When Christmas Uncovers Difficult Memories
Snow began to tumble from the sky as I paced the living room floors. Our toddler slept in his bed and my husband eyed me nervously. I was thirty-seven weeks pregnant, and contractions had been coming and going all morning—but they seemed minor and inconsistent.
“Lara, I think we should go in,” Daniel said, running a hand through his hair. “Can I please call my mom to come watch Levi?”
I grimaced as a contraction came and slowly dissipated. “No,” I said, “It’s probably nothing.”
He exhaled loudly. “I don’t want you to go into labor here, and I don’t want to drive in a snowstorm. Please, can we go?”
I finally agreed, and we went to the hospital. Eventually the contractions became regular. But something started going wrong.
“Baby B’s heart rate keeps going down whenever she has a contraction,” a nurse said to my obstetrician. His heart rate dropped three more times, and I was taken for an emergency c-section.
We welcomed our twin boys into the world seven days before Christmas. After five long days in the hospital filled with weighings, bloodwork, IVs, and blood sugar checks, we were finally released with the ominous words “Your family doctor must weigh them every few days. If they aren’t gaining weight, you must come back. And we might need to do feeding tubes.” I drove home in tears. I tried to enjoy our first Christmas with our twin boys, but I felt suffocated under numbers, breastfeeding, pumping, bottling, and sleeplessness.
As the Christmas season approaches, those memories are beginning to make their way back into the forefront of my mind. Perhaps you have your own difficult memories knotted into this holiday. Maybe you’re worried about the tensions that might arise around the dinner table this year. Maybe you’re reminded of something that isn’t as it should be or a tragedy that grieved your family one Christmas. The pandemic alone has made difficult memories for many.
How do we quiet our hearts to enjoy Christmas this year? How do we find the peace that was announced on Christ’s birth? How do we keep our eyes set on Jesus when dark clouds seem to hide his face? I think of Mary, the mother of our Savior, and the example she left us.
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