Shickel Family

  “Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.” In preparation for Easter, this verse looms around in my head. Also in this season of so many unknowns, this verse aches in my heart.  We found out I was pregnant a few weeks before Christmas after trying to get pregnant for 11.999 months (as Ike says.) We told family and close friends on Christmas and in the weeks after. Then at 11 weeks, during an ultrasound, we learned the baby had fluid on the back of his head/neck, called a cystic hygroma. This could mean a million different things - will it go away in the months following or will we have a child with a severe disability or will he reach full term? We did genetic testing. We waited. Two agonizing weeks of waiting to hear results. Which came back normal. And a BOY! One excitement among the muddied trench of unknowns in this journey.  I almost hesitate to call it a "journey." That term has connotat...