Follow Every Rainbow

I don't know when I fell in love with rainbows. For as long as I can remember I have been fascinated and enamored by the hazy spectrum of every colour stretched across a sky. I grew up in Church, and part of that fondness related to the promise of God it symbolized, which for the longest time was a nice sentiment but hadn't fully trusted for myself. 

Then, in 2013, I asked for the promise to be mine, for a rainbow to be a sign I was pregnant. 

And I was pregnant. I was certain of it. Even my husband guessed before day 7 of being late, which is when we had decided I would tell him. But then the doubts started to creep in. A few weeks earlier, only a week after ovulation, I was pouring out my worry at God's feet as fear from every other miscarriage rose up in me. I had determined I wasn't about to test, not until 2 weeks late, so instead I asked God for a rainbow. 

A rainbow.
In the middle of January.
In the middle of January in Winnipeg, also affectionately known as Winterpeg. 

I even laughed at myself, the audaciousness! “Now there’s a challenge for you God! I guess You’ll have to give me a sundog!” 

No rainbow appeared that day. 

Or the next week.

Or for over a year.

I was not to keep that baby. Yet, I felt like I was supposed to keep pursuing that rainbow.  A few weeks later my friend saw a double sun dog rainbow and felt God whisper it was for me. Then a few months later she felt yet another whisper that I would be a mother, on the very night I had been watching the musical Sound of Music.  Where they sing the song that includes the lyrics, "follow every rainbow until you find your dream."  Honestly, that had always been my least favorite song in that whole show, but that day it suddenly moved me deeply. Then my friend called with her message later that night.  I felt all the signs align, I was to keep trying for my rainbow baby.

In the meantime though, I was overlooking other signs.  

Within the two weeks of that January miscarriage, God placed 3 young women into my life and very quickly after, into my heart, whom would become like my own daughters. To this day they all still hold a very important place in my heart. The first rainbows I saw after my request was 16 months later, when I was with 2 of my girls, and we all saw a double rainbow. Then on a few other occasions I saw rainbows with them or immediately after being with them. I also began to see rainbows on my travels to visit my nieces and nephews, whom I also consider my spiritual children. You would think I would get the hint. However, because I was seeing rainbows at other times as well, I considered it sweet & sentimental, but not a sign. 

It took almost seven years later for me to finally realize that following the rainbow to my dream of having a rainbow baby was not what God had intended, yet they were not misleading, those rainbows were leading me to follow another dream.  For almost those same number of years I have realized that mentoring young women is a big part of what I want to do in life, and this is one of the dreams I am meant to follow. In fact, almost immediately after my discussion with my husband about ending our pursuits to have children, we talked about the idea we'd contemplated for a few years, and that was that we could be a safe place for those young people who would need a temporary safe & supportive home. 

Wouldn't you know. a month later, on Mother's Day, we had our first opportunity.  We didn't need anything as obvious as a rainbow overhead for us to follow, we followed our hearts. We both realized everything was aligned for us to offer our home to this young woman, whom we already had a special place in our heart for.  It was just what all of us needed. 

Just before her arrival in our home, I had been contemplating a tattoo to memorialize the close to our infertility chapter.  Once upon a time I thought it would be a rainbow tattoo for our rainbow baby, but with all the pieces coming together, I saw the rainbow was still so very relevant, and following it did lead me to this new dream.  A dream I wonder if it would have ever happened, had we had our own children. If I would have had it my way, this young woman may never have had this safe space and who knows what would have happened to her during this time. And so, I realized a rainbow tattoo was exactly what I wanted to represent this milestone. A reminder to follow every rainbow, there are more dreams out there for me, I am certain. 

I have had at least seven losses through my 14 years of trying to conceive, one for every colour of the rainbow. Yet. I am certain that my numbers of spiritual children will far exceed that, and like you often experience with a rainbow, that expanse will be so large you can't ever see the end. 

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