We knew about our surprise baby for about two weeks before we found out that the pregnancy had ended.

It’s now been two weeks since we received that terrible news.

It’s funny how different the same length of time can seem, depending on your perspective.

Those first two weeks went by so quickly. We were full of plans and dreams and excitement. There were so many things to think about and talk about and hope for. For two fleeting weeks, we were, as a family, on top of the world. It was kind of like Christmas–no matter how much you want to slow down and enjoy it, the happiness just makes time fly by.

These last two weeks, in contrast, have been interminable. The weight of our sorrow, the disruption to our normal routine, the knowledge that someone will now always be missing from our family, have made time pass so very slowly. It’s like a bad dream you know you have to wake up from, and yet can’t escape as quickly as you want. Only this has been no dream, and no amount of waking up will make the hurt go away.

But, life does have to get back to normal. Routines need to be reestablished. Work has to be done. And we’ll carry on. But I imagine that ache will never totally go away, and that knowledge of our loved, but absent, family member will always be with us. There will still be moments of sadness, but the joy of everyday life will outnumber those moments. Just as spring always follows winter, bringing light and color and happiness, happiness will follow our sorrow. And we’ll continue to carry on.

Four previous pregnancies, and I’ve never had a miscarriage before.

It sucks.

One thing I have learned, though, is how many other people have suffered the same thing. I guess it’s just not something generally talked about–I know I wouldn’t want to remember or talk through this ordeal, unless I thought it might be of some comfort to someone else struggling. But once people know that you’re a member of the “club,” too, they open up and share their stories. And it is comforting, if also depressing, to know others have walked the same path.

The thing that bothers me most is that we didn’t make it far enough to know who this little person was. How can you give a child a name if you don’t even know its gender? So I guess we will always remember this baby simply as “Baby.”

This has also been particularly bothersome to Turkey. But we talked about it, and decided that even if we don’t know who Baby was, God does, and has given him or her the name he or she was supposed to have. And there’s some comfort in that. He has a reason for everything, after all, even when we can’t see it, and He knows all, when we don’t even have a clue.

The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the Name of the Lord.