The Puzzle of Elijah

After I hung up the phone, my hands were sweaty and shaky, and tears covered my eyes. Good thing no one saw my pale face. I couldn’t concentrate or tell anyone the terrible news. How could I? “I will have an ill child? It can’t happen to me.”

After few minutes, I calmed dawn, walked to my supervisor’s office and asked for permission to leave work and see the doctor. She let me. It isn’t safe to drive, when you are scared and can’t concentrate, but I drove to the doctor’s office.

“Olga, we can do an amniocentesis test to make sure the ultrasound results are correct,” the doctor said.

“How do you perform this test?” I asked.

“With a needle we will poke your stomach and will take a small amount of amniotic fluid to check for genetic abnormalities. We don’t have to do it today. You can talk to your husband and let us know of your decision.”

The doctor gave me a brochure with this information. I spoke with Oleg at home. He was calm, but I worried.

“Our child is healthy. Everything will be okay,” he said.

In the brochure I read that there is a 60% miscarriage chance after this test. I called the doctor.

“We will not do this test,” I said. “Even if you did the test and it was abnormal, we would still not abort the baby. We know abortion is a sin, and we love our baby so much. We will pray, and God will help us.”

Oleg didn’t show that he worried, but I did. I couldn’t calm down. Being pregnant, I still had to continue working, drive children to Mom’s house in early mornings, pick them up after work, clean, cook and take care of the children. At night I would wake up at 2 or 3 A.M. and pray to God, begging Him to heal our baby. Only Mom, one of my sister and few friends knew about this problem. I was embarrassed to tell this news to someone or ask for prayers. I kept it all to myself. “How can I go back to work and show him to my co-workers? How can I show a disabled child to my friends and family? What would this say about me?” I thought.

When the time came for our baby to be born, I was in tears and couldn’t imagine what he would look like. But God heard our prayers and saw that we were not ready to accept a disabled child into our family. With tears of joy, we welcomed our healthy baby Michael. For us it was a miracle from God! Michael’s name means “Who is like God”.

When we brought Michael home, at first David and Kristina were happy to see him, but then they started acting up, crying and being jealous. Oleg was at work, and I thought, “What is going on?” Then I understood that they needed more of my attention, and I had to learn how to be a mother of three children.

Being parents of three is vastly different than being parents of two. I wanted to stay home to breastfeed Michael. WIC, my employer, supported my choice to combine maternity leave, saved sick and vacation leave, and time off without pay to enable me to be off work for eleven months.

…….

When I returned to work, there were some changes at the WIC program due to budget constraints. This required all clerks to also be cross-trained as Nutrition Assistants. Thus, in addition to scheduling appointments, issuing WIC vouchers, and answering a multiple-lined phone, my new duties included diet and weight assessments, checking hemoglobin and teaching the nutrition classes.

This offered several challenges. I was scared of blood. To do a hemoglobin test, I had to poke a client’s finger and deal with the blood. I also had to speak in front of people, but had no confidence to do so. How do you get up in front of a group of people when you have an accent and have no confidence in your ability to speak? I expressed these and other concerns to my boss.

“Olga, you have a choice. You either do it, or you quit,” she said.

“I need a job. It is a good job with good income and benefits. I have no choice as to keep the job and learn my new duties,” upset, I answered.

It is amazing what you can accomplish, if you put your mind to improving your skills. Two years later, in addition to my previous duties, I began teaching pregnant women about breastfeeding and helping them after delivery.

…….

In 2007, ten years into our marriage, Oleg changed to another auto body shop. Our income and benefits dramatically increased. Our house was on a busy street and not safe for our children, so we decided to buy a bigger house in a better neighborhood. We also bought two new cars on credit. Our life was good. We thought the money would always flow and we would be fine forever.

Raising our children was fun, but it also required lots of work to assure that our children were getting the best that we could provide them. I even volunteered in our church to teach Russian language to a class, which David attended. I understood the importance of our children knowing two languages, so I taught them how to read, write and speak Russian.

