This months inspiring woman is Skye...
Her testimony of God and His plan for each of us is undeniable. Her words have helped heal my heart and gave me hope that all will work out in the end. Skye is an amazing mama, wife, friend, and person. She is the first woman I have asked in person to share their story, her reaction to my question gave me an instant feeling of peace. I knew she was supposed be May's inspiring woman. She was so humble and so touched. It surprised me how surprised she was that I wanted her to share her story. She seriously has no idea how inspiring she really is. I am so grateful she was willing to share.
Here is her story....
My name is Skye Longhurst. I’ve been
married to the most wonderful man, Bracken for almost 11 years. We
have four beautiful children we get to raise in this life, and two
more who were only with us for a short time. Our two oldest
children, Hayes and Kamri were relatively easy pregnancies. With
Hayes I had some complications at first and learned I had a
bicornuate uterus that makes me high risk for pre-term labor and
placental abruption. The placenta did end up tearing at 38 weeks so
he was delivered by C-section. Kamri’s pregnancy was smooth sailing
until I was in the hospital, in labor, fully dilated and complete
when the doctor checked me and the baby was breech. Kamri was
delivered by C-section as well. Born 3 days before her due date, she
was my largest baby at 8 lbs 13 oz. Although the complications at
the time were scary, both of our children were healthy so we were not
nervous when we decided to get pregnant with our third.
We moved to Las Vegas, NV when I was 14
weeks pregnant. Even though the decision to move had been done with a
lot of prayer and I knew we were making the right choice, it was
really hard for me. I often questioned why we had to leave a good
job and a place and people we loved to move where we knew only a few
people and Bracken would have no income because he was attending law
school. One night, when I was 26 weeks along, I started bleeding. We
called my dad’s cousin who was the only family we knew well in Las
Vegas at the time. She came and stayed with our kids while we rushed
to the hospital.
That night was full of a lot of pain
and waiting. The specialist on call was trying to determine what was
causing my bleeding and trying to get contractions to stop. They
weren’t successful and my doctor came in (even though he wasn’t
on call so the hospital never called him) and took over the
situation. I’m not sure why it wasn’t obvious before that it was
a placental abruption since I had that with Hayes and everything was
pointing to it being the same. Our doctor sprang into action to help
me deliver the baby, I pushed once, he gave me a numbing shot (which
were super painful) then an episiotomy, (now grateful for the numbing
shot) and I pushed once more. After one more push the doctor could
see the baby’s face presentation was wrong and the baby’s heart
rate was dipping. The baby’s little body couldn’t handle more
stress so my doctor yelled for an emergency C-section. What happened
next was a blur of movement, nurses throwing sheets, lifting me onto
a wheeled bed, holding my arms and legs as they splashed me down with
antiseptic solution. I was out in ten seconds as they rushed me down
the hall. One minute pure panic, then nothing. Bracken was left
alone in a room that looked like a crime scene, not knowing what
would happen to me or our baby. Dane P was born Sunday, November 15,
2009 he was 2 lbs, 6 oz and 14 inches long.
Monday and Tuesday were full of visits
to the NICU from my hospital room, updates from the nurses and
doctors, and many visitors from people in our church and a couple we
became friends with from law school. I was so grateful for every
single visitor while Bracken was away at class. Most of them didn’t
know me well but came and provided me comfort and a temporary
distraction from all the stress. The doctors had told us that being
born at 26 weeks Dane had an 80 % survival rate. It seemed like none
of them were worried that he would die, just what minor setbacks we
would have and what would be done to fix them. I was worried but
truly felt peace from all the visitors, calls, text messages and
prayers that were said on our behalf. Another tender mercy was one of
the nurses who worked there was in my ward at church. I had only met
her once before I got to the hospital, but she took care of me on one
shift and made sure I had the best nurses for other shifts.
Wednesday morning the NICU called and
the doctor wanted to meet with me and Bracken. A whole group of
doctors and social workers came into our room and we knew it wouldn’t
be good. We were given the news that ultimately our son wasn’t
going to make it and we needed to prepare to say goodbye. The doctor
was choking up as he told us the news, and I kept thinking that this
can’t be real. One of those bad dreams. We talked to a second
doctor the next morning and he unfortunately had the same conclusion.
