When You Feel Like God Has Forgotten You

Helloooo friends 😊 How has it already been another almost 2 years since I wrote my last blog post? Well — I have the answer to that – it’s been a hard season but unlike other seasons, this one really knocked me out.

The last time I wrote y’all, I had just stepped into my 40’s era! 🫶🏻 (and you can read that post here: snapshot of what I’ve been up to the past 2 years 🙃 – Alisha Headley)

Never did I expect my 40’s to start off with the most exciting high that my husband and I have ever experienced after seeing a positive pregnancy, to our lowest of lows losing our first pregnancy to a miscarriage. And never did I expect that first miscarriage to be followed by 3 more pregnancies only to turn into 3 more miscarriages and losses. So here I am 2 years later having experienced a total of 4 devastating miscarriages in the last 2 years, and still no baby in our arms.  

With my 42^nd birthday coming up this weekend (September 14^th 💜) I never expected to be in the same position I was in 2 years ago still fighting, praying, believing, and hoping for a baby, yet still having no baby in my arms to hold.  

Let me first start of by saying this: if you are reading this and have experienced a miscarriage, I want you to know I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry for your loss. I’m so sorry you experienced the pain both physically and emotionally of losing a dream and losing the idea of your future family and I’m so sorry things don’t look like how you thought they would. I want you to know that I see you, I understand you, and I’m here for you.  

Today, I am writing this blog post in a valley, sharing my story from a valley, not a mountaintop yet with great news to share. I’m still not pregnant. I still don’t know if I’ll be able to bear my own child, nor do I know the outcome as the outcome is still unknown. But I do know I’m not giving up (although many times I’ve wanted to), nor am I going to stop trusting in God, even in the midst of loss.

When I think of loss in the Bible, I think of Job who was no stranger to loss. For most of the entire book of Job, Job cried out to God, questioned God, asked God why, and many times doubted God…yet didn’t hear anything back from God. I’m sure he felt forgotten. He said things like “how long would you torment my soul and break me in pieces…(Job 19:1) He felt unheard, alone, and forgotten.  But God showed up. Just like He ALWAYS does. And God finally answered Job in Chapter 38 and reminded Job of who God is revealing and reminding Job of God’s omnipotence (all powerful) and sovereignty (in control of all). God has the power to make things happen and is in control of it all. He reminds Job that God is the Creator of the world we live in and everything in it. God goes on for multiple chapters reminding Job that if Job can trust God to run the universe as its Creator, that he can also trust God to run his life.

I relate to Job. I have cried out to God more than I can count. I have shed more tears in the past few years than I probably have my whole life all together. I have been so hurt by God, angry with Him, confused in His plan and what’s He’s doing, I’ve avoided Him at times because I’ve felt like I have nothing else to say as sometimes I feel like a broken record asking for the same thing over and over, only to find myself disappointed and heartbroken all over again. I’ve asked Him WHY so many times. But more than anything else – I have felt forgotten….

When every friend, family member, best friend, acquaintance, husband’s co-workers, frenemies, or even some enemies (jk, I don’t have any 🤣😇) have become pregnant and have tried after just a month, or even worse, those who get pregnant who weren’t even trying or didn’t really want kids in the first place. Or how about those girls that are already pregnant with their second child in the past 2 years, while I’m still fighting over here for my first. When everyone around me is pregnant, and I’m still fighting to keep a pregnancy and give birth, I feel forgotten. Not to mention the judgement that has popped up in my spirit at times that follows those feelings of feeling forgotten…. (I confess these awful thoughts 🙈), but I have thought things like why her God? She doesn’t even believe in you and you’re blessing her with the one thing I am begging you for? I am the one who has been faithful to you, I’m the One who believes in you. I am the one that is fighting harder than her. Why why why? I feel the way Job did at times questioning God, but did you know Jesus too had a moment of feeling abandoned and forgotten in Matthew 27:46? Right before He was about to die on the cross, He “cried out with a loud voice, saying, “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Jesus knew God had a greater purpose yet still asked why and felt forgotten.

