the unfathomable

I don’t know how to share this. It’s just too awful. This can’t be ME writing about this again. Putting it in black and white means it was real, the nightmare really happened, and there’s no escaping.

Our hearts are broken again.

On Thursday, May 28, at 7:30am, our youngest baby Joel Jhon was taken from us. One of our very healthiest babies ever, the picture of robust health. On Wednesday night he was fussy, so I snuggled him in the sling. While someone made his bottle, I coaxed some coos and smiles out of him. He had the best smile EVER! His smiles and “talking” always made the room light up. He only drank about half the bottle before falling completely asleep. I kept him on me awhile longer even though I was worn out from a full day and still had a lot to do, including practicing piano for rehearsal the next night. I was enjoying his sweet, warm, heavily asleep body against mine. There’s nothing like it! Then at 10 something I took him back to the night caregivers, placing him gently in his basket still in the sling so as not to wake him, without an inkling of what the morning held. The tías said they would take him out of it a little later.

At 2am he drank his milk so quickly they gave him a bottle with some tea, and he just drank a bit before falling back asleep. He was in his bassinet in between the two night caregivers.

At 7:07am, there was beating on my door and the scream “Tia, there’s something wrong with the baby!” [“the baby” always being our youngest] I leapt out of bed and by the time I got to the door the tía was already gone. In five years of living in the Baby Home, I have been woken many ways in the morning but never this way. I was just sure it was all a terrible dream that I would soon awake from, as I tried to process what was going on and why and how, as Joel lay there unconscious but gasping for breath every 10 seconds or so.

This was the beautiful perfect, 3 1/2 month old baby that I cuddled less than 10 hours ago. I won’t go into details, but he was in almost exactly the same condition as Gabriela was 4 months and 5 days before (minus the horrendous chicken pox sores). How these images burn into your mind! When I saw Gabi that way in January, I burst into tears (those who know me know that never happens) immediately recognizing she was in critical condition, but this time I was so stunned I couldn’t even think what to do. I was in total denial.

Katrina, our medical assistant, just “happened” to have slept at the Baby Home the night before (thank you, Lord!). She had heard the commotion, took one look at the baby, and said “I’ll take him in, I’m calling a taxi”. Within 10 minutes he was in the emergency room of one of the best clinics in Bolivia.

Meanwhile I was hastily getting ready to follow them. It was so, so surreal. It was like I was watching myself go through the motions from somewhere else. And even though I was trying to block the terrible image of trying to revive Joel out of my mind, and pretend like I was just getting ready for a normal day, scary thoughts kept creeping in. This was supposed to be the day of the Mother’s Day tea, not a funeral. I informed God (shaking my fist at Him in my mind) that it was IMPOSSIBLE that this was happening again. That he HAD to raise Joel back up. That I wouldn’t hold Gabi’s death against Him, as we pled for her life outside the ER for over 30 minutes before they gave up, that He could and WOULD raise Joel back up.

I had such a clear vision of being on a road on a clear beautiful day (the kind of days we’ve been having in Cochabamba, until actually this day which was oddly cloudy and almost cold), but approaching the edge of a storm, a terrible terrible dark cloud with hail, rain, lightening, thunder, wind, and cold. The storm of death, which I’ve already encountered this year with Gabriela. I told God I wasn’t strong enough to go through that same storm again already, to please let this cup pass from me. To pick someone else, that maybe He doesn’t know me that well and doesn’t know I CAN’T TAKE THIS AGAIN. Much less leading all my staff through the valley of death - a second time.

I was ready to leave, and Katrina was already calling my cell. I didn’t want to answer, to hear what she was going to tell me. Her few, quiet words seared into my head: “Bring his papers, he’s gone”. As a taxi drove me to the hospital (I didn’t want to drive) I felt it was taking me to the eye of the storm, where I did NOT WANT TO BE. This fallen world… It is so hard to be here sometimes.

On the same day, my sister Heather was told it’s confirmed, she has lupus. When I was able to talk to her late that night, I didn’t know whether to be concerned or touched by how she took the news. On her lunch break our Mom told her about baby Joel, so with that fresh on her mind she just told the doctor “I’m still alive, it can’t be that bad. Today my sister lost one of her babies”.