We were involved parents, trying to provide every opportunity for our children, and especially those opportunities we had not had as children. David was growing up as a serious and neat boy. Happy Kristina always helped me in the kitchen and took a good care of her younger brother, Michael. She loved doing his hair and dressing him up. And Michael was growing as a happy and patient baby. It was like he understood that I had to care for his brother and sister as well. With straight hair and blue eyes, Michael looked a lot like me. When Michael was growing up, we noticed that he was a very brave kid. At the age of four, he started riding his bike without training wheels, and two weeks later he rode a real dirt bike! We loved our children and provided what we could for them. Life with three children was so busy, but worth every moment of it!

Our third child, Michael

…….

As a family, we regularly attended church and read the Bible. Serving God and being close to Him was important to us. Oleg and I often discussed what our parents taught us, what we saw in church, and what we hoped to have in our life. We were a little dissatisfied that we were Christians, but didn’t experience God’s big power in our life. In the Bible, the book of Revelation 3:15-17, we read that God preferred for people to be either “cold” or “hot”, but not “lukewarm”. It is better to be a non-believer, than to claim that you know God and profane His name with your bad deeds.

Up to this point in our marriage we were Christians, but we took being Christians for granted. For example, reading the Bible and attending church was something we did, but we weren’t fully engaged. We didn’t do it with joy or excitement, because we felt that we were obligated to do it. We never questioned the relationship of ourselves to our faith. We just accepted what we were told. But now Oleg and I wanted to experience more of God’s love, power and presence in our life. So here, as I already said in the beginning of the book, our journey began…

One evening, when we knelt to pray to God, I heard Oleg pray, “God, I am so tired of being a lukewarm Christian. I want to have a personal relationship with You! I want to experience more of Your love, more of Your power and more of Your presence in my life. Please send a situation into my life that will show me WHO YOU REALLY ARE!” For a moment, I felt scared and wondered what Oleg was talking about. “How would this change our family and our life?” I thought. But I loved Oleg and trusted him. I thought he must know what he is asking for, but I had no idea what this would mean for our family. It struck me – it was an important moment in our lives.

From that day, Oleg totally changed. He began reading the Bible daily, sharing what he learned with us, and seeking answers for questions he had. It was like he was driven and wanted to know more. After he finished reading the book of Romans in the Bible, he did not understand it and had lots of questions. He wanted to know who the Apostle Paul wrote the book of Romans to, what he meant, and did it apply to us? We had been taught that certain parts of the Bible applied only to Gentiles, while other parts applied to Jews.

One day Oleg told me, “You know, Olga, if I want to know more about God, I probably have to learn more about the days of Moses, Jesus and His Apostles.”

I wondered what information he will be able to find. Oleg used the internet for research and was excited to share with me daily what new insights he learned. His love and interest in the truth about God grew. He simply had to know more. As we discussed and thought about what he learned, we began to have questions about what we were taught and prayed to God to reveal us the Truth. I also read the Bible, but hearing what Oleg shared with me was very interesting and unknown to me before. We began to question what God actually required of us, and what was the purpose of our life. Each question would lead us to other questions, like an unwinding spool of yarn. As a family, we studied and grew together in our faith.

……..

At the same time, significant changes happened in our life. Oleg’s job with a good salary was an hour drive each way. He decided to switch to a closer location, to be able to spend more time with the family. Unfortunately, his new location was not as busy. Oleg’s income decreased because there was less work and he was paid on a piece rate.

At about the same time, Oleg’s Father passed away at the age of 54. It was a big hit for Oleg’s whole family. It took them a while to accept it and move on.

Soon after, I injured my shoulders, which led to pain for the next few years and frequent doctor visits. Also, the economy took a downfall and our WIC department received a layoff notice due to lack of funding. I was going to lose my job in a year.

Between the house payment, car payments, our credit cards and other expenses, I wondered if we would ever be able to pay off our debt. I often cried out to God that we didn’t have the strength to handle this.

