Spectrum

October 28 was a Sunday. Early in the morning I got a text from Blue-eyed Becca requesting prayers for her dad who had fallen and broken his hip. I then had a busy Sabbath full of very good things and declared, as I crawled into bed at exactly midnight, this was my best Sunday since moving. I was on cloud nine until I realized I'd spaced calling my sister for her birthday. The next morning I found out a demure, curly-haired four-year old half a mile away from me died unexpectedly from croup/bronchitis. The helicopter flew low and loud but it flies multiple times a day and I didn't think twice when the house vibrated so late that night.

I thought about that little girl and her parents all day. I'm still thinking about them. I'm hoping Halloween won't always be sad for them. I'm upset with myself for whining about all the bedding I had to wash the two weeks rotavirus circulated through our house. It was just throw up. Nobody died. I've wondered why I am the mom who still has her four-year old when I've done things like yell at him for drawing plus signs on my leather chair with his "I Am a Child of God" pen he won in Primary.

What a spectrum on October 28. It was my best day, someone else's worst day, and everything in between. I did not personally know the little girl that passed away but I was compelled to pray for her parents. I was frozen for a couple of minutes as I tried to decipher what I could pray for. I knew the Lord was aware of and loves all of his children. I knew I couldn't pray to change his will. I knew I couldn't pray away someone's agency. So what did that leave? I heard myself asking the Lord to please just give them peace and an added measure of strength to endure this heavy thing.

A week later, just before sunrise, I saw Venus and a waning crescent moon* hovering above Timp (roughly 12K feet). The moon was so thin, like a single strand of the angel hair my mom used to stage our porcelain nativity on, but Venus was pulsing with shimmer. The moon had just about given up on shining but Venus was having her moment. Spectrum.

When I was just 14 weeks pregnant with our third child, doctors informed us that the baby would miscarry due to complications with his lungs. That news was devastating: I felt heartbroken, terrified, and uncertain of the future. That evening, my husband and I went to the temple with heavy hearts and eyes full of tears. We needed answers, guidance, and strength, and we knew that in the serenity of the temple we could draw close to the Lord. We were astonished at the peace we felt in the celestial room. I knew that even if this baby was not supposed to stay on earth, all would be made right.

Later, on my knees I poured out my soul to Heavenly Father. I told Him I understood that our son wasn’t supposed to linger but that I desired some specific blessings, if possible. I also promised that if my desires weren’t granted, I would not lose faith. I asked that this child might stay with me longer—that he might live, even just a short while, until all our family could hold him. The doctors had said that if by some miracle our baby went full term, he would be born purple, but I prayed that he would be born pink so that our other little boys wouldn’t be afraid to hold their brother. I asked the Lord to let us remember our eternal bond after the baby, whom we decided to name Brycen, was gone.

As the weeks went on, doctors professed shock at baby Brycen’s progression but warned of his certain passing after birth. I felt indescribable heartache, knowing that we would lose him, yet I was also ecstatic that he was still growing. Carrying this son who would not live was a continuous burden; I felt pain whenever others asked about our baby’s gender or due date and I had to pretend that everything was normal. We bought a monitor so we could check his heartbeat daily, always anxious to hear that precious sound. My grief was severe. The Savior’s Atonement gained new meaning for me: I finally understood from experience that Jesus Christ not only suffered for my sins but also felt every sadness, every pain. As my Savior, He truly carried the weight with me so I would never be alone.

At 37 weeks I checked into the hospital, knowing I was officially starting the time clock on Brycen’s life. It was both terrifying and beautiful. The doctors reported that he might live anywhere from 10 minutes to several days. Despite my fears, I felt the Lord’s reassurance. Brycen Cade Florence was born on January 27, 2012. I sobbed the moment he was born—pink, so handsome, so perfect.

Our boys rushed into the room to see and hold their brother; we brought a photographer to capture the moment. Brycen lived only 72 minutes, literally just long enough for each of us to hold and love him. It was the only time we were all together as a family on this earth, but it was everything we had dreamed. The boys couldn’t get enough of their brother, kissing him, singing him songs, and begging to hold him. He even remained long enough to receive a blessing from his father, something my husband had hoped and prayed for.

As a family we have a testimony that the divine plan of happiness enables family relationships to be perpetuated beyond the grave and that temple ordinances and covenants allow families to be united eternally. To us, having an eternal family is everything. The most beautiful part of the gospel is that death will never separate us; we will continue our journeys together.

Through this trial, I have come to know that God is in the details. He cares about us individually. While trials and difficulties will come, God can make them easier to bear.

If there is any one thing I can't handle it is stories of dying babies. I've spent so much of my life trying to get my babies here that the thought of them dying as babies is unimaginable. My heart breaks for any woman who has lost a baby. This story came with a picture. I included it at the top. Look at that perfectly prayed for pink baby. Look at his mother looking at him. What a warrior of a woman to be strong enough to only ask for pink. I would have prayed daily for his chromosomes to change, for his cells to morph, for the God of the universe to pause his moving of mountains and simply rearrange the building blocks of my fetus so he could live with me for a lifetime, not minutes.

