I Wish God Didn’t Trust My Friends So Much

A week or two, my friend Jenn lost her husband.

Today, two of my friends (Laura and Tim) found out from the ultrasound that their baby didn’t develop a skull or brain tissue.

Cue Mother Teresa quote: “I know God won’t give me anything I can’t handle. I just wish He didn’t trust me so much.”

Because of my own science project pregnancy experience, I feel especially hard for Laura and Tim because this is one of those situations where they did everything they were supposed to and something awful happened. I feel awful that they’re going through this at all but I feel especially awful that they’re going to get the following comments from well-meaning (and some not quite well-meaning) people:

[+] At least you have a healthy two year-old daughter. Yeah… be as that may, Magdalena does not make up for the baby that they’re losing now.

[+]Well, if Laura had only done [insert thing], she wouldn’t have had this problem. Laura is one of the most granola hippie people I know. She wouldn’t do anything while pregnant to make this happen. This also discounts the fact that crappy things like this happen for reasons that are only clear to God.

[+]This will make Tim a better pastor. While this is partially true, it’s still not going to remove the sting from this.

Keep them in your prayers please.

Yet Another Surprise

After my pregnancy with Daniel, I kept having joint and muscle pain which I couldn’t blame on pregnancy. It was worst in January and February and has continued intermittently since with the worst of it being at times of high stress.

I finally got a referral to a rheumatologist and saw him this morning. His thought: a “little bit” of fibromyalgia. Apparently, I have the tenderness in the right places and all the other symptoms and conditions that are associated.

The good news is that this isn’t life-threatening or crippling. Staying active will help keep it at bay.

The bad news is that flares can be triggered by excess stress and it’s one of those conditions that’s a diagnosis of exclusion which means that everything else needs to be ruled out first. They also can’t treat the disease — just the symptoms.

They took some blood and I’ll see the doctor again in two weeks.