Out of my control

So grateful to some wonderful friends who made this stone for us to put in our yard!

I feel like Greg has to remind me on a daily basis that certain things are just out of my control.  I struggle greatly with this just in life in general, but when you throw the loss of a child and an ovary and a near death experience in there, it seems to magnify the fact that I am not in control anymore.  I guess I never was, but I thought I was.

Back in August, we forced ourselves to go order Norah's headstone.  It was difficult--it was expensive--it was just one of those things we had to do.  We wanted to make sure there was plenty of time to get the stone so that it would be in for the anniversary of her death in November.  I just really needed it to be there.  We visit the cemetery frequently, and it becomes increasingly hard to "find" her spot that is no longer bare.  Well, here I sit on January 17 and still no stone has been laid.  Yesterday I asked Greg to call one more time because he is much more persuasive than I am...if I call, I will start crying and just lose it on someone!  The stone has been sitting at the cemetery since the middle of October just waiting to be laid.  It is now the responsibility of the cemetery to set it.  I am SO frustrated with this whole process.  The smallest stone is super expensive--we paid another $150 for the people at the cemetery to just put it in the ground!  And now it is winter.  The ground is frozen, we've had a lot of snow.  But I still go by weekly in hopes that it will be there--I need to see her name there.  I had the crazy thought yesterday that I would just go to the cemetery and try to find "the guy" who is responsible for this and explain to him that this is really important to me.  But then I would be that crazy woman who thinks she can control everything.  I am not in control of this.

Every day when I wake up, I need to tell myself that the day really isn't mine.  It is my almighty Father's day--He is in control.  Sure, He gave me free will to make my own decisions--good or bad.  I get so easily bogged down in this every day life that I forget the eternal perspective.  In my devotional this morning, this was the verse from 2 Corinthians 4: 16-18 (NLT)

¹⁶ That is why we never give up. Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are^[e] being renewed every day. ¹⁷ For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! ¹⁸ So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.

This strengthens my hope that one day all this worry and lack of control will no longer matter.  I get so tired....tired of grieving, tired of crying, tired of the jealousy I feel towards others who seem to have their "perfect" life, tired of the physical and emotional pain that plagues me every.single.day,  tired of longing so much for another baby and wondering if that will ever happen for us. But God consistently "renews my spirit every day."