Praying for Gratitude

12 years ago, I gave birth to my 9th child more than 16 weeks early. Life suddenly became a lot more challenging. I wanted to see our very sick baby as much as I could but I had 8 children at home who also needed me. I was also trying to pump valuable breast milk for her and sleep was in short supply. There was so much uncertainty. We didn't know if our baby would survive and if she did, what her life would look like. What disabilities would she likely have? Our bishop gave her a blessing the day she was born that brought me a lot of hope but the health crises that she continued to have and some of the doctors' lack of optimism made it challenging to hold onto the hope. After about 11 days, she had a bowel perforation which required her to go to a hospital an hour away which made it harder to visit and supervise her care. I didn't get to hold my baby for the first two months of her life because her health was so fragile.

Adding to the challenges was my own health crisis. About six weeks after the birth it wasn't clear to me that I was healing properly. Even though I didn't feel like I had the time to go, I went to the doctor and he discovered the problem. In his efforts to fix it, I started hemorrhaging and ended up going to the hospital in an ambulance for an emergency surgery. The surgery was short and successful but I had to get a transfusion from loss of blood and stay overnight. Just in case things weren't complicated enough, my husband was out of town and my parents were out of the country and couldn't help me. It was easy to feel sorry for myself.

Susanna turned 7, 7 days after the birth of our baby

And Halloween was a few days after that.

How did I get through all this? Two things helped: prayer and gratitude. More than any other time of my life, I received answers when I prayed. I felt directed in what I prayed for. I felt directed to pray for patience when that really wasn't what I wanted. I felt directed to go to the doctor when I didn't feel like I had the time. I also prayed for gratitude. During this time, I read an article in the Church News that said that people who kept gratitude journals were happier. I decided to try it out since journaling was something I could do as I pumped so I had time for it.

Christmastime

An early snow that November

I remember in particular one day in December when I prayed to feel grateful and several things happened that helped me feel God was aware of me and had blessed me in small ways. The first thing that happened was that a particular nurse who had seemed unkind when our baby was first born happened to be my baby's nurse that day. I had an opportunity to have more positive interactions with her so I could let go of the hurt I had felt. Remarkably she was never our baby's nurse again. Another thing that happened was I saw a woman in a wheelchair pushing herself along the street trying to go where she needed to go. I realized that I had a very healthy body plus a car to get me just about anywhere I needed to go which was something I usually take for granted. The third thing that happened was that I got to talk to another nurse about an issue that one of my other children was having a problem with and she was able to give some ideas on how to help this child. It gave me a lift to find some answers.

My larger problems did not go away. My baby still had significant health problems and spent a lot more time in the hospital. But it gave me a lift each time I focused on how God had blessed me. It's a lesson I need to remember.