Mother's Day Mourning

     Mother's Day is a day of mixed blessings for me.  For the past seventeen years, Mother's Day has been a reminder that a piece of our family is missing.  Maleigh Ellen James was born on February 21, 1995, twelve weeks before she was due.  She lived a short five-and-a-half weeks, confined to an incubator in the Regional Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at UAB Hospital.  Although she was considered a "garden variety" preemie and thrived for the first few weeks of her life, she succumbed to a gastrointestinal disease called necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC).  For several years I resented that the designated day for decorating the cemetery was Mother's Day.  I didn't want to be reminded that my daughter was not with us on a day when I should be enjoying the gift of my own mother and the blessing or our other four children. 
     Time has certainly taken care of some of the pain of losing a child, but there will always be an empty place in my heart.  I used to think of all the things Maleigh was missing.  She never got to come home and be a part of our family.  We have no family photos with her.  She never learned to walk or run or dance or sing.  She was not cuddled and kissed.  We had to scrub and sanitize our hands just to touch her in the incubator.  The few times we got to hold her, she was so wrapped up in blankets we almost couldn't see her face.  These are things that I miss.  But I can't read God's Word and grieve for Maleigh's sake.  Maleigh isn't missing anything in this world.  She isn't missing out on my parenting.  She is in the presence of her perfect Heavenly Father.  She is not alone.  She is with Jesus and a host of loved ones who have gone on before her.
     The good things of this life that Maleigh has missed, like childhood friends, family relationships, marriage and  children, these are meant to give us a tiny taste of what our eternal home will be like, where we will live in perfect unhindered relationship with our Savior and with one another.  Family on earth is just a foretaste of what the family of God will be for eternity.  Some might say her death was tragic, that she died before she had a chance to live, but I know better. "For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain."