He's A Keeper

Linking up today with Edie and telling my little love story:

To say we were shocked when our first child was born with Down Syndrome would be an understatement.

We'd had a pretty uneventful life up until that point.

We met in college, Jim and I. I was an Air Force brat...traveling the world with my family. He was a country boy...growing up in LA. That's Lower Arkansas, folks! I went to the Southern Baptist college in the small town of Arkadelphia. He went to the State university across the street. I lived on campus...he lived at home. I'm an optimist. He's a realist. I see the cup as half-full. He says, "WHO DRANK MY WATER?"

I didn't know a soul in Arkansas, not one soul, but my pastor had gone to school at Ouachita. Hearing him talk about it peaked my interest, and, after much prayer, that's where I decided to go.

In the housing application, I had to fill out a form about my likes and interests. I checked all the appropriate boxes, and then had to write a little bit about myself. In an attempt to be funny, I remember writing that I really liked chocolate chip cookies. My roommate? She apparently wrote the EXACT SAME THING. God thing? I think yes.

She was from the same small town as my husband, and so she fixed us up. Two weeks into my freshman year, Jim and I went on our first date. And the rest is history.

I have written before about my Cinderella Complex. Oh, I had it...and I had it big.

Truthfully, I still do. I just see things differently. Rather, I CHOOSE to see things differently. I just like to be positive...and happy.

We were married 5 years when I became pregnant with Joshua. Jim had just gotten his first "big" job after college, and we had moved to the big city of Little Rock. We bought our first house. We found a church home, made great friends. We were livin' the dream, and putting our roots down deep.

In our childbirth class, there were 12 couples....24 people. During the first class, the instructor had us fill out a little "get to know you" sheet, and then she shared some of the comments with everyone. One of the questions was "I hope my baby is _______." We were supposed to fill in the blank. I put "cute" because DUH.

23 other people put "normal."

When Joshua was born, it was after hours of labor...followed by an emergency c-section, which means I was knocked out. When I woke up, things were fuzzy...but I heard people talking in hushed tones and something in my spirit just told me something wasn't "right."

The days that followed were filled with medical lingo and testing (for us and for Joshua) and lots and lots of visitors. Jim had to call everyone to tell them. I mean, someone had to...and it couldn't be me. It was before the age where we had cell phones, so he was using the phone beside my hospital bed. There was joy in the voices of our families and friends when he told them our baby had been born...and then silence, and some tears, when he told them Joshua had Down Syndrome. I remember him calling our friends, Billy and Sherri. I remember him trying to hold it together on the phone. I remember him telling them, "don't come...we are fine."

They came anyway.

But this post is about my husband. He was my rock during those early days...he really was. And he still is all these years later. It was a blessing that we had so much support...and it was a blessing that we had NO CLUE about Down Syndrome. We were just thrilled with our baby boy and couldn't wait to take him home.

Billy and Sherri got there, and in the course of their conversation, Jim told Billy, "I think he'll be able to hold a fishing pole." Billy said, "well, then he's a keeper."

And Jim said, "Yep. He's a keeper."

All of those women out there who have said they fell in love all over again with their husbands, after seeing them hold their babies for the first time, have got nothing on me...because in that moment, holding our precious son...whose future was uncertain, but likely very difficult...my husband thought he was a keeper. Just the way he was.

There just nothing more he could ever do or say that will ever top that moment.

"The the LORD God said, 'it is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is just right for him." Genesis 2: 18