Happy Tears!

I can cry them now. I did the grad photos, I'm 99% sure I bombed them, but I'm beyond caring! I'm done my project for tomorrow. My numbers are great, my baby stinks like poop (no more constipation!) my husband is about to make milkshakes, I've already read my scriptures today, life is good. I'm feeling a lot of peace right now.

I'm glad I got the beta number today, and that the doctor's office called me to give it to me and to tell me to not worry anymore (HA, thanks alot for your approval!) and that I didn't have to hunt it down. I don't know if I have the energy to hunt it down right now, as all this goodness is mingled with exhaustion and a head cold that's lingering. But still.

To be honest, Sunday was a really good day for me, and put me into a better way in terms of enduring the stress and wondering and worrying I was going through. I feel like the high beta is just the icing on the cake, and that's a nice feeling.

I meant to post on this yesterday and I never got the chance, but what really helped on Sunday was reading the lyrics to a couple favourite hymns, as follows.


Be Still My Soul (v's 1 and 2)

Be still, my soul: The Lord is on thy side;
With patience bear thy cross of grief or pain.
Leave to thy God to order and provide;
In ev'ry change he faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: Thy best, thy heav'nly Friend
Thru thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul: Thy God doth undertake
To guide the future as he has the past.
Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;
All now mysterious shall be bright at last.
Be still, my soul: The waves and winds still know
His voice who ruled them while he dwelt below.


Where Can I Turn for Peace?

Where can I turn for peace? Where is my solace,
When other sources cease to make me whole?
When, with a wounded heart, anger, or malice
I draw myself apart searching my soul?

Where, when my aching grows? Where, when I languish?
Where, in my need to know? Where can I run?
Where is the quiet hand to calm my anguish?
Who, who can understand? He, only One.

He answers privately, reaches my reaching.
In my Gethsemane, Savior, and friend.
Gentle, the peace He finds, for my beseeching.
Constant He is, and kind, love without end.

I discovered the power of the hymn Be Still My Soul last April. Have I talked about this before? I thought I was pregnant again when Elijah was only 2 1/2 months old. I thought I understood everything, and was only struggling to know how I was going to do it, having two babies less than a year apart. I turned to Heavenly Father for guidance and strength, and instead found out I was not actually pregnant on the same day my closest friend found out she was.

What followed was a complete spiritual crisis and I'm not even going to get into it much. Basically, I had misinterpreted that experience, and felt all of a sudden like I couldn't trust any spiritual experience I had ever had. It was one of the hardest times of my life, and it made me feel like a terrible mother for struggling so much when I already had Elijah. It wasn't really that I wasn't pregnant, I'm glad I wasn't! It was more the feelings I had had, and the confusion I experienced that shook me.

Always, throughout that trial, I would come back to the hymn Be Still My Soul. I had felt prompted to read and memorize it before my spiritual crisis, and it came to me so often when I was struggling. The second verse especially helped, knowing Heavenly Father was guiding my future still, just as He always has, and remembering that, "All now mysterious shall be bright at last." Even though I didn't understand it then, I would some day.

I'm admittedly NOT at the point of understanding the purpose of that trial yet, but I've realized I don't need to know why I experienced what I did. I just know how I can react in the middle of such a situation. I can break down like I did, and fight to not despair, or I can turn to the Lord and ask for help and comfort.

It's a lesson I'm constantly being reminded of, this frustration and confusion over my beta levels notwithstanding.

And so, on Sunday, I had come to the realization that I could be fine without reassurances from tests. I could and WOULD be fine based on the spirit I felt and the strength I received as I prayed sincerely.

Sunday was a good day. I am SO grateful for the higher beta levels, but I'm even more grateful that I had made my peace with the situation before the number even came back. It made today even better I think.

And that's what trusting in Heavenly father does, isn't it? It makes everything, good news especially, all the sweeter.