Purpose in Puke

February is generally a tough month for me emotionally.  Jacob turned four, my mom would've celebrated a birthday, and it marked two years since my surgery to remove the melanoma and lymph nodes in my arm.  To describe it as an emotional roller coaster would be an understatement.  Then comes Asher's birthday.  I know I've said it before, but February 22, 2008 was one of the most amazing days of my life.  Asher's birthday was a sacred kind of day that has changed the course of everything for us.  God has used our sweet Asher in more ways than i ever could have dreamed and while my arms still ache to hold him, I see daily the difference he is still making in this world.

This month, has been that same emotional roller coaster as always, but this year we have also dealt with some big house repairs needing to be made, foster care struggles, adoption struggles, hives and a LOT of vomit.  In each season of my life I have made some friends who were in that same season, my foster adoptive peeps are the ones I tend to be with most at this stage. The community of the few close friends we have right now makes life so much better...when one of us struggles, we all just jump right in and help the others.  Everyone just does what they can do and we call it the "trickle down effect", so one family might help another family so that they can help another.

Sometimes, that means other things trickle down.  This month, it was the stomach flu.  It was ugly, it was brutal and it didn't discriminate.  It ran through three families and back again through each of them.  I was texting with one of my BFFs who we'll just call JB, chronicling my day of vomit, flooded basements and letters from prison and ended the list of happenings with Asher's birthday.  She commented about how the struggles we're having now seem trivial in comparison with Asher's birthday, and I quickly replied that at least I have peace in Asher's story because it has been life changing and meaningful.  It is hard to find meaning when you are cleaning up more bodily fluids than you knew possible.

That evening as I was filling a garbage bag with bedding to be burned because...some things are just not worth saving, my mind went back to that conversation with JB.  I went back in to the bedroom to help clean my six year old up from her recent sickness and as I wiped her face, tears ran down my own, I remembered the days after her EB diagnosis, I wondered if I'd get to see her grow up and here she is defying ALL odds.  I'd give anything to have Asher here even if it meant wiping puke from his face.  February 22, 2008 was a sacred day, I bathed my dying baby and was surrounded in love, and I am so grateful that I get to be Asher's mom, but there is also something sacred in bathing the sweet blessings in this home, there is purpose in cleaning up the puke.  In their sickness, they feel the same love Asher felt in his and that is something.  I GET to be here and love them when they're sick as well as when they're not, and let's be honest, friends, as they get older, sick time snuggles are pretty precious because snuggles get a little harder to come by as our kids grow up.

Happy 8th birthday, sweet Asher Joseph.  I miss you more than words could ever say, and my heart aches each day to get to snuggle you just one more time.  God blessed us BIG when he gave us you and you continue to bring perspective and help me find purpose in all things... even puke.

It is well.  It is well with my soul.