Two Months Gone
Two months since you left this broken world to live with the angels in Heaven. Two months of gut wrenching heartache day after day. We miss you so very much sweet boy.
We cannot believe we have been without our sweet son for two months. We have made it another month without him - how? I have no idea. You may be wondering "well it seems like you are doing fine, you smile everyday.". True I do still smile, but that's just because I like to smile. The pain and heart ache is still there every single minute of every single hour of every single day. I have realized that I am semi okay during the day, but grief hits me HARD at night. My mind still goes back to 9:21 am on February 8th. Could I have done something different? What if I went in Jack's room ten minutes earlier? These feelings are all too real...still. Even so little moments get me during the day and it takes all I have not to have a full on meltdown. Just yesterday I went to frame a few gifts we received for Jack along with a set of his footprints. Everything was fine until I had to leave these keepsakes with the store. I started walking towards the front to pay for something else and felt like I was suffocating. My eyes welled up with tears and I barely made it to the front. Luckily, I was able to take a few deep breaths in a empty aisle where no one else could see my very sad situation. Talk about overwhelming. Yes, I know they are just things, but they are his things and being separated from them was harder than I ever realized. This reminded me to give others grace. Sometimes we really don't know what people are going through, but through grace and love we can be their light.
I'm not sure about any of you, but once Jack left us for His Kingdom I was really fixated on what he was doing/saying/playing. Our friends who have gone through all too similar heartache gave us the following book, Heaven by Randy Alcorn. If you or a loved one has lost someone and crave to know more about Heaven I cannot recommend this book enough. I had and still have so many questions. What did it look like the moment he got there? Did other family and friends who have left before us greet him upon arrival? Is there music? So many questions. I truly encourage you to read this if you are curious about our eternal home.
On another heart aching note, we have finally decided on Jack's headstone. I know it took us quite a while to get to this point, but it is one of those important things that is permanent. We prayed that the right verse(s) would come to us and they finally did. Below is one of the verses we have decided on.
Some of you have asked about updates on genetics and I wish we had better news. Basically one of the genes that Jack was missing was potentially the reason for his diagnosis of Lissencephaly so the geneticist took my blood and sent it off for testing. Crazy enough I am also missing that gene. Jack inherited that missing gene from me and since I am 100% healthy and do not have Lissencephaly the geneticist can now say that missing gene was not the cause. Bummer. We are back at square one.
The semi good news is that our geneticist found out that the original lab that tested Jack's DNA still had a small sample left and upon talking to other geneticists found that the best next route was to find a specialized lab to do a panel on the remaining DNA. Upon further research they found that The University of Chicago has a specialized lab where they would be able to compare Jack's DNA with the others who had Lissencephaly. We are onboard, but unfortunately the cost could range from $1,500 to $6,000 to do this testing so right now we are figuring out if this is right avenue for us. Even with this specialized test the results could come back that we still have no idea what caused our sweet Jack Evans to suffer so greatly. We know by prayer and repetition that the right thing to do will come to us and we will trust in Him. I also did receive positive news. While I gave blood for the missing gene, I also gave blood to screen for 274 recessive genetic conditions. Those results came back 100% negative/normal, which according to the genetic counselor is great and really helpful for future family planning. Thank goodness for that. Even though we still don't have answers on why this happened to Jack we are trusting Him and His plan. I'm not saying that His will was to take Jack away from us, but that He knew all along His plans for us.
Thank you everyone for your continued prayers and love. We are so thankful for all of you.
God Bless,
Paige and Kyle
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| My sleeping angel::taken two days before Jack passed |
We cannot believe we have been without our sweet son for two months. We have made it another month without him - how? I have no idea. You may be wondering "well it seems like you are doing fine, you smile everyday.". True I do still smile, but that's just because I like to smile. The pain and heart ache is still there every single minute of every single hour of every single day. I have realized that I am semi okay during the day, but grief hits me HARD at night. My mind still goes back to 9:21 am on February 8th. Could I have done something different? What if I went in Jack's room ten minutes earlier? These feelings are all too real...still. Even so little moments get me during the day and it takes all I have not to have a full on meltdown. Just yesterday I went to frame a few gifts we received for Jack along with a set of his footprints. Everything was fine until I had to leave these keepsakes with the store. I started walking towards the front to pay for something else and felt like I was suffocating. My eyes welled up with tears and I barely made it to the front. Luckily, I was able to take a few deep breaths in a empty aisle where no one else could see my very sad situation. Talk about overwhelming. Yes, I know they are just things, but they are his things and being separated from them was harder than I ever realized. This reminded me to give others grace. Sometimes we really don't know what people are going through, but through grace and love we can be their light.
I'm not sure about any of you, but once Jack left us for His Kingdom I was really fixated on what he was doing/saying/playing. Our friends who have gone through all too similar heartache gave us the following book, Heaven by Randy Alcorn. If you or a loved one has lost someone and crave to know more about Heaven I cannot recommend this book enough. I had and still have so many questions. What did it look like the moment he got there? Did other family and friends who have left before us greet him upon arrival? Is there music? So many questions. I truly encourage you to read this if you are curious about our eternal home.
On another heart aching note, we have finally decided on Jack's headstone. I know it took us quite a while to get to this point, but it is one of those important things that is permanent. We prayed that the right verse(s) would come to us and they finally did. Below is one of the verses we have decided on.
 |
| Matthew 19:14 |
Some of you have asked about updates on genetics and I wish we had better news. Basically one of the genes that Jack was missing was potentially the reason for his diagnosis of Lissencephaly so the geneticist took my blood and sent it off for testing. Crazy enough I am also missing that gene. Jack inherited that missing gene from me and since I am 100% healthy and do not have Lissencephaly the geneticist can now say that missing gene was not the cause. Bummer. We are back at square one.
The semi good news is that our geneticist found out that the original lab that tested Jack's DNA still had a small sample left and upon talking to other geneticists found that the best next route was to find a specialized lab to do a panel on the remaining DNA. Upon further research they found that The University of Chicago has a specialized lab where they would be able to compare Jack's DNA with the others who had Lissencephaly. We are onboard, but unfortunately the cost could range from $1,500 to $6,000 to do this testing so right now we are figuring out if this is right avenue for us. Even with this specialized test the results could come back that we still have no idea what caused our sweet Jack Evans to suffer so greatly. We know by prayer and repetition that the right thing to do will come to us and we will trust in Him. I also did receive positive news. While I gave blood for the missing gene, I also gave blood to screen for 274 recessive genetic conditions. Those results came back 100% negative/normal, which according to the genetic counselor is great and really helpful for future family planning. Thank goodness for that. Even though we still don't have answers on why this happened to Jack we are trusting Him and His plan. I'm not saying that His will was to take Jack away from us, but that He knew all along His plans for us.
Thank you everyone for your continued prayers and love. We are so thankful for all of you.
God Bless,
Paige and Kyle
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