30 Days of Thanksgiving-Day 3

30 Days of Thanksgiving from Karla Dornacher

Tonight as I was standing at our kitchen table folding laundry, I picked up a small flannel shirt and brought it to my face. I nuzzled my nose into the soft, warm material, remembering how it wasn't so very long ago that Baby Sam was born into our family.

As I stood there remembering and thinking back to his birth, my mind began to wonder and I found myself thinking about our 3 sons who died in my womb just 22 short weeks after their conceptions ~ Emmett Christopher, Thomas Ward, and Micah John. As my mind continued to drift back, I remembered the excitement of the positive pregnancy tests. I visualized me and Tim telling the rest of the kids that I was pregnant. I recalled being on the sonogram table filled with excitement for the life within me. I remembered being elated with joy when we found out that we were going to have a boy. I, then, remembered feeling the deep stab of pain as we were told, not once, not twice, but three times, that our son had died. A pain so piercing, I thought it would never end. I thought it would never go away. To this day, the pain remains, but it is lighter and easier to bear. I am able to look back and see God's active hand in my life.

After losing Micah John, our 3rd son, I had convinced myself that I would never be able to carry a boy again. But God had bigger and better plans for us and on March 26, 2009, Samuel Isaiah Walker entered our family. The pain of losing the boys will never go away and I will never understand why God chose to take them home so soon. But I embrace His will in my life and everyday I thank Him for the gift of Baby Sam...the son that I thought I would never be able to hold.