Lessons from the NICU

This is a post that has been a long time coming. I have been thinking it over in my head for a couple of months now. It has been 3 months since we got to bring sweet baby Kate home from the hospital. The 6 days that Kate spent in the NICU were some of the hardest days of my life. But through that I have learned so very much. It has taken me this long to even just begin to process it all. It was such a whirlwind time and very overwhelming. I am thankful for the experience and the time I have had to process it all now.

Last fall I was praying to God to really increase my faith. I was thinking about how I have had a pretty easy life. Everything has sort of fallen into place with no real struggles. I was wondering how strong my faith really was because I had never really faced anything difficult. Well God heard my prayers and thought he would throw a little curve ball our way. We thought we were going to have a perfectly healthy baby girl. Even 5 minutes after she was born, I was thanking God that everything had gone so well. Things changed rather quickly as Kate was rushed off to the NICU. Talk about a scary time. But God is faithful and through the experience I learned so much!

We have friends that have gone through so much worse lately and their stories are so much greater. And there are people that have much longer and scary NICU stories. But I know God is using the trial that we faced in a big way in our lives. Our pastor started a sermon series last week called "Lessons from the Storm." He is taking literal storms from the Bible and applying the lessons that are to be learned. God is so great and His timing is so awesome. I had been praying over the previous couple of months about what lessons He wanted to teach from the experience we went through. My goal is to see what lessons I could learn through that storm in life. So here are some of the lessons I have learned.

1. God has a bigger and better plan than I can ever come up with. Those of you that know me well know I am a super duper type A over planner. I have list after list. I even have lists of lists I need to make. I pride myself on having a plan and sticking to it. So of course I had it all planned out how things were going to go with Kate's birth and afterwards. God had to pull me away from my perfect little plan to make me depend fully on Him. In those days when there was no plan, I had to lean on the fact that God was making the plan not me. And I learned that His plan is so perfect. I knew that but I had to fully experience it.
   
2. God is sufficient to meet all of my needs. I am also a fiercely independent person. I like to do things on my own. Through this experience, I learned that sometimes I in and of myself can't do it all. In those moments when I was struggling to understand why everything was happening, God was right there providing me the comfort and peace that I needed. I learned that I am not as strong as I think I am . I don't ever cry but that first day Matt and I just cried and poured our hearts out to God. He met us right there in my hospital room and filled us with such a peace. Through the whole week, He was walking right with us and meeting every need that we had along with some we probably didn't even know we had.
   
3. Prayer is a lifeline!!! Once again something I knew but had never really experienced for myself. I did more praying in that week than I probably ever have in my life. As I would sit by Kate's bedside, I would just pray for her. Not just for healing but for her whole life. I would pray that God would use her in a mighty way as she grows to be a woman after His own heart. That brought me so much comfort. Really that week totally changed my prayer life. I pray that I don't forget this experience and that I can continue to pray with such eager expectation!


4. I am so blessed! First and foremost with a wonderful husband who walked through this storm with me. I will never forget some of the sweet moments the 2 of us shared together when we were alone without our new baby. Secondly with great friends and family that helped us out so much. But most of all for a Savior that never leaves or foresakes us!! I often times wonder how people who don't have a personal relationship with the Lord can make it through difficult times. And I am blessed in the fact that my sweet baby girl is perfect and healthy now. We truly experienced God's healing hand and power.

These are just a few of the big lessons that I have learned through our experience. God is still working on me and teaching me new things. Our experience really has inspired me to a new faith. As our pastor talked about last week, I pray that I will continue to know Jesus even better after this experience than I did before. I think the verse that sums it all up is one that I now have hanging on Kate's wall. "The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy." Psalm 126:3