Be Still, My Soul: Eden's Story

On January 24 of this year, our beautiful daughter, Eden, was born 6 weeks early at 2 pounds and 12 ounces. She went on to spend 41 days in the NICU before finally coming home 3 days before her due date. I want to share what God taught me and my husband, Nathan, through this terrifying, wonderful, trying, and transformative experience.

“Be Still, My Soul” is a hymn I sang to Eden constantly in the NICU. It became very comforting, and the first verse describes well the heart posture to which God brought me through that time. He used Eden's birth and the marathon of 6 weeks in the NICU to drive home simple truths like never before in my own life.

Be still, my soul; the Lord is on thy side.

Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain.

Leave to thy God to order and provide;

In every change He faithful will remain.

Be still, my soul; thy best, thy heavenly Friend

Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

- “Be Still, My Soul” by Katharina A. von Schlegel

Eden’s Story

The morning our baby was born, I woke up around 5 a.m. feeling horrible. I was 34 weeks pregnant—and I knew something was wrong.

Our girl was due March 9, and we were planning for a natural home birth. A couple of appointments in, however, our midwife noted that my belly wasn’t growing as quickly as she’d like to see. Our baby measured significantly small at her 22-week anatomy scan. At a follow-up growth scan at 28 weeks, she was diagnosed with intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR).

Risks of stillbirth, fetal distress, maternal complications, premature delivery, and all kinds of other things were elevated. Unless she proved everyone wrong with a growth spurt, our plans for a home birth were out the window. I was referred to a high-risk office for ultrasounds every week until she came.

Scan after scan, our baby dropped percentiles. She was healthy and active despite her size; but scans began to reveal blood flow to her from my placenta was decreasing.

I’ve often heard pregnant women complain that their babies keep them awake kicking when they lie down to sleep. For the last few weeks of my pregnancy, I couldn’t sleep unless I felt her kick.

On Wednesday, January 21, the doctor came in to inform me that her size had dropped below the 3rd percentile. After a talk with the doctor, we learned we would likely have our baby that coming Monday. Little did we know that it would be even sooner than that.

The following days were a whirlwind: painful steroid shots, a false-alarm ER trip, frantically packing to get to my in-laws before the ice storm blew in, a 24-hour shift for Nathan, and lots of prayer. Even after all of the evidence we had, it still felt strange for someone to tell me my tiny preterm baby was safer outside of me than inside. We needed wisdom. It came that Saturday in the form of sudden onset severe preeclampsia.

On Friday night, my blood pressure began to climb. Nathan was at work. By the time I woke up around 5 a.m., I had intense pain below my ribs and felt like I could faint, vomit, or go crazy at any moment.

My mom drove me to the nearest hospital. Unfortunately, this was in the opposite direction from the hospital where we had planned to deliver and was out of network for my insurance. Sure enough, my blood pressure and protein numbers were through the roof. They got my blood pressure down, Nathan arrived, and we left to get to a hospital where I was insured. Not the hospital where I had received prenatal care or planned to deliver, but exactly where God wanted us to be.

After my second preeclampsia diagnosis of the day, we discussed options with the doctor. I was nowhere near being in labor; our baby was tiny and likely would not tolerate an induction very well; there was no one ahead of us in the operating room. Nathan and I had a clear peace to move to C-section.

At 3:13 p.m., Eden was born. She came out wiggling, crying, and breathing on her own. She was almost 3 pounds of miracle.

I got to see and touch her briefly before they took her to the NICU. I wouldn’t get to hold her until two days later. She was the smallest human I had ever seen or touched and covered in wires and tubes of various kinds.

Eden was born below the 2nd percentile for a 6-week preemie. She spent 41 days in the NICU stabilizing, growing, and learning to eat by mouth. She has always been strong, and she proved she is one tough cookie. I am still amazed by how God made her to be so resilient and well-developed while she was so small. We brought her home March 6, a 5-pound bundle.

Surrendering Control

“And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?”

- Matthew 6:27, ESV

When I was pregnant, I was wracked with an anxiety rooted in control. I did not want to lose our baby, and I felt that it was up to me to make all the right decisions. Everything I ate and did scared me.

