Everyone makes plans for their life. Graduate college, get a high paying job using your degree, marry the perfect guy, have 2.5 children and a dog, and live happily ever after. But your plans get interrupted. You get laid off from work, you thought you’d be married by now and there aren’t even any options on the horizon, the pregnancy test shows up negative again, your spouse leaves you, you have a major health problem, the list goes on. The unexpected interrupts our well-planned lives.

Last year I was very excited to be pregnant with Caleb. All was going according to my plan. Then in one day our lives were flipped upside down. Instead of being the happy new parents bringing home their first baby, we were planning his funeral and buying a cemetery plot. I had become part of the unofficial “moms who’ve lost babies” club – the club you don’t know exists until you’re in it.

“God must have a purpose in this,” I reasoned. In the meantime I knew there was a lot at work I could accomplish that I didn’t think I had time for. But two months later the company needed to reorganize, replacing staff with volunteers. I found myself at home with no baby to take care of and no job to throw myself into. Life interrupted again.

I’m very thankful that I have the luxury of being home and not needing to work, but I felt like I was going through an identity crisis. I began volunteering for Young Life doing simple office wok. I operate best when I have a routine, and I knew I would need a reason to get out of bed in the morning.

Eventually we started trying to get pregnant again. We were more fortunate than many people, but the couple months it took felt like forever… and my 30th birthday was coming up. Couldn’t just one of my plans work out?

I can look back on these interruptions and see God’s hand in all of it. It’s good I don’t have a job so that I can really devote myself to bed rest. I miss Caleb with all my heart, but if he had survived, we wouldn’t have this baby, I think God really has great plans for this child. Because of Caleb my faith is stronger, I’m closer to my husband and family, I’ve made new friends who went through similar situations, I’ve seen friends, neighbors, and churches love and care for us in amazing ways. Right now there are hundreds of you praying for us, because of what we’ve been through. I’m amazed at how God has worked all things together for our good (Romans 8:28).

In every interruption, the Lord was there. These things may have surprised me, but they didn’t surprise Him. “In his heart a man plans his course, but the LORD determines his steps.” Proverbs 16:9