Even though my family was not here this time to walk through this with us, God sent angels friends to uphold us on a very, very difficult day. There are so many precious details, of how friends visiting helped with purchasing the casket, covered all expenses, bought flowers when we didn’t have time as we made dozens of phone calls telling staff and friends and family, how the all necessary paperwork and reports came together, how volunteers helped us prepare pictures and other special things for the memorial service (something I so regret not having done with Gabriela), how the Baby Home was crowded with dear friends all afternoon and we squeezed into three vehicles to get to the cemetery, how my Dad’s former car carried a baby there again even though he’s not here (our great friends the Holmans now have that SUV), how in that same car we quietly sang on the way home “You give and take away, blessed be Your name"...

This seems to be a senseless storm. We are here to save babies, not helplessly watch them die. I’m not very appreciative right now that God seems to want me to major on loss and grief. But I am choosing to trust His purposes in this. There are many moments when I don’t, but that’s my goal.

Nikki, the volunteer who was the closest to a loving mother Joel ever had, who in fact planned on returning to Bolivia adopt him, said that God has had this verse in her head for a time now and now she understands why.

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Jeremiah 29:11

This plan for Joel, to live such a short life on earth but of blessing to so many people, was certainly a plan hidden from us.

Lord, help us all to still love you, even when we hurt so badly and our arms ache for our baby!

Tuesday night, May 26
The last picture made of him before Heaven, as far as I know (did anyone else take one later?)

It was hard to take pictures but I knew I would want these later. A few from May 28....

I hate the part of the coffin, even saying it. That is NOT where a baby is supposed to be! It was brutal, having him in the dining room all afternoon. It looked like he was peacefully sleeping, just like the picture I had made of him less than 48 hours before (above).

Nikki insisted on a "chocolate casket for her chocolate baby". He was also dressed in favorite clothes rather than something he never wore when alive and well. Nikki included a lock of hair, a place where he always grabbed onto when she held him. A little toy, a favorite blanket, and one of the "rags" he arrived in was also placed inside. (And yes, the few of us present cried our eyes out as Nikki included these precious items and explained each one!)

Missionary pastor Joe Holman spoke in English and Spanish, since we had people present who just speak one or the other. Many were shaking their heads in agreement as he shared and I know it was a blessing to everyone. (The laptop was showing a slideshow of Joel pictures and playing music before we began.)

He thanked me afterwards for asking him to handle the service. Really generous, since the last baby funeral he did was of his own in early February (his wife miscarried a week after we lost Gabriela).

So, so hard... Saying bye for the last time. The sobs of the staff and volunteers broke me in two.

A guy from the cemetery played and sang a couple of songs...really nice

All of our flowers pressed into Joel's spot

One of the first things Joe Holman told me when he got to the Baby Home in the morning, catching a minute in between teaching Bible classes to check on us, was "This SUCKS!" Those were his "words of wisdom" to me. Or in the words of his wife, "This STINKS!" Either one works! Although Rick Alseth of our house III says this is so awesome for Joel, it's only rotten for us here, left behind. He's already in the arms of a Father who will NEVER abandon him, never forget about him, never cease loving him. My Dad said "It's not fair. Nothing about this is fair." My Mom asked if she should come (from Tennessee). I was like yeah, if you can be here in two minutes, not two days! My sister Emma imagined that baby Joel was playing with baby Gabriela and Jesus. That made me cry.... I'm glad they can all be together, but what about us here?

God is with us. We've seen His hand in the small details and the big details, when we stop long enough from pleading "Why???" Why was he taken? But this will be a long road of grief, and for most of us compounded with still grieving Gabriela.

Pray for comfort for Nikki & daughter Alie, all our staff, the 4 other volunteers who were also shaken (without even having been around baby Joel much), Katrina who dealt with the brunt of the hard stuff on this day, how the government sees this, and certainly for me - I won't be shy!

Thank you for your prayers.