One day, my friend invited me to a prayer group, where God spoke to me, “My daughter, give your worry to Me and I will help you. All I need from you is PRAISE!” So, every time I worried, I praised God and His peace would come. It was such a wonderful feeling! Inside my heart I knew that God would help us.

The downturn in the economy also impacted my brothers and sisters. At that time, our parents started a family prayer time on Wednesday evenings at their house. Together with our children, we worshiped God and prayed for our needs and for needs of others.

One evening, my Aunt prophesied to most of the people in the group, and then to me, “My daughter, prepare yourself for an ordeal. Pray often for strength when a disaster comes to your family.”

I was scared and thought that something bad would happen to Oleg. Later that evening, my Grandmother came up to me and said, “Learn to be humble and patient.” I praised God often and prayed for His protection over our family.

…….

One month was replaced by another and the time of my lay-off was getting closer. We made financial changes in our family. Unbelievably, our debt became smaller. We sold both cars, eliminating two big payments and bought cheaper cars. Saving every penny, we tried our hardest to pay off our credit cards. I stopped going shopping and sometimes even went to a food bank to get help with food. The year of lay-off notice gave us time to adjust to a lower income.

Surprisingly, a year and a half later, we were debt free, except the mortgage payment, which was still very high relative to our income. We sought a loan modification, which took about three years to be finalized. Looking back, we were amazed at how God had helped us. I stayed at home with David, Kristina, and Michael, who were 11, 10 and 6 years old. We were happy together and thanked God for blessing us.

…….

4

You never know what your real values are until you

are faced with difficult real-life choices.

We love children and were delighted to find out that I was pregnant with our fourth child. In the sixth week of the pregnancy I developed complications and went to see the doctor.

“Olga, the ultrasound shows two fetuses,” the doctor said. “But one is smaller and not developing, and the other one is bigger and growing. This creates a risk of miscarriage. I need to prescribe strict bed rest for you.”

“A miscarriage? Two babies? One is not developing?” A sense of dread descended over me like a shroud. Scared, I implored God to save our baby, if it was His will. A few weeks later, I felt better and one of the fetuses survived.

At four months of pregnancy I went for a second ultrasound.

“It is a BOY!” the nurse said.

Then she paused, seemed worried.

“Actually, let me go get the doctor,” she said. “There seems to be a problem here.”

The doctor came and very carefully examined the ultrasound images. The look of his face registered concern. I knew immediately, there were serious problems.

“Olga, when we do the ultrasound, we can see if the baby’s heart is healthy. If a baby has Downs Syndrome or Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome, the heart looks different. I can see the left side of your baby’s heart is not developing. It means he has Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome, which is not good news.”

For a moment, I couldn’t speak. My heart started beating rapidly and my hands started shaking.

“What? Our baby has health problems?” tears filled my eyes.

“This is a very rare heart defect which occurs in only 1 of 2,500 births. Usually, with this syndrome, 50% of babies also have Downs Syndrome. Your baby has no chance for life once born,” the doctor explained.

“Is there anything you can do to fix this problem?” I asked shakely.

“Previously, these babies had been dying right after birth. But 30 years ago, the doctors began doing surgeries to correct such problems. Usually they do an open-heart surgery on the first day of the baby’s life. Then, another surgery at six months, and the third one at the age of three years. The recovery is very difficult and not many babies survive these surgeries,” the doctor answered with a sad tone.

I was devastated and shocked by the news and could not believe this was happening. Why had God allowed me to survive the risk of miscarriage, to let this happen to my child? I wasn’t sure if I would be able to handle this situation, but just because I thought this, it didn’t make the problems of my pregnancy go away. “What if I could not handle this situation emotionally or physically? What about our other children?” The questions raced through my mind. Then reality grabbed me. No matter how many questions I had, none of the answers would take away the harsh reality of this pregnancy.

