Monday, December 27, 2010

Trial


Michael and I found out yesterday that some of our Laramie friends lost their 5 year old girl in a skiing accident and the mom is apparently still in critical condition. They have 2 other kids. This family invited us over for homemade mexican food right after we moved into the ward and they were our good friends from then on. We were neighbors so we would watch our kids play at the complex playground together and visit. She talked me into running my first 5K. I watched their little girl (the one that was killed) when they went to the hospital to have their 2nd. They were a blessing to have for neighbors and I am heartbroken that they have to deal with this.

It seems like there has been a lot of tragedies like this lately. I've been following the blog of a young couple whose baby girl fell in a canal and drowned, and then my cousins little girl passed away and now this. It makes me feel weak and vulnerable because you realize all the sudden how fragile life is and that Heavenly Father allows his children to suffer so they can learn. I pray for these families and hope they will find peace in the gospel.

2 comments:

Trish said...

I was actually thinking about you yesterday and wondering how you were dealing with this. I had a hard time with Kerrigan's death and then when I heard about Kelli and Elise I felt horrible. I've had a lot of the same thoughts as you over the past month and I'm still trying to sort through it all. It's something I hope I never have to go through as a parent.

Kimberly said...

Emily, this is Danen. It's been such a struggle for Kimberly and I to deal with something this close. Not only are they good friends, but the family so closely resembles ours in makeup that we almost feel guilty to still have ours together while they suffer so much. Our hearts break over and over every day we wake up. Thank goodness for the blessings of the Temple and the teachings of the gospel. That's the only way I can imagine coping with such tragedy. I have a talk on CD that I downloaded from Deseret Book this summer that I've been listening to. It's called "What's On the Other Side: What the Gospel Teaches Us About the Spirit World" by Brent L. Top. If you're looking for comfort, this will help. The best part of the entire talk is a quote he gives by Pres. Joseph F. Smith. He says, "A mother who laid down her little child being deprived of the privilege, the joy, and the satisfaction of bringing it up to manhood and womanhood in this world would after the resurrection have all the joy, satisfaction, and pleasure, and even more than it would have been possible to have had in mortality, in seeing her child grow to the full measure of the stature of its spirit." How glorious the Plan of Salvation is! Sorry this is so long, but I wanted to share a bit of hope amid such sadness.