Disconnect

The waves were crashing in the background and the sky was cloudy, but it was a comfortable day. I was in shorts and a t-shirt and pacing back and forth on the beach like a boxer before a match. The beach on Lake Michigan is often a calm place with plenty of visual and sensory cues of our Creator (rocks, water, wind, sun…all ways of describing the Godhead). I was aware of that, and acknowledged it as I occasionally shot off short prayers or thoughts and questions.

However, it didn’t diminish the pacing. I had a growing sense that I came here for a fight. I took a selfie that day that became my profile pic and prompted friends to check on me and make sure I was alright. I was…just was ready to pick a fight, and it probably looked like it. I wasn’t quite exactly sure what the fight would look like, but I did have a feeling it revolved around my early days of life. I was attending The Journey at Maranatha, which is a week long intensive of delving into your story. Not long before I traveled to Michigan, I increasingly sensed I had questions about how my early days impacted my little body and how I might still be carrying trauma.

Two Scenes I Have Questions About

There are two particular scenes that I can’t time travel back and view, but that I have questions about.

• Immediately after my birth, did my birth mom hold me?
• When I was delivered, did I experience physical pain?

It might be easy to say “well, of course” to each of them, but I don’t think it is that easy. When I was born, I have heard that it might have been common for a birth mom not to hold her baby (if she planned on giving up for adoption). I don’t know if I can verify this, but it has made me wonder what it did to me to be carried for a full pregnancy, being connected to my birth mom, then not being held by her. I was held plenty, I know this, in particular after being adopted at five days old. Yet, was there a disconnect that I experienced in my earliest days that has been a part of me throughout my life? How does that emotional disconnect get carried around in my body? Does that and other emotional traumas throughout my life contribute to the persistent and chronic backpain I have?

Maybe nine years ago, there is another event that caused me to question whether I had experienced some kind of pain as I was born. At the time, I played guitar with our worship team at our church, and we led worship at a prayer conference. I definitely have not historically been someone who sought out healing prayer services, but during a session breakdown there was a pastor praying for healing for people with various conditions. I decided “why not? Have a little faith, right?” So, I brought up my back pain and that is all I mentioned.

Somehow, as he prayed, he began mentioning my birth. He mentioned someone saying in the delivery room, “oh, that’s going to hurt” as he accurately ran his hand in the direction that my pain followed. My ears were perking up. And, then, the kicker…he mentioned the “young mother who wasn’t ready to be a mother.” Afterwards, I mentioned my adoption. Several people I know were there and can attest this happened. I can’t know if this happened by anything other than faith, since I haven’t mastered that time travel thing.

So, I have had questions about what happened to Little BabyCabs early on, which is the set-up for the next post or two. Yeah, I was pacing like boxer, and was ready for a fight, and it would be coming into play just four days later, and it involved Little BabyCabs…but I just didn’t know how it would unfold.