Love Givers

One of my biggest learnings in the last year and a half has been how to let people help me. I'm not good at accepting help. (To those who know me well, thank you for not publicly snorting at my understatement.) I'm much better at giving it. That's what I do. But then life circumstances kind of came and kicked the carp out of me and I had to accept help. I couldn't NOT accept help.

That didn't make it easy to receive, though. Every time someone did something nice for us, I cried. It was awkward for me and yet deeply, deeply moving. Also, I think, it was healing for me. Thanks to repeated teachings from the Love Givers inspired by Sam, I've gotten a little more graceful about receiving help. And the magic of every gesture is still there for me.

Help often came from unexpected places. Parents at school, colleagues from work. Crazy things happened like my friend Lisa offered to spend two days repainting our family room because we just never had time. And I LET her do that. People who I didn't even know were praying. Praying! Women at heart-sister Lori's church would press cash into her hand for our stroller or give her a bag with food and a homemade blanket. I'm familiar with Love and consider myself pretty connected to it. In my life before Sam, I had never contemplated that this kind of Love was just walking around out there ready for MY family.

I want to tell you about some special Love Givers in my circle. You know how there are some people in your life who you don't really know but you actually really do? You haven't had a lot of time together and you don't know all the details of each others lives, but you somehow just *know* them in a beautiful spirit kind of way. Carissa and Lesley are those kinds of people for me.

Carissa and Lesley know about hanging out in the hospital with your baby. They have both done their time with fear and prayer and hospital-world-depletion. They have both walked out with grace and wisdom and gratitude. And then they turned all that into a desire to love on other people. They are like that.

In a whole bunch of little ways, they have woven themselves into Samuel's loving quilt. There was an ICU Survival Kit that showed up one dark and scary night early on. It had things like tea, a coffee card, and hand cream. There were books with short, simple stories for mommies with no access to even their most frazzled brains. There were prayer beads that I have worn every single day in the hospital, handmade by Lesley using special magic beads to remind me that God is listening.

An envelope of cash arrived another night, tucked in with a bottle of wine. Carissa collected money from people who don't even know us but who wanted to help. It was the exact amount needed to pay for our monthly hospital parking pass. These were the tangible gifts but there were other important gifts. Through their messages in email and on the blog, they let me know that I was not alone, that there were these other women out there who walked where I walked, women who had come out the other side with their families and their selves in tact.

When Samuel was hospitalized for his surgery in February, Carissa decided that she would love on the big brothers. She called upon her team and a package was delivered to our house for Valentine's Day. I came home from the hospital that evening to find my boys on the floor surrounded by books, gift cards, candy, baking, DVDs, games and toys. Just for them. Amazing. Then cookies and loaves appeared on our doorstep too. Thank you Kim, Jamie, Susan, Carmen, Christine and Ryan who I don't know and love. Thank you Jana-Lynn and Lesley who I know and love.

Extra super-duper special to me were the cards acknowledging and encouraging Daniel, Zachary and Jacob and the prayer beads that Carissa made for each of them to honour their amazing big brother journey. They have beads just like mama. To remind them that God is listening.

Also, there were two candy bouquets from - get this - some of Carissa's students. They suggested we could share one of the baskets with a special hospital person and we did just that, giving it to the family across the hall from Samuel in the ICU. So the Love passed on to the 4 siblings of Sawyer, who has spent his whole 3 months of life in ICU. Thank you Emma, Victoria and Megan for being kids willing to care so much about other kids.

On one of my walks with Zachary recently, he said to me, "You know, Mum, there are a lot of disadvantages to you being at the hospital all the time, but one of the big advantages is that people sent us candy and stuff!" Spoken like a 7 year old.  

Thank you Carissa for being one of the most open-hearted, faith-filled people I know. You've taught me more than you know and I will have you in my heart every time I get to pay forward such Love. Thank you Lesley for the way that you give of yourself and for the way that your humour and words can lift me right up. (Special thanks for giving me the phrase "big girl pants" which is such a smiley way to remind myself that I can do hard things.) I hope to be more like you both, walking this world with your kind of grace and wisdom and gratitude.

To Carissa and Lesley and a whole whack of other people reading this who I know and who I don't and who I love.... Thank you for bringing Sam into your great big hearts and for sharing him with your own teams of Love Givers. As it turns out, being able to receive AND give Love has just turned me into a New and Improved Love Giver! Which is just a cool thing to have figured out in all of this.