Gratitude Friday…

Last week, one of our new hires decided, rather quickly, she did not want to be here. Her situation went from swimming-along-smoothly to holy moly we’ve lost her at sea in about two days. One morning she left the building and told the receptionist to tell me she was quitting. It was the strangest thing I’ve ever seen. Really, I thought that kind of stuff was office horror-story folk lore.

Apparently I was wrong.

But I haven’t lost a wink of sleep over it. Finding her replacement, however, does wear me slap out. I’m getting better at interviewing. I think. I generally have a formula now with a few questions tailored to the candidates resume.

Today, I interviewed a lovely lady. Her resume wasn’t the most outstanding I’d ever seen but her charity work definitely caught our eye. She is president and co-founder of an organization that makes dreams come true for terminally ill children. Like Make a Wish only on a local scale.

I took a look at the foundation website and of course, it broke my heart. She started the organization after she lost her own daughter at age 7 to a rare brain tumor. I thought about my grandmother and how she lost her daughter around the same age to a brain tumor. I thought about the sweet couple in our Sunday School class who lost their daughter to Trisomy 18. The couple in our OKC Sunday School class whose son died because of a heart defect. My co-worker whose son was still-born.

We all know stories like this.

And I thought about how differently one family handles the tragedy over another.

Monday is our first trimester test for Down’s Syndrome, Trisomy 18 and tubal defects. It’s just some blood work and an ultrasound. I told Dr. Z last week when I agreed to the test that it really didn’t matter what the test said, our decision would be to keep the baby. Regardless. I could forego the test entirely but any chance to see E on ultrasound I’ll take.

I have no idea how I would handle the loss of a child. I know our struggles to have a baby forced us to look at the world one day at a time. And to be grateful for that one day and it’s blessing. I am grateful when people can turn their grief into something positive for others. Like the foundation. And I am even more awed when our Savior uses our darkest days for His glory. Like my co-worker who along with his wife led their delivery nurse to Christ the day their precious son was both born and went home to heaven. I am grateful that even when we think the plan for our lives did not work out the way it should have or the way we would have wanted it to that God is still working His plan. Our struggles are not His plan B. All things work together for His glory.