Now, I can see clearly that anxiety did nothing at all to benefit me or Eden. At best, it was my care for her taken sinfully too far; at worst, it was a scheme of the enemy to steal away my trust in God and any amount of joy I could have in pregnancy.

The day our girl was born, my illusion of control was completely shattered and, with it, the anxiety. What is amazing is that once that illusion was gone, it opened the door for the Lord’s peace. As I was wheeled into the operating room that I had no plan to enter that day, I felt like a child. My baby and I were powerless and completely at the mercy of the doctors and nurses around us—but beyond them, we were at the mercy of a good God. That truth flooded my heart and filled me with a peace I hadn’t had for the whole time I was pregnant.

God has called us to be good stewards of what He gives us. We are called to be wise. However, at the end of the day, if we do not acknowledge that all control belongs to Him and that we cannot truly carry the weight of any part of our lives, we will live in a false sense of control that can progress to a paralyzing anxiety. God brought me to the place where I had no choice but to actually cast my cares upon Him—and I found that when I did, He truly is kind. Not because everything turned out well, but because no matter how it turned out, He is good, and He is in control.

Little Things Matter

“Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

- 1 Thessalonians 5:18, ESV

We had never been so physically or emotionally vulnerable in our lives. For myself, I had just had major surgery, I had a nice little cocktail of strange and painful postpartum symptoms, and I had to leave my tiny baby behind in the hospital to be cared for by people I had never met. You can imagine a similar experience for Nathan, just with his role being more of a caregiver for me.

God was kind in preparing our hearts in a unique way: In the weeks leading up to Eden’s birth, Nathan and I had talked a ton about how gratitude changes everything. With minds primed with that truth, we were able daily to see all the ways God was providing for us.

We lived rural, so Eden’s NICU stay meant we lived in a different city for 6 weeks. Many weekday mornings, we would go to the Ronald McDonald Room, where they had a free breakfast for patients and parents in the children’s hospital. Everything they had was donated. A blueberry bagel, some peanut butter, a fruit cup, and a hot cup of coffee had never been more comforting or meant more to me. Someone donated a bag of bagels and some fruit cups, and God used them to provide breakfast for me and Nathan in the midst of an intense trial.

We still have several knit and crocheted hats that Eden wore in the NICU. Ladies’ church groups would make them and donate them to the hospital. As she grew, there was always a handmade hat available that would fit her little head. She also received several books, handmade blankets, and more that came from donations. It was humbling and encouraging to see the effects of God’s grace through kind people’s generosity. I never knew the profound effect a meal cooked by a friend, a cozy bed to sleep in, or a knit hat could have.

He Is With Us

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

I will fear no evil,

for you are with me.”

- Psalm 23:4, ESV

I’d bet money that if most seasoned saints were to share stories from their lives when God’s presence was most tangible, they would describe some of the most intense trials they have ever faced. God seems to be a big fan of not wasting the hardest times.

God’s presence had never been more real to me than when I was wheeled into the operating room to have our baby. Through every step in the process on that day and the following days in the hospital, it was like He was physically holding my hand. His kindness was suddenly so real that I could not sing hymns to our daughter in the NICU without crying. His peace that surpasses all understanding kept us steady, and His mercy carried us through every hard day and long night. In the early days, when my pain was most intense and our baby was most vulnerable, His kindness was most clear. It’s the beautiful paradox of living this life walking with the crucified God.

I told Nathan at one point during our girl’s NICU stay that I had no idea how someone could go through something like we were without the Lord. I realized how many people there were in that hospital who were in some sort of life-changing crisis, and how few of them were walking with the Lord through it. How were they making it?

What’s really amazing is this: Though the experience changes, the truth never does. I had never felt the presence of God like I did in the hospital before then, and I haven’t since. But Jesus says in Scripture that He is with us always (Matthew 28:20), and regardless of my feelings or present situation, that will always be true. He often uses the fieriest times to bring us to a deeper knowledge of His enduring goodness.