Thursday night Bracken and I held our
son for the first and last time. It was a tender mercy from our
Heavenly Father that we were able to hold him as he passed away. It
was the hardest thing, the worst thing, and yet the most amazing
thing I had ever done. There is nothing to describe the mixture of
utter heartbreak and complete peace that I felt. I know that my love
is not perfect but the love I felt for Dane was so immense, I can
only imagine how strong God’s perfect love is for all of us. As I
sat there holding my baby as he took his last breaths, I was in
despair but enveloped in pure love. November 19, 2009 was the day
that cemented in my heart the importance and truth that families are
eternal.
Two weeks later, I was sitting in
church and we were singing hymn number 97, “Lead, Kindly Light.”
The words struck me as I sang. The first sentence seemed to be my
life the two weeks before, 'Lead, kindly Light,
amid th'encircling gloom..' There were days that I
still felt gloomy but when I would think about all Heavenly Father
has blessed me with and the experience of holding Dane, I felt His
Light carrying me on.
Besides having lost a baby, I also
grieved over life not going as Bracken and I had planned. It had
seemed perfect, Hayes and Kamri were 21 months apart and I
loved it. Kamri and Dane were going to be 21 months apart
and now we didn’t even get to have him with us. Why couldn't it
just go like I had planned, 'I loved to choose and see my
path; but now, Lead thou me on!' but I started to realize (oh so
slowly) that Heavenly Father does know what he's doing, he does love
us, and we need to sit back and realize how little we can really
control that happens in our lives. But oh how much HE cares for
everyone. And even if life doesn't go how we planned it, we'll be
better for it because it goes how He planned it.
About 9 months after we had baby Dane
we felt like it was time to get pregnant again. When I was about 20
weeks pregnant I was hit with a bout of anxiety. In some ways, I had
been in denial that anything bad could happen again and I suddenly
realized that one loss didn’t negate the possibility of another. I
was frozen in our rocking chair with fear when I had a sudden small
prompting to study hope. I grabbed my scriptures and studied
everything I could find about hope. I was filled with a feeling of
peace. Even if things didn’t work out again, I could be filled with
hope, that through Jesus Christ’s atonement and temple covenants we
could be an eternal family.
I ended up on full bedrest at 26 weeks,
although not ideal, we were grateful to keep our baby in there
cooking! This pregnancy humbled me. I’m a very independent person
but being on bedrest I had to have help with our two older kids.
Bracken went to law school full time and would come home and take
over everything I usually did. People we barely knew brought us
meals. For two weeks, friends and acquaintances took turns taking my
kids for the day while Bracken was at school. Family took my kids for
a week at a time and finally one of my cousin’s sacrificed two
months of her life to come live with us and care for my kids. I don’t
see many of them on a daily basis anymore but I think of them often.
The love that so many people showed my family I will never forget.
Our beautiful baby girl, Lyla Hope, was
born 6 weeks early in April 2011. She was 5 lbs 1oz. Even though she
was in the NICU for two weeks, none of it was for life threatening
reasons. Her calm demeanor helped to heal our hearts. I’ll never
forget the look on Hayes’ & Kamri’s faces when we finally
brought her home to them. Pure love shone through their faces as they
held this little baby sister they had waited and prayed so long for.
We had another beautiful baby boy,
Hansen, join our family in February 2013. My pregnancy with him was
similar to Lyla’s. Weekly shots, bi-weekly appointments, lots of
praying and nervousness. I would lay down multiple times during the
day to try and avoid full bedrest. Thankfully, this time around I was
able to be up more. Hansen was born at 34 weeks as well, weighing 4
lbs 15 oz. He was also in the NICU for two weeks. We probably seemed
a bit odd to the nurses since we were so calm about him being there.
Hansen has the funniest personality. He spreads happiness to everyone
he interacts with. I really believe that my children were born in the
order and time they were for a reason. We would need Hansen’s
cheerfulness for what was to come.
When Hansen was 4 months old we moved
back to Cedar City where this story all started. As much as I hated
Las Vegas when we moved there, I had come to love it and it was
really hard to move away, even if it was moving to my hometown! From
the time Hansen was a few months old I had this incessant feeling
that I needed to decide what to do about more children in our family.
