I am on a spiral? But if on a spiral,am I going up or down it? How often will the vast emptiness astonish me?

"Blessed are they that mourn"

So since my son passed away, every prayer that I say always ends with the plea of no more tragedy in my life. I pray for life to go on as simple and free from sorrows as it can get. What a plea huh! Until one day I was reading some quotes from one of my favorite authors C.S. Lewis. And the quote says " We were promised sufferings, they were part of the program. We were even told, blessed are they that mourn." It was so familiar to me when I came across this quote, because the night that my son passed, I remember holding him in my arms. I was in the room with him for about 20 minutes before anyone from my family got to the hospital,and I remember telling the nurses that god was a liar. I remember screaming that out loud hoping that the lord could hear me. And when the nurse finally asked me what I ment I told her, the lord said he would only give us what we could handle, and this was by far beyond what I could handle. I was so angry with the lord, I was furious that he would take my child from me. But as soon as those words left my mouth, it was like I got a flash back of the pre-existence. I know it may sound crazy but its like I remembered the promises that I was making with the lord, before I came to this world. I imagined the lord saying that there were spirits who only needed to come down for a while, and if there were mothers who would take them,knowing the heartache they would go through,when that spirit was called home. I pictured myself stepping forward and saying, "Me, I will take one." I then imagined the lord showing me that exact moment that I was going through, showing me the scenes from the hospital,when they worked on my son,until there was nothing left to be done and then telling me that he had passed. I pictured the lord saying to me"This is what it is like when he is called home,are you sure you want to do this?" For a moment, maybe even half a moment, I had peace in that hospital room, somehow knowing that this spirit was ment to come to me,that somehow I was preordained to the mother to this sweet little child who only needed a body, who only needed to be here for but a moment, compared to the time I will get with him in the eternities. I think of Emma Smith and all of the trials and tribulations that she witnessed in her time on earth. All of the sweet spirits she lost far to early. In one of C.S Lewis' books he talks about how people go through the "peaks" and the "troughs", meaning times of joy and times of sorrow and mourning, and he tells how people turn to the lord more during the troughs. He also talks about how the lord puts many of his favorites through many troughs. I believe that the troughs make us stronger. They prepare us for the glory and responsibility which lays ahead in the after life. When my son passed away, I began reading many of the teachings of the prophets books, and I found that not only Joseph Smith, but many other prophets have had children who have passed away.I think the lord puts us through trials to give us experiences not only for ourselves but for any one we may come into contact with that we might be able to help with going through that same "trough." It makes me happy to know that Emma Smith is now with all of her sweet spirits who she was away from during her mortal life, I can imagine her up there now, filled with so much joy,that those memories of all the "troughs" ,she suffered are just that...... memories,forgotten and replaced by peace! So through this quote by C.s. Lewis, I am once again learning that it is not my will but the lords will that I must go by. So rather than pray for no more sorrow, no more sadness, no more tragedy, I can just pray for the strength and faith to get passed whatever the lord sees fit to put me through, because "We were promised sufferings, they were a part of the program, we were even told, Blessed are those who mourn"........

"He is not here; for he is risen."

If any of you have ever been in my home, you can say that I have alot of pictures. I love to take my favorite pictures of my babies and put them through out the house. These children are what I live for. They are what keep me going. But in my home, there is a picture that is by far my favorite. It is not one of my husband and I when we were dating and I was thin.lol Or even of my first born son. It is a simple picture, in a simple brown frame, done by a man named Walter Rayne, that sits on my window sill above my sink in my kitchen. It is a picture of an empty tomb where Christ was laid to rest, and on that tomb the cloth that he was wrapped in, and the picture is called "He is not here;for he is risen.... This picture, this sentence out of Mathew 28 is so important to me. This to me, may be one of the important pieces of truth that I know. Jesus Christ himself made it clear to Martha when he found her weeping over the death of her brother Lazarus.

I find myself thinking of my son often these days. I can not help but worry about was is yet to come with all of these wars and natural disasters the world is experiencing. I read the headlines "Families still searching for loved ones", or " I was helpless as my child was taken from my arms" after the tsunami in American Samoa. I watch my friend as she buries her son I see the look his fathers face as he places the dirt in the grave of his beloved child. What heart breaking experiences we go through and stories we read about these days. As I see these things and watch the news I am understanding more and more each day that everyone , everywhere, no matter who we are, where we live or the color of our skin, will one time or another experience sorrows and pain. And as much as I have hated the sorrows and have had my faith shaken almost beyond no return , I know that without pain, there is no joy. When I lost my son almost 2 years ago, I found myself regretting the fact that I ever had children at all. I remember screaming at my parents for even bringing me into this earth, where we are susceptible to pain, and heartbreaks and sorrows. But as time has passed by and pain has softened, I know that I wouldn't trade these children for anything in the world. They are what life is about. These children ease the sorrows, and make the pain we go through worth the struggle. The time I spent with my son for the 7 months that he was physically here, was the most important months of his Mortal Life. My Davis was already a perfect spirit, he was already righteous enough to not have to go through the experience of "This Life." At a fire side once I listened as the speaker talked about the things that are the most important for us to do, in order to make it home(heaven) again, and the first one is to obtain a body. We must become mortal in order to eventually become immortal. And my child passing before the age of accountability, has promised his glory. What comfort it is to know where my son and his perfect spirit resides until I am with him again. I often think about the words of a song in my mind when I see, or hear of people and communities in such pain.

" This is not my home,

its not where I belong,

windows and rooms, I'm passing through,

this is just a stop, on the way to where I'm going,

I'm not afraid because I know,

this is my, Temporary Home"

I love those words, because they remind me that my son is not lost to me....he is home. I am not missing him from my life, rather he is home waiting until my testing on this earth is through, until the lord seems fit to call me home. So all the , natural disasters, wars,rumors of wars,

evil and destruction, sorrow, pain, trials and tribulations this world has to offer, in the end, it will be ok because, This is OUR temporary home!