Good Things Happening at PPSC

Grandparents Day seems to come and go each year without fanfare, have you noticed? According to my calendar, it fell on September 8 this year. The special day didn’t exist when I was a little girl learning the grandmotherly art of crochet from my grandmother. Now she is long gone, and I am the grandmother. Still crocheting.

In honor of Grandparents Day, I decided to finish my nearly completed baby afghan in variegated shades of purple and pink. I enjoyed shopping for a few baby-girl items to go with it and carried the whole package to our local Prairie Pregnancy Support Center.

When she greeted me, Executive Director Mary Loewen gratefully accepted my gift and offered me a tour of the facility. Although I’d attended their fundraiser banquet last spring, I’d never seen the inside of their Tupper Street premises. I was impressed!

What first captured my eye was a warm, inviting reception area with plenty of space to relax, talk, read resource materials, or just hang out. I also caught a glimpse of their modern office, where Mary and the center’s only other paid staff member, Dawn, accomplish their administrative work.

Next came a large, beautifully appointed room used for various purposes such as guest speakers, volunteer training, and educational or social opportunities. One wall displays photos of all their volunteers, including board members and client advocates. Off this room await two small, cozy rooms used for counselling and prayer sessions.

Perhaps most impressive is the larger room used to store and display items like the ones I brought with me—including maternity clothes, baby and children’s clothing neatly organized into sizes, and all manner of supplies needed for outfitting a little one.

PPSC provides services to our Central Plains area. Its primary mission is to offer compassion, hope, resources, and support for anyone facing pregnancy-related decisions. This non-profit volunteer agency is affiliated with the Canadian Association of Pregnancy Support Services. Its volunteers receive rich training from leaders in the field and bring their compassionate, caring hearts to our community with professional candor. They provide pregnancy testing, options education, and ongoing support in the form of peer counselling, maternity/baby clothes and supplies, peer support groups, infant loss support, post-abortion recovery, referrals to community agencies, sexual education, and sexual integrity discussions.

With 5 grandsons, it was fun to shop for a baby girl!

The organization receives no government funding but relies on donor support to be able to offer all their services free of charge. Their desire is to answer questions, present options, and provide support through the decision-making process and beyond. PPSC is not a medical clinic and does not refer clients for abortion. These volunteers work and pray hard to offer hope and to empower lives in our community, behind the scenes and with strictest confidence. They serve clients regardless of age, gender, sexual identity or orientation, race, or religion.

For those experiencing post-abortion stress, whether their symptoms are emotional, physical, behavioral, or spiritual—and no matter how long ago the abortion occurred—help and healing are available through one-on-one counseling or a post-abortion support group. Both are a safe place to talk about your thoughts and feelings with others who understand because they’ve been there. This service extends beyond women who’ve chosen abortion, including anyone who may be affected but often overlooked, such as fathers and grandparents.

If you need to talk, or if you’re interested in donating or getting involved in the Prairie Pregnancy Support Center, you can do so by calling or texting 204-240-4357 or emailing info@prairiepregnancy.ca . For more information or to read some inspiring stories, visit their website HERE.

Happy belated Grandparents Day!

On Becoming a Grandmother

In honour of Grandparents’ Day this weekend, I’m sharing a story I wrote upon the birth of my firstborn’s firstborn.

I thought I was prepared.

I was a mother, after all. I already knew what it meant to love someone so much it hurt. I understood the old adage that to be a parent is to walk around forever with your heart outside your body. I had written in my journal, revealing all the emotions I’d discovered tag-teaming in my heart: happiness, melancholy, anxiety, joy, anticipation, worry. I had seen the ultrasound pictures. I’d crocheted a soft, fuzzy blue blanket, patiently undoing all my bungled stitches and doing them over so it would be a perfect square. I had memorized the verses in Psalm 139 that tell how God wonderfully forms us in our mother’s womb. I had prayed daily for this child and for his parents since I learned of his existence. I had written letters to his mom and dad, assuring them how proud I was of them both, how they would be excellent parents.

I’d prayed for myself, too. I’d wrestled with the idea that I was going to be a grandmother. Shouldn’t I be wiser first? Or sweeter? Or at the very least, a better cook? How exactly did one cram for this event? I had even admitted to myself that I would soon be sleeping with someone’s grandfather. That idea took a little getting used to, let me tell you!

I had bragged to my friends. I had celebrated with my mother. I had gifted my daughter-in-law with maternity clothes and bought the most irresistible little stuffed puppy for the baby.

The day he was born, I rode along with his other grandparents to the hospital to meet our mutual little descendent for the first time. We were told to wait in the hallway while the nurses finished up whatever they were doing with him and his mother in the room. Given the hospital rules, I fully expected my first sight of my little grandson would be in his plastic baby bed and I was prepared.

But when I turned around, I instantly knew that no amount of groundwork could have prepared me for that moment. Instead of the expected baby bed, I was beholding my own firstborn carrying his firstborn in his arms.

Keegan and Me on the day he was born in 2007

I came unglued. Part of me was carried back 26 years to the day I first laid eyes on my son. But those 26 years had passed in an instant, and here I was looking at the next generation, with the same dark skin and the same head full of thick, dark hair. He was beautiful and I was smitten. I didn’t even try to check the tears running down my cheeks as I held him in my arms and hugged his dad as tight as I could with the baby between us. What a cherished moment!

This little boy is now in Kindergarten and has two little brothers. Every day brings new adventures, new things to learn, new memories to make, and new opportunities to wonder at the marvelous work of our Creator. These little guys have taught me that sometimes stopping to watch ducks is more important than getting in out of the rain. They’ve uncovered my own impatient ways, the ones I thought I had overcome but now realize the opportunities to demonstrate patience have only become less frequent. They’ve reminded me that time spent cuddling a sleeping baby in a rocking chair trumps pretty much anything.

Most of all, I’ve come to realize that no matter how hard I tried, I could not have prepared to love someone so profusely, or to learn so much from someone so small. 

Happy Grandparents Day!