Last month, I introduced you to my wonderful new friend, Adrienne Graves.

Adrienne is, first and foremost, a child of the King. Next, she is the wife of her husband, Jason, and mother to three children: Emily, age 10, Ryan, 21 months, and Noah, who is in heaven.

I first became acquainted with Adrienne through the blog she wrote while Noah was in the hospital. You must read Noah’s story…you will absolutely fall in love with this tiny boy who has led so many hearts to Christ. During his 7 months on earth, he reached every continent in the world through Adrienne’s blog!

Adrienne has been gracious enough to share her heart with us here, in the hopes of providing greater understanding to the Church. Obviously, her motherhood has included rare, raw, painful experiences that most of us will never experience. However, we are, all of us, in the same Body, and we’re called to rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. The best way to do this is through understanding.
I asked Adrienne to help us understand by first explaining how she dealt with the uncertainty of Noah’s illness…

Honestly, my eyes were opened during Noah’s hospitalization to my need to be both his mommy as well as his advocate.  It’s true, the doctors and researchers were stumped.  I’m so thankful God provided world class insurance during that season because the types of tests the doctors were ordering were no longer typical, run-of-the-mill tests.  (The doctors) were in uncharted territory.  As a result, I began to dig into research myself.  I also asked the question, “Why?” a lot.  I was not trying to be disrespectful to any of the team within the medical profession, but when a doctor hands you a list of 17 different disorders your child could possibly have, you don’t read the list.  You say, “I’m sorry, my job is to love on my son, not to research 17 potential disorders.  Please narrow this list down to one so I can know what we are dealing with here and why.”  

Noah was never given a diagnosis.  

I think at first I dealt with the uncertainty by seeking more answers, but looking back, those were the answers of modern medicine I was seeking.  Test after test after test came back inconclusive.  We found a biophysicist on the outside who helped us with further research which has opened my eyes to a whole new world of “modern medicine” but there still wasn’t a cure and there certainly weren’t any treatments doctors were willing to try.  I remember thinking the whole scenario seemed like a game of greased watermelon in a pool…no one ever had a hold on it.  But, in the bigger picture, where my world was crashing down around me and I was angry because I couldn’t “fix it”, I had a perspective shift.  I knew from the moment Noah was born that God was more in love with him than I could ever be, which is difficult to swallow for a mom, so even though the whole situation was out of my control and uncertain, a peace from God came over me as I literally trusted Him one step at a time.

Next: Adrienne discusses how Noah’s illness affected her marriage and her relationship with her then-four year-old daughter.