“Olga, I am referring you to a high-risk pregnancy specialist, in case you consider an abortion,” the doctor continued.

“I can’t do an abortion. This is our baby, whom we already love so much.”

All in tears I left the doctor’s office. Outside, shaking, crying, and having a hard time concentrating, I called Oleg at work and told him the devastating news.

“Our baby is a boy, who is having many heart issues. He will die if we don’t do the surgeries. Why did God let it happen to us?”

“Olga, God will help us. We should trust in His will,” Oleg said with a calm voice.

But I thought reality is reality and miracles just don’t happen in today’s world. Men often hide their feelings and don’t talk about them as much as women do. I wondered whether this was Oleg’ true feeling or if he was telling me what I needed to hear.

…….

That minute I remembered the Bible story of Job that Oleg and I had recently read. Job was a blameless, upright person, who feared God and shunned evil. Satan thought that Job was righteous because God had blessed him.

“If you take everything away from Job, I will prove to You that Job will curse you,” Satan told God.

“I let you test Job. I am sure he will not curse Me. He is a righteous and blameless person,” God replied to Satan.

With God’s permission Satan tested Job, by destroying his wealth, killing all his children and taking his health away from Job. But Job didn’t curse God. He remained loyal to Him. Satan was proved wrong and God blessed Job even more than before, by giving him more children and wealth. I wondered if God was testing us, as He had tested Job?

I drove directly to Mom’s house to see and talk to her. I knew her comfort would be forth coming.

“Our baby has very serious heart issues and may be born very ill,” I broke in tears. “He may not even survive…”

“Daughter, please don’t cry. Give your worry to God. He is in charge of everything and He will help you. We will be praying for your baby,” hugging me, Mom tried to calm me down.

I picked up our children and went home. Later that evening, Oleg and I talked to our children.

“David, Kristina and Michael, we have news for you!”

The kids came and sat next to us, ready to listen.

“The baby in Mama’s womb is a boy. You will have a little brother!” Oleg said.

David and Michael jumped up, being so happy about baby brother.

“But I wanted a sister,” Kristina started crying.

I comforted Kristina and shared the rest of the news.

“We also have very sad news for you. Your baby brother has many issues with his heart. When he is born, he may not even live long. He might require multiple surgeries and may not come home right away.”

The children were scared. With tears on their eyes, they looked at us, not sure what to ask, how to react or what to answer.

“We need to pray to God and ask Him to heal our baby,” Oleg said. “God is powerful. He heals people, if it is His will.”

Oleg embraced the children in his arms. We all prayed and cried out to God, asking for His mercy.

…….

One week later, while Oleg was at work, I had a second ultrasound at a high-risk Obstetrician/Gynecology clinic.

“Olga, this ultrasound confirms that all the problems with your baby’s heart are real,” summarized the doctor.

“Why did it happen to our baby? Did I do something wrong?” I asked through tears.

“No one knows why the Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome occurs. As with most congenital heart defects, there is no known cause.”

“Can you tell me more about the surgery?” I asked.

“Sure,” the doctor said. “It is a very complicated open-heart surgery. Eighty-five percent of babies survive the first surgery. Less babies survive the second surgery. And a lot less babies survive all three surgeries. With time, their heart becomes very weak. They require a heart transplant. If they can’t wait long enough for the transplant, they die. Only a few individuals live up to thirty years.”

The doctor paused, and I did not know what to say or ask. What a terrible dilemma for a parent to face. Our baby will die if we don’t do the surgery. But, I also didn’t want my baby to go through the pain of surgery…

“Olga, you may consider an abortion,” the doctor said.

“No,” quickly escaped my lips. “I love my baby so much already. There is no way we can do an abortion. I am also from a Christian family and we know that abortion is a sin. I feel that aborting my baby would be the same as killing him. I can’t do that. His life is in God’s hands. I will give my baby all chances for life, and I know God will help me.”

The doctor looked at me, regretfully. He knew I had no idea what I was facing if I decided to go with open-heart surgeries on a newborn baby.

