Lauren, Sabrina, and Ann Marie loving each other. Note the hand hold.
One of my greatest fears in those dark days in the hospital tending the lifeless body of my baby girl was the thought of going home. How could I go home without her there? How could I leave her? The two times I left the hospital to try to get some sleep I went to my sister's house. I just couldn't go home.
Sunday, before we turned off the machines, my brother gave me a blessing. In it he quoted a scripture with which I was unfamiliar. "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear" 1 John 4: 18. I felt a warm feeling of assurance come over me. Love was not something lacking in my heart or in my life or in my home. Love was like the air around me. It surrounded me and was keeping me alive breath by breath.
I thought of my girls and how much love my girls and how much all of us loved Camille. And suddenly I was no longer afraid to go home. I knew as long as our home was filled with that love, Camille would always be there, in our home, in the love.
The past three months, I have stressed the need for our home to be filled with love. This is not always easy. Kids fight. They get tired and grumpy and they bicker. Sometimes even the big people get tired and grumpy and bicker too. But there has definitely been more love in our home lately.
I often find my girls being incredibly loving with each other. It brings me the joy I am seeking in my life. I found them all laying on each other in the photo above a couple weeks ago. I love the picture. I love those girls. And I love that they love each other.
I know I have talked about this before but I think it is worth the repeat because it is so easy to lose sight of the need for love to fill our homes. Life so easily distracts us. Like the other day when Lauren was climbing up on me for the hundredth time while I was trying to type something. Frustrated and annoyed, I finally asked her, "Why are you doing this? Why do you always have to sit on me?"
Her simple response brought me back and reminded me about what is important.
"Because I love you, Mama," she said. Love is really what it is all about.