I don’t know the answer to why everyone around me has been blessed with a child and I’m still fighting for one. But I do know this, that after 2 years of this, God has never forgotten me. And He has most certainly not forgotten you. Just like He didn’t forget Job or forget Jesus. Maybe it’s not children you are fighting for, but you can name your pain, and whatever it is, you also feel forgotten by God. Jesus Himself had a moment of feeling forgotten by God…His Father and our Father also. BUT – how can a Father who is all love, who left us with a love letter on the pages of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, who sent His very own son to die for us sending him to this earth to live a short life here on earth only to be brutally beaten with a painful death JUST FOR US so that we can spend eternity with Him….how can a loving Father like that ever forget us?

It’s not possible for a loving God to forget us – His daughters. His beautiful masterpiece creation of a daughter. His daughters that He created for a purpose and a purpose that is good. Even if things don’t feel good right now, God is good, and “His plans for us are good” (Jeremian 29:11), and He is a good Father who promises to “never ever leave us or forsake us”. He “hears our every cry” (Psalm 34:17) and He “keeps track of our pain, and collects all our tears in a bottle…” (Psalm 56:8)

He is working behind the scenes, even if we don’t see it yet. God eventually answered Job in chapter 38, and God will answer us too in the chapter of our lives that God has beautifully written for us in His perfect timing. Right now, we are in the middle chapters, the chapters where we might feel forgotten.

Here are 3 things to focus on during the middle chapters of our lives when we feel forgotten:

1. We have to REMEMBER that God’s plan is better than our plans and His ways are better than our ways (Isaiah 55:8-9). And what we think is best for our lives, might not be HIS best. We have to remember those times in the past that He was faithful or that He protected us from taking the wrong path even when we thought it was the right one, or remember the times that you wanted something, or things didn’t work out the way you had hoped, but in “hindsight”, God worked it all out for better.
2. We have to SURRENDER. We have to surrender that thing we are wanting so badly, and we must also surrender the idea of how we think things are supposed to be. When we don’t surrender, we try to control, and it only leaves us with a lack of peace. Let go and let God is truly casting the weight of everything you are waiting for onto God (I Peter 5:7) who is more than able to carry the weight of our desire (along with our heartbreaks) much better than we are.
3. We have to keep BELIEVING. Girl, it’s time to GET UP again! To keep believing for that baby. Stop letting the enemy feed you lies of inadequacy or fear topped with comparison. The devil is a liar! (John 8:44) And he’s afraid of a woman who keeps getting back up! He keeps beating us down over and over again with disappointment, only to realize that he can’t bring down a woman who walks and believes in God. Even if she falls, she will get back up again. I’ve been where you are and when you experience a miscarriage, it’s a kind of loss that is indescribable. I’ve been beaten down multiple times, but I never stay down long (partially thanks to my hubby Nick who I talk more about later). But we have to keep BELIEIVNG. Believing God is bigger than our doctors’, believing God is bigger than any diagnosis or label you’ve been told, believing that we serve a God of miracles. And if God doesn’t deliver what we desire, we have to believe also that He’s got a good reason and something better is on the other side. Hear me when I say this: take the time to grieve. Please. But just don’t stay there for long giving the enemy the time to take up residence in your mind where he will continue to torment you and poke at you. Get up, girl – get your armor on, and keep fighting and believing.

Lastly, I want to leave you with the sweet goodness of God and the sweet gifts and blessings He gives in these middle chapters of our lives. As many of you remember, my brother died of cancer at the young age of 33 years old in 2013 (you can read more of his story here: one of the best gifts I ever received – Alisha Headley). And one thing he told me right before his death, was God never left him, he was never forgotten, and never once left his side. He said God was absolutely so real and shined so bright in the dark nights of pain and agony and He was able to see all of God’s blessings and goodness even when he was facing the loss of his own life.  

In the same way, God has been good to my husband and I throughout our devasting losses and I encourage you to take some time and take inventory of your own life and try to find the blessings in the midst of the losses and in the midst of feeling like God doesn’t hear you and has forgotten you. His goodness and blessings are all around us if we pay attention to them.