“I will refer you to a cardiologist,” the doctor said. “They will do an echocardiogram, which will show more details of your baby’s heart. Talk to your husband. You still have time to do an abortion, if you decide.”

I left the doctor’s office and called Oleg.

“The ultrasound confirmed again that our baby’s heart is badly malformed and is not going to change,” I said through tears.

“God will help us, Olga. Please don’t cry,” Oleg tried to calm me with little success.

“I can’t accept it. I don’t want to accept it. Why did God let it happen to our baby? Did we do something wrong? Is He punishing us for something?”

“Olga, we don’t know why it happened. You know we didn’t sin. I don’t think God is punishing us. For some reason, He let it happen and He will help us through it,” Oleg did his best to soothe me.

Until that day, I was hoping that it was a mistake, but it seemed that both Oleg and I were powerless, and that God had failed us. Driving home, I cried out to God, hardly seeing the freeway through tears.

“Why, God, You decided to give us an ill baby? Are you punishing us for something? Show me, what is it? I will do whatever it takes to fix it. I just want our baby to be healthy.”

But God was quiet. I didn’t hear Him answer…

At home, I continued to cry and implore God to heal our baby. I could do this since Oleg was at work and the children were at school. I was home alone. No one could see me cry. After a while, I began to sense a different perspective. I felt as if through our experience with the third pregnancy, God prepared us to better handle the issues in the fourth pregnancy. The doctors predicted that our third child could be born with serious health problems, but he was a healthy baby. Could it happen again? Here we were, facing a decision: the doctors were telling us there was a huge problem and suggesting an abortion; our religious values said we should not do an abortion. How do you decide such a critical question? I knew Oleg and I needed to think and agree, and it had to come from our heart and values.

…….

I knew our situation would be nearly unbearable and that we would need lots of advice, love, help, comfort and support, to be able to deal with this complicated pregnancy. I first turned to my Father. We share a special connection; I know he will always be there for me. His words and guidance come from the heart. When I was a child, I always heard him pray every night and I knew God heard him. My Father also often told us how God healed others through the hands of his Grandfather. I knew we had to pray.

“Dad, our baby’s heart issues are so serious. Can you please pray for us?” I asked my Father.

“Olga, the news is terrifying, but please, take care of yourself,” my Father said. “Don’t worry. God will take care of you and your baby. We will pray, and God will help. I love you, Daughter. Be strong.”

I know Dad worried and wanted to help me. Even though there was little he could do, he could continue loving us and praying for us.

I also called my Mother-in-law to tell her the news and ask her for prayers. She is such a wonderful lady. She tried to calm me down and asked me not to worry, reminding me that often the doctors are wrong. She promised to pray for us.

Next, I called our friends, relatives, co-workers and neighbors, and asked them to pray for us. The illness of our baby did not only add worry to Oleg and me. It affected our whole big family and the people who surrounded us. Everyone questioned why God let it happen. People didn’t know what to tell us or how to comfort us, yet they promised to pray for us.

…….

We sought support and comfort from the ministers of our church. We spoke to them about the serious problems of our baby, expecting prayers and the traditional anointing of the holy oil. Instead, we heard the opposite, “Check your lives. Maybe there is something for which God is punishing you. God doesn’t usually give ill children to Christians.”

Oleg and I were shocked. We expected support rather than more pain. We knew we didn’t sin. We thought God is merciful. Everything comes from God. Nothing is done without His will. It is only God who judges us. Returning home, we prayed asking God to heal our son and to give us strength and understanding to accept His will.

Every day I was in tears. Often, I called my best friend, Katya, with my questions. She knew I needed help.

“Call Pastor Ivan,” she suggested. “He is my cousin, a positive and a knowledgeable person. He will answer your questions.”

One day, when I just couldn’t find peace, I called the Pastor Ivan, whom I had never met. I asked him my questions. His answers were like a breath of fresh air that poured new life and strength into our lives.