The Thing I Dreaded Most

I'd been a mom for less than five days when I did the one thing I dreaded most (and I blame the percocet) ...

Jalynn is an unconventional girl. Today she dumped a whole box of princess bandaids on the floor in search of just the right one. I asked her to pick them up. Her response: "Actually, you're gonna have to do that. I have to go work out." Two-and-a-half and already working out (I'm fine if you wanna believe she learned that from me).

She's always marched—or should I say "worked out"—to the beat of her own drum. Even before she was born she did things her own way. Three weeks before her due date I felt a tectonic shift within me. I looked down and saw little limb shapes protruding from my tight round belly. This was far from an ordinary baby kick. And sure enough, an ultrasound two days later showed that my little passionate one was sitting on her behind ... breached. She would be born c-section.

I sat in bed nursing Jalynn on my fifth night of motherhood, foggy from lack of sleep and percocet. I remember holding her up against my shoulder for a post-snack burp. And, yep, that's pretty much all I remember.

I don't know when I came to. Five minutes later? Maybe an hour? All I knew is that my arms, which were supposed to be holding seven and a half pounds of miracle, were empty. I had done the thing I dreaded most about being a mom: I had dropped my baby.

In one terrifying moment, I jabbed Jimmy awake and jumped out of bed. "The baby. The baby" were the only words I could manage. I stood hovered over Jalynn. My hands were shaky and my legs like gum. What if she was broken? I didn't trust myself to touch her. Jimmy swooped her up. She wasn't just okay, she was wide awake and perfectly content (a combo that'd prove itself pretty rare for the next three months).

In the panic of the moment, Jimmy and I didn't think much about how and where Jalynn lay when we found her on the floor. I don't think either of us slept another wink that night—our nerves beating out fatigue—so we had plenty of time to think. As dawn first peeked through our blinds, it occurred to us ... I had been holding Jalynn at the head of the bed. We found her at the foot. Next to the head of the bed was a table. At the foot was a soft, plush rug. Unless I chest-passed her across the room, it didn't make sense. We reasoned a little more: if you've ever dropped a gallon of milk or sack of potatoes from, say three or four feet in the air, the resulting thud is pretty noticeable. When I dropped Jalynn, there was no noise. No shriek of a surprised newborn. Nothing.

Jimmy, always the researcher, sat on my side of the bed, took a stuffed animal, and tried dropping it at every realistic angle. There was no way that Jalynn should have ended up where she did. Unless, of course, she didn't actually fall. Unless someone caught her and placed her gently on the soft rug near the foot of our bed.

I grew up knowing about angels. There was never a time when I would have denied their existence. Yet the reality of the spiritual mingling with our everyday realm wasn't something I gave much thought to. That night changed my life. God began opening my eyes to glimpses of His supernatural glory, of His crazy crazy love for me.

My unconventional little girl now talks to angels at night and laughs with them during nap time. She gets to grow up knowing a God that it took me almost 30 years to believe in. A God whose supernatural glory isn't reserved only for the book of Acts. A God who loves my babies so much that He's handpicked angels just for them.

"See that you do not look down on one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven." (Matt. 18:10)