Daniel W. Jones was born in 1830 in Missouri, and he joined the Church in California in 1851. In 1856 he participated in the rescue of handcart companies that were stranded in Wyoming by severe snowstorms. After the rescue party had found the suffering Saints, provided what immediate comfort they could, and made arrangements for the sick and the feeble to be transported to Salt Lake City, Daniel and several other young men volunteered to remain with and safeguard the company’s possessions. The food and supplies left with Daniel and his colleagues were meager and rapidly expended. The following quote from Daniel Jones’s personal journal describes the events that followed.

“Game soon became so scarce that we could kill nothing. We ate all the poor meat; one would get hungry eating it. Finally that was all gone, nothing now but hides were left. We made a trial of them. A lot was cooked and eaten without any seasoning and it made the whole company sick. …

“Things looked dark, for nothing remained but the poor raw hides taken from starved cattle. We asked the Lord to direct us what to do. The brethren did not murmur, but felt to trust in God. … Finally I was impressed how to fix the stuff and gave the company advice, telling them how to cook it; for them to scorch and scrape the hair off; this had a tendency to kill and purify the bad taste that scalding gave it. After scraping, boil one hour in plenty of water, throwing the water away which had extracted all the glue, then wash and scrape the hide thoroughly, washing in cold water, then boil to a jelly and let it get cold, and then eat with a little sugar sprinkled on it. This was considerable trouble, but we had little else to do and it was better than starving.

“We asked the Lord to bless our stomachs and adapt them to this food. … On eating now all seemed to relish the feast. We were three days without eating before this second attempt was made. We enjoyed this sumptuous fare for about six weeks.”

In those circumstances I probably would have prayed for something else to eat: “Heavenly Father, please send me a quail or a buffalo.” It likely would not have occurred to me to pray that my stomach would be strengthened and adapted to the food we had. What did Daniel W. Jones know? He knew about the enabling power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. He did not pray that his circumstances would be changed. He prayed that he would be strengthened to deal with his circumstances.

I can't help but think Daniel Jones and Cari Florence will be kindred spirits in the next life. They prayed the right way when their skies offered sickle-shaped low light. They didn't pray for instant sunlight; they prayed for help to see in the dark.

The enabling power of the Atonement of Christ strengthens us to do things we could never do on our own. 

The Savior has suffered not just for our iniquities but also for the inequality, the unfairness, the pain, the anguish, and the emotional distresses that so frequently beset us. There is no physical pain, no anguish of soul, no suffering of spirit, no infirmity or weakness that you or I ever experience during our mortal journey that the Savior did not experience first.

You and I in a moment of weakness may cry out, “No one understands. No one knows.” No human being, perhaps, knows. But the Son of God perfectly knows and understands, for He felt and bore our burdens before we ever did. And because He paid the ultimate price and bore that burden, He has perfect empathy and can extend to us His arm of mercy in so many phases of our life. (emphasis added)

Phases of life. Like moon phases. From new moon to full moon and everything in between, be it the anorexic waning crescent or the cup-about-to-run-over waxing gibbous, the Savior understands what we are feeling. I always interpret infirmities as all the painful things you can't actually talk about. Which makes His succor even more of a miracle.

I've been paying special attention to the sky, you know, ever since I bookmarked moongiant.com and mastered the cycle of Earth's trusty night light. Late Thursday, after a greasy and frazzling day topped off with an auxiliary training meeting, I had the good fortune of closing down Kneaders with a prized friend over two Mexican hot chocolates. I returned her to the top of the mountain and slowly wound back down to my street. As I turned left I couldn't help but notice Orion doing a sideways jumping jack over Timp. He looked like he was kicking his heels up to one side, the way people in musicals do when they're happy. It made me smile and I chose to believe Heavenly Father was reminding me that he wants us to have joy. This really is the Plan of Happiness and it includes a personal Savior who understands how to disguise tragedies and tests into personalized miracles, even pink babies and iron stomachs. He is the Savior of extremes, of opposites, and of every individual wherever they may lie on the infinitely wide spectrum.

Photo by Cari Florence. First italicized story by Cari Florence, obtained from the February 2015 Ensign article here.

Second and third italicized chunks by Elder David A. Bednar's 2001 BYU Speech here.

*Of course I had to google it—I don't have a PhD in Moon. Moongiant.com was so helpful! Technically speaking it was a waning crescent with 2% illumination, which means it was the skinniest sliver of moon there can be because the next day it's a new moon. Here's the "Moon For Dummies" in case you were a kid who, like me, appreciated the moon but never got scientific about it.

Full moon. Easy. It's the brightest.

Then the full moon slowly gets a little smaller each night, which is called waning. A waning gibbous is when the moon is still over half full and waning crescents are when the moon is less than half (and makes the crescent shape). When the slivered wisp of crescent is extinguished there's a dark moon. But Stephenie Meyer called it 

New moon. Easy. The dark one.

And then the dark slowly goes away as the crescent grows and grows from a waxing crescent to a waxing gibbous. And then we're back to full moon.

The moon is either full, dark, gaining light, or losing light. So between waxing and waning it's better to be waxing. Waxing leads to increased light.