A few ways I have seen God’s hand and blessings the past 2 years:

• Blessed us with JOY. I’ve woken up more days with JOY than I have with LACK. Because God is my treasure, I never felt a feeling of lacking because I haven’t had a child yet. In fact, I have had more days of contentment and joy in the last 2 years than I have of heartache because of my joy found in in God. Nehemiah 8:10 says, “The joy of the Lord is my strength”. Our inner strength, contentment, and JOY come from our relationship with the Lord. While my heart still desires a baby, I have a full life of joy and contentment exactly where I am with today.
• Blessed us with amazing doctors (well-known specialists we trust fully)
• Blessed us financially in business (we have a lot of freedom and peace)
• Blessed me with a newfound worth. I thought I was a confident person before all of this, but a lot of this was tied closely to my achievements. I grew up an athlete, I had a successful career, a loving marriage…most of the things I sought out to do, I excelled at them. My worth was found in WHAT I was (a title or achievement) vs in WHOSE I was (a daughter of the King). My worth is not based on whether I can have a kid or not, nor does it make you and I less worthy if we can’t have kids. My worth is found in Christ and Christ alone. And my heart and worth have been recalibrated and blessed with a security in my position in the “royal family” (I Peter 2:9) of Heaven (where I will spend eternity), that I’ll never find in the insecure worldly achievements (that are only temporary). (2 Corinthians 4:18)
• Blessed me with a heart of compassion I never knew existed. Being that I have now experienced multiple miscarriages, my heart has grown so much bigger for those that have also. Before my own journey started, I have had so many friends and family members that had experienced miscarriages and/or infertility, and I was sad for them for what they were going through. But now I have compassion and heart for them in an even bigger way as my heart has enlarged. My heart prays for women daily that they are comforted in their weakest moments.
• And last but not least, God has blessed my marriage in ways I didn’t know we needed. I thought my marriage was solid 2 years ago, but going through something so devastating, not once, not twice, not three times, but 4 times now…can either make you or break you. And I am so blessed with the strength God has blessed us with in our marriage going through this together. Allow me to have a wifey gratitude moment here 🥹: going through losses like a miscarriage is so personal to a woman for it’s her body that’s losing the baby – which takes a physical painful toll, but also an emotional toll that bring out emotions I didn’t even know I had haha (my poor husband 🙃) as well as very deep feelings of inadequacy. Nick has been my best friend, my biggest cheerleader, my greatest confidant, and my shoulder to cry on. And while my disappointing losses have brought me low at times, Nick has been my side reminding me that it’s my faith in God that will always keep me high. His heart is so sweet, and I admire the way he has approached every devastation with valor and strength. He’s taught me the meaning of bravery, and most the time I have got back up, was because he was right there to carry me when I couldn’t carry myself. God knew exactly what he was doing when He wrote our love story, (which you can read here: our love story – Alisha Headley) and I feel so blessed. Nick even planned an impromptu trip to Spain a few months ago just a week after our last miscarriage, and below are some of my favorite pics from it 😊 It was exactly what my fragile heart needed.

In closing – remember, God is good. Even in our fallen-broken-death-ridden-loss-filled-betraying-unfair world, God’s blessings are everywhere. Don’t lose faith in Him. Your story will be THAT story that helps another woman struggling with the same thing you are struggling with right now. Just like I hope that my pain and my messy story and middle chapters can be a light and message to your life reading this. While I’m still navigating my middle chapters, I hope I can help navigate you through some of yours as well. You are not forgotten. You are not alone; I understand full well the pain you are going through. Please don’t hesitate to email me, message me, or forward this to anyone you know struggling with loss of any kind and that may feel forgotten. I’m here for you.

PS – for those of you asking – YES, I am still writing my book. I’ve finished my first draft of the book proposal but then took the past year off dealing with the grief of these losses, but I’m taking my own advice as I tell myself daily – Girl, it’s time to GET UP! I love you all so much. Thanks for following me and being a part of my journey. 🩷

XO,

Alisha Headley