the Author

The baby I mentioned yesterday, the one who I said was so sick, went to Jesus last night. Her little body just wasn't strong enough, didn't have enough reserve, couldn't take any more. It's all over now; the monitors have been disconnected, the last of the supplies cleared away and the sheets on the bed have been changed. Her family is making their way back to their home in Togo, their shattered hope wrapped in a little blanket. This is when the questioning sets in, when I start going over everything in my head, examining my steps one after another, reassuring myself that I did all I could. This time, I'm not sure I did.

Just typing those words makes me want to scream. To throw myself on the hard floor of my cabin and weep for the family that can never be the same again. Everything inside me rises up in revolt against the idea that I did things wrong, and a hundred reasons spring to my lips. There was no way she could come back from that kind of deficit; it's not your fault. She came to us already malnourished; it's not your fault. This would have happened no matter what we did; it's not your fault. There were other patients, other sick children who needed you, and it's okay that you were caring for them, too. It's not your fault.

Intellectually, I know that all of those statements are true. But intellect is a force that pales in comparison with guilt and grief. I know that there was nothing I could have done to change the course of Akouvi's passing, but my conscience burns me, peering into the dark corners of my heart and holding my fingers to the flame.

You knew her potassium was already low on Tuesday night. You should have pushed harder, told more people. You knew she was sick when Andrea called you over to her bed early yesterday morning. You knew she looked bad, and you should have said something. You let her lie in the corner all day, and you knew something wasn't right. You were so busy with your patients, with the babies who would have been fine if you had left them alone. You failed her. You failed.

As I curl up into myself, ready to shoulder what I can only see as my rightful share of the blame, another voice starts to make itself heard. This voice is softer, barely audible through the accusations flying through my soul, and I'm so weary from blaming myself that I would have missed it had He not been so insistent.

Child, stop. Quiet now. Just stop. Don't you know Me by now? Haven't you seen enough to know that I don't make mistakes? When have I ever given you cause to doubt Me? And as much as I want to be calmed and reassured, I'm still crushed, because it's not Him I'm doubting this time; it's myself. I'm the one who messed up here, not You.

Again, the voice, a whisper in my heart.

You think this was your fault? You think there was anything you could have done or anything you didn't do that would have changed that little one's outcome? Don't you know Me by now? I am the Author; I am the One who wrote Akouvi's story. I wove her together in the secret places, when she was nothing but a carefully nurtured dream in her mother's heart. I opened the book of her life, and I penned every beautiful page before she was even born. I knew the number of her days, dear one. I knew the days she would laugh, and all the days she would be in pain. Today, so early in the morning, her days were finished, her story ended.

I knew.

I have always known.