Were we done, should we get pregnant again, should we do foster care
and adopt? We spent a year and a half praying, discussing, and
searching for what we should do. We met with a foster care recruiter
and an OB/GYN doctor here in town to discuss different options hoping
we’d find confirmation in what we should do. Through prayers and
promptings from the Holy Ghost, Bracken and I individually came to
know it was God’s will for us to get pregnant one more time and
that this would be my last pregnancy.
As expected, this pregnancy was
anything but easy. There were ups and downs from the beginning. One
night the bleeding was so bad that I was sure I had miscarried. A
doctor appointment the next week showed that miraculously there was
still a heartbeat in my womb. I went through my weekly progesterone
shots, bi-weekly appointments and at 18 weeks had a cerclage in hopes
that a stitch would help strengthen my shortening cervix. After three
weeks of bedrest, including missing out on our family vacation
(Bracken is a rock star to take all four kids on his own!) I started
having contractions. They were able to get the contractions to slow
and labor wasn’t progressing so they determined I would be on
bedrest for the rest of my pregnancy in the Saint George hospital. I
was feeling much better and we were optimistic that I could handle a
long hospital stay. Bracken headed back to Cedar to get my things I
would need. About 10 minutes before he made it back to Saint George I
started shaking and felt freezing cold. A nurse came in and took my
temperature. I had a fever. They ran to get the doctor. Bracken came
right as the doctors were discussing what to do. An amniocentesis was
done and found that I had an infection in my uterus. The baby would
have to be delivered.
Our tiny little girl, Naomi Faith, was
delivered still at 6:22 p.m. on June 11, 2015. She was 15
oz and 11 inches long. As they handed her to me, I realized the sheer
beauty of being able to deliver a baby and the baby being handed
directly to you. It broke my heart that I was being handed a baby
that would never breathe, who I would never get to know in this life;
but the act of being able to deliver her was a tender mercy. I am
grateful to have been able to experience that instead of having to
have a sixth C-section. Her body was perfectly formed, beautiful
nose, fingers, ears, legs, arms, toes, tongue, eyebrows, hair. It was
all there in miniscule. I couldn’t stop looking at her and saying
I’m so sorry, over and over. My body had let her down.
Heartbroken
again, Bracken and I headed home the next day. Hayes and Kamri had
asked after every doctor’s appointment if the baby was still alive.
We dreaded getting home this time and having to tell them no. I had
been home an hour or so, we had told them, and I started feeling
feverish again. I had to go back to the hospital. I spent three more
days in the hospital with IV’s full of antibiotics to save my life.
As hard as it was to go back and sit for three days in the hospital
after everything that had happened, I was filled with gratitude that
through modern medicine I would be able to go home and be with
Bracken and our four living children.
It has now almost been a year since we
had Naomi and six and a half years from Dane’s. Those two children
have brought our family closer together. Dane & Naomi are talked
about often by their siblings and parents. My children have learned
at a young age that death is not the end and we will see them again.
I have learned and continue to learn the power of Jesus Christ’s
atonement to bear our burdens. There are still days and moments I
struggle with my grief but most of the time I am in awe at Christ’s
power to bear our burdens and make them light.
I don’t feel like I’m an inspiring
person or that my story is particularly inspiring except that through
these experiences I have come to know of God’s love for me and for
everyone. I have felt God’s love through the hundreds of meals that
have been brought to our house, the hours of care that have been
lovingly given to my kids, the visits, the calls, the text messages
of comfort and support that have been sent and the countless prayers
that have been given on our behalf by friends, family, acquaintances
and strangers. I have been amazed at how many people have reached out
to me at random moments when I have needed it the most.
I am learning to not be critical of
others’ choices and try my best not to judge. I am not perfect but
these experiences have helped me strive to be better. You never know
all of a person’s backstory. I often get the well-meaning comment
from strangers when they see me with my kids, “Two boys and Two
girls, what a perfect family!!” and while I appreciate that I am
significantly blessed to have the children I have, I can’t help but
think of the two who are missing. I’m grateful that I know this
life isn’t the end, that one day I’ll have my family all together
but until then, I hope to help others feel of Christ’s love for
them by serving them as so many have done for me.
