Say Grace

“Grace isn't a little prayer you chant before receiving a meal. It's a way to live.”

 Jackie Windspear quotes

 

This evening my day 16 meditation was titled, Radiating Grace. As Deepak spoke on the definition of Grace, I was thinking how I have experienced it deeply in my life. Our daughter, aptly named Grace was one of my greatest blessings.

Our sweet girl finally came after a long time trying to have our 5th child, and after experiencing a sad miscarriage of what I thought at the time would be our last baby. She came on the wings of surrender and gratitude. 

Before she was conceived though there was another. That baby I called my Soulbaby. We had finally gotten pregnant the month of the horrific 911 tragedy. Why, after trying to conceive for so long we should finally get pregnant that month. I don't know but despite how a shadow of darkness had descended upon the earth, our Soulbaby arrived bringing light to my life. 

She wasn't with us long. Only a breath of time. When I was 10 weeks pregnant I went in for an ultrasound only to hear words that will never leave my memory, "I'm sorry, there is no heart beat." What happened in the last few days before that ultrasound? They measured her and found that she had just passed based on her size. I chose to wait for my body to miscarry on it's own because as sad as I was, I wasn't ready to say goodbye to her. Even though she had left her body, I wasn't ready to let her little shell go. 

 

And so I waited day after day for my body to realize that it didn't have to keep sending energy to my womb but it didn't want to say goodbye either. During that time of grief I was given a deep sense of comfort, which enveloped me like a warm blanket.  As tears flowed from my heart, I was flooded with love and I knew I was experiencing grace. It was deep and powerful but light and peaceful as well. 

 

I knew I was loved and I had been given a gift. Something I had been praying months for and it had been given but with conditions. The fact that I had even been pregnant felt enough. Sometimes we have a lifetime with our children and sometimes we are not given that but even a brief time is a lifetime. It was my Soulbaby's lifetime. I knew she had given me a glimpse of eternity.

After two weeks, my Dr. wasn't prepared for the pregnancy to continue even though my body wasn't showing any signs of letting our baby leave. There was fear of infection, so I was admitted to the hospital where they induced the miscarriage with drugs.

As the first snow of the season gently drifted outside my hospital window, like angel wings falling to remind me all was well, I miscarried on November 30, 2001. It was a tough Christmas that year.

We had given our children two Siamese kittens for Christmas, and one was not thriving. I carried Samurai (our little warrior)around in my arms and fed him with a tiny baby bottle of special kitten formula. I prayed with each breath that he would start to grow but he too wasn't meant to survive. When he was 10 weeks old, our vet who we had been working with closely, told us that he had severe digestion abnormalities and we agreed to let him go peacefully. I mourned that kitten along with our Soulbaby. Still, I had a deep sense of everything happening for a reason and beneath all the grief there was this brilliant light.

 

 As winter was ebbing away, my sister C, who is a yoga teacher, asked if I would like to join her and her yoga class to attend a weekend retreat of meditation and yoga at a nearby forest Buddhist Monastery. Although, I had 4 other children to care for and I hardly ever left them, I asked my husband if I could attend. He had a sense this was what I needed to do so he agreed to hold down the fort.

 

The month of the retreat, I started meditating as I knew we would be doing seated meditation for at least 30 minutes at a stretch and I had to be in condition to sit that long. I would practice my yoga and then sit and focus on my breathing. Before settling down I would breathe slowly in and out repeating the words, " trust and let go, trust and let go, trust and let go."

 

I was planning while at the monastery, to surrender my desire for another baby. Ever since the miscarriage 4 months earlier I held onto the belief that maybe we would get pregnant again but I had to face reality. I was moving closer to 43 and our Soulbaby would be our last. I was letting go and trusting. With each meditation session I felt a greater sense of peace and  pieces of joy were finding their way into my life. I saw beauty in the smallest things and I was immensely grateful for everything in my life. The time was deeply profound.

 

The day before I was to leave though I thought it odd that I hadn't had my monthly menses. Since I still had a drawer full of home pregnancy tests from trying to conceive for so long, I casually took a test. I never in my wildest dreams thought it would show a positive. I just needed to know so I could prepare the appropriate products. As I was packing hygiene items, I picked up the home pregnancy stick and couldn't believe what was showing. Two perfect pink lines.

 

 

Is there a more beautiful sign?

 

I went out into the garden as the March sunshine was starting to bring out the first blooms and I just sank down into deep appreciation and awe. Could I be so blessed to have conceived another baby? 

All through the retreat weekend I carried a sacred secret and was over flowing with love for everything. Nothing bad could ever touch me again because I knew that even if I lost the baby I was carrying I would be okay. I just enjoyed each day I was pregnant and my mantra was a whispered, "thank you."

Our daughter was born December 5, 2002, 1 year and 1 week after I had said goodbye to our Soulbaby. A month after I turned 43. It had been a difficult birth since she was born posterior. There was a tension and hush in the labour room and I knew from given birth 4 times before that the nurses were concerned. After the birth, our nurse told me she thought for sure I would need a C section. Most babies in posterior position aren't born vaginally.

 

But she finally arrived after a long struggle, sunny side up but very blue and still..  She was whisked over to the isolette and the silence was heavy as the seconds ticked by without any sound. I prayed that I wasn't going to loose her now after going through so much but I was just so thankful for the time we had had together. It had been the most joy filled pregnancy. After what seemed like forever, the best sound broke through the quiet of the morning. A small cry was heard.

 

And so, tonight's meditation reminded me of that time and I felt like I needed to share it. Our Grace is a lovely, sweet 11 year old now and when she smiles it lights up the room. I  will never forget the one that came before and I have wondered if it was her soul coming to teach me to be grateful...and then she came back again. That belief feels right and resonates with my soul. She is my Soulbaby. My Grace.

 

Below is the written excerpt from my evenings meditation. I hope you are following along with Deepak, Oprah and I as well. This meditation series has helped to expand my happiness this month despite the fact that I could wallow in sadness over several of my children leaving the nest. But I'm not. The really cool thing about experiencing Grace once is, it never leaves you.

 

Our beautiful Grace Elizabeth

 Day 16 - Radiating Grace

“The quality of mercy is not strain'd . . . it is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.”
― William Shakespeare

Grace is an important aspect of expanding our happiness, because it is through grace that we express love and blessings completely and unconditionally. We are each a source and conduit of grace.
Grace is a loving power and presence that elevates and brightens whatever the challenge or situation might be. As we mature into our authentic selves, we are more open, receptive, and expansive, and so we naturally feel the influence of more grace in our lives. It is this same expansiveness and openness that makes it easy for us to radiate that grace along to others.
Radiating grace is not about adopting an attitude of sainthood, and offering benedictions to family and friends. It happens naturally, in moments as simple as passing along, or sharing, the fullness of heart that you feel when you offer a helpful gesture or kind word. When we share grace, our happiness increases many fold. <span 1.6em;"="">Today’s meditation facilitates this free flow of nature’s grace from your life to others.

Have you experienced a moment of Grace?

In deep gratitude it comes.

 

Until I see you again, may you be well, happy, grace filled and peaceful.

Blessings from Hope