Signed, limited edition, 12" vinyl version of So Am I. Pressed on beautiful opaque blue vinyl!
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I wrote this book during Olivia’s life—it starts from the day she was born and ends the day she passed away.
This book is not about what happened on the outside (although I did include a journal entry for each month Olivia was alive to help fill in the story). This book is about what was happening inside me during these moments, and a condensing of the lessons I learned about life, living, and letting go from Olivia.
The theme of this book, as was the theme of our lives during these 14 months, is *rest in the midst of uncertainty*.
We found out about Olivia’s condition while Heather was pregnant with her. The following months were a blur of doctor visits, sonograms, meetings with specialists and grief counselors, planning for the day Olivia would be born… the day we would say goodbye.
Everything was planned. I had a picture in my head. They said there would be a person there with a basket—that when we were ready, they would place her in that basket and take her away. I wondered what it would feel like after that. Would we stay at the hospital for a while? How would the drive home feel?
It turns out that sometimes Trisomy 18 babies do survive birth. Sometimes they even come home for a while. I guess they figured they’d prepare us for the worst. Whatever “worst” is. “Worst” is definitely not synonymous with “most difficult”.
Olivia came home. The following 14 months were full of the most difficult moments of my life. They were also full of the most beautiful ones. They were full of life.
Olivia, a baby girl deemed “incompatible with life," brought a full lifetime’s worth of life into these short 14 months.
Olivia, a baby girl, deemed “incompatible with life," redefined life for me and my wife and family.
This book is my best attempt at sharing that life with you. And what I couldn’t fit into words, I poured into music.
As you read the book—as you listen to the music—please let yourself return to where you are. Notice it. And notice that while my story is unique to me, it is also universal—it is your story as well. We all have our own path to walk; we are all on the same journey, somehow.
THANK YOU for traveling these 14 months with me.
Includes unlimited streaming of So Am I
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about
I began writing this song years before Olivia was born and then put it aside. At the time, I worked in the Church. I felt frustrated with the way church-culture seemed to set aside humanity in order to elevate Christianity. To me, that never felt right. I have always felt like God's deepest desire is to *restore* our humanity, not to cover it with something else.
After 30 years in the Church—15 of them part of its leadership—I found myself longing for a more simple and more human exchange. That's how "So Am I" began—as an example of a conversation that, to me, felt more true, more basic, and more human.
I ended up throwing the song out because I didn't want to just write a song about a problem I saw. It didn't feel helpful.
A couple of years later I found myself sitting on the bed in our bedroom, holding Olivia skin-to-skin during a particularly long day of just. sitting.
We couldn't do anything. We just took care of Olivia, kept our other kids alive, and—once in a while for a few minutes—took care of ourselves with a shower or a peaceful coffee. In order to take care of Olivia, we had to let go of everything. So we did. And here I was, sitting all day in bed with my daughter. While I sat, my hopes and dreams about all I would be and accomplish faded away.
I'd always measured my worth by my productivity. Now, I was no longer "productive”. No one saw me. I was no longer on a stage. I was just in this room. Sitting. I felt like I had disappeared. I'd lost all of my usefulness to the world. I just sat.
As I sat there with my daughter—a girl who was deemed "incompatible with life”... a girl who could not hold up her own head or even breath right... a girl who would never do a single "productive" thing—I realized we were the same.
“Incompatible” with life. Yet, very much alive.
Olivia may be the most alive person I have ever known. She did not live the length of time we expect a person to live. She did not accomplish the things we expect a person to accomplish. But she was definitely alive, and the way she lived changed the way I live. She was *all her*—no one else, nothing else... she just *was*. She breathed in. She breathed out. She smiled. She cried. She loved, and she was loved. She was anything but incompatible with life. She embodied it. She was beautifully alive.
And so was I.
*We're still here. We're breathing out. We're breathing in. We're alive. And maybe life is still ