When my first pregnancy resulted in a miscarriage, I wasn’t worried, I was angry. For weeks, I held it in, but finally, I literally raised my fist at God and told Him off. “You failed me!” was the gist of it.
Later, I realized I was already a couple of days pregnant when I had ranted. Holding a beautiful baby boy in my arms nine months later, I laughed at myself and my misguided words. I also asked God for forgiveness.
During all of my pregnancies, I had worry dreams. I was too busy during the day to imagine my worries, but in my sleep they appeared in Technicolor. What if I got distracted at a park and someone kidnapped my baby? What if I checked on the baby in the night and he or she had stopped breathing? What if I somehow caused some terrible thing to happen to my children?
I never verbalized these worries to other people. I would chalk up the dreams to my vivid imagination and try to shove them out of my mind. I would also do something else, and this is what changed my life.
I would pray. Not just generalized prayers—I would pick apart my worry dreams and commit every single eventuality to the Lord.
“Help me never to get distracted when I’m at a park with my children.”
“Keep us safe this night and keep my little ones. Keep their hearts and lungs. Help them grow strong and healthy. Help me be aware of their health and know when something is wrong.”
“Help me be a good mother. Help me be kind and gentle and care for my children well. Protect us on our walks and in the car.”
Whenever an image would enter my mind portraying some worry I hadn’t thought about or prayed over, I would stop whatever I was doing and pray. I would take apart the new concern and give every part of it to God.
In the end, I realized that, worrywart that I was, I had learned to fight in prayer. The thing that made me the weakest and that I battled over the most actually became my strength, as I changed from a worrier to a prayer warrior.
My children have now grown up, and I still worry—and I still pray. Whenever I think of one of my children and begin to worry, I put those thoughts into words and give them all to Jesus. And I feel the same reassurance in return as when they were tiny tots.