Ashley Nicole’s Legacy

Our daughter, Ashely Nicole, was born May 1st, 1984. We had her for nine days before she passed away. My husband and I were nineteen with a toddler at home. We had no clue what to do with such head-spinning, heartbreaking grief.

And here we are forty years later and May is upon us. If you read my other posts, you’ll see I don’t shy away from talking about grief and heartbreak …

… but today we celebrate.🥳

Because not long ago, life got hard again. Really hard. For a while, I lost sight of the joy parts of my story. Maybe you’ve been there.

Our joy hides.  And so do we.

But God calls us out of hiding. He wants to lift our heads.

It’s amazing what we see when our sights are raised above our struggle. It’s not about stuffing our pain or forgetting our people. It’s about turning it around. Moving forward with our grief and letting it inspire us: our life, our love, our purpose.

Then a little bit of them lives on ~ in us and through us.

Do you sense the power in that? God can use a heart gouged by sorrow. That raw space opens us up to  more joy and more healing. To a deeper compassion and a deeper appreciation.

We honor the ones we miss by engaging and embracing the ones still here.

A few days after Ashley Nicole died, a hospital chaplain gave us pins that say, “I Am loved.”**  Sometimes, I use my little pin to tell her story. How God wrapped us  in grace. How he patiently waited as we finally found our zig-zaggy way to him. How he gave us beauty for ashes. And still does.

I’ve kept my little red and white pin close by over the years. In a shadow box, in my purse, now on a book shelf amid my rocks. It reminds us we’re strong. It reminds us we’ve persevered through some really tough stuff. We are resilient.

And it reminds us how God reaches in and rescues us. Even when we try to hide.

Ashley Nicole’s little life leaves a legacy. And I intend to use it for good. This moves me forward, determined to turn the pain around, to redeem it.

Because joy is a gift. It’s part of who we’re created to be. So we have the capacity to choose it every day. We won’t always feel joy and that’s okay. We just need to remember …  it’s not gone. It’s just hiding.

Jesus came to give us abundant life. To take our most difficult situations and turn them around. Even grief.

May we let Jesus lift our heads and keep moving forward. 💗☮🙏🏻

One way I turn sadness into joy is to bless others on Ashley’s birthday. Click the link below to read about it:

Click Here to Read “Grief & Joy Can Coexist?”

**Thirty years after the hospital chaplain gave us our “I Am Loved” pins, we discovered a whole bowl of them at Helzberg Diamonds in the mall! We had no idea where they came from. We are forever grateful for their message. They gave a bit of light on one of our darkest days. Thank you, Helzberg Diamonds! 😊

 

“Don’t forget that in the midst of all your pain and heartache, you are surrounded by beauty, the wonder of creation, art, your music and culture, the sounds of laughter and love, of whispered hopes and celebrations, of new life and transformation, of reconciliation and forgiveness.”~ W. Paul Young