Bittersweet Sixteen

Sixteen years ago today I became a mama.  My well-thought- out birth plan was forgotten as an emergency C-section ushered our boy into the world.  My dreams of taking my baby home the next day were replaced by 5 or 6 days of praying for a miracle, and another 5 days of witnessing that miracle as our baby boy defied the doctors' expectations and was discharged with a clean bill of health.  For 4 years we lived what felt like a charmed life, adding 2 more boys to our family and living fully in the chaos 3 little boys insures.  Then it all came crashing to a halt as sickness entered our world. 

Once again we were facing a VERY DIFFERENT reality than our expectations had prepared us for.  For a year we fought the wrong disease, with poor results.  Then our true enemy was exposed and we fought cancer for another year.  Timmy faced each battle, each procedure, with a maturity and courage far beyond his years, helping all of us to do the same.  We never dreamed he would have to leave us.  We just couldn't imagine life without him and didn't want to. 

But we have now had to "celebrate" 11 birthdays without the birthday boy here.  It is such a mix of joy and sadness.  To celebrate his amazing life while allowing ourselves to imagine who he would be today.  He sure packed a lot into his (almost) six years!  16 is such a milestone birthday, and it is a hard one to process for this mama.  I watch Timmy's peers and I feel such pride and joy in who they are becoming, and if I'm honest, jealousy that my son is not amongst them, leading the band :-). 

Who would he be? how tall? how blonde? how amazing on the drums? would he really be driving? what aspirations and dreams?  What passions and struggles?

Someday we will celebrate together again.  And the future will look so bright and spread out ahead of us and the “past”, the long journey we are now walking, will be as the blink of an eye.  We long for that glorious day. 

But today we celebrate you, Timmy, with a fancy lunch, some Seahawks cheering, a homemade baseball cake (compliments of Micah) and some family time with the new Peanuts movie.  We wish you were here, sweet boy of my heart.  You would be so proud of your brothers.  They all have pieces of you woven through their personalities—the places you would have connected with them.  It is a gift to me to see them, and they each feel a little closer to you because of it.  You still lead the charge here, bud.    Your baseball passion remains unmatched (though barely).  Your heart for worship inspires your brothers . Your heart for Jesus challenges me and your dad.   Your silliness still makes us all smile. I can only imagine how incredible 16 year old Timmy would be.  Maybe we’d call you Tim or Timothy a bit more, less Timmy.  That’d be okay.  Someday I’ll hear your voice say “Mama” again, and a sweeter day I cannot imagine. 

My life today, as rich as it is, is SO not as I would have planned. I would rewrite this story in a heartbeat if I was allowed.  And I know I am not alone in this sentiment! But somehow Jesus has sustained me.  He has healed me.  Truly.  We have marked 10 years (last month) and now the 16^th birthday.  And the darkness no longer has the power it once did.  I can say with a loud, though tearful, voice, that He has brought redemption to the desolate places of my heart.   And I know Timmy, from his vantage point, is cheering us on as we learn to live more deeply and vibrantly the lives we were created to live. We wish he were here in the mix, with his deep thoughts and crazy ideas and passion for life.  But until we meet up again, we’ll keep living and loving and remembering the beautiful boy that changed the world he lived in in under 6 years.  It may seem a bit backwards, but I want to live a life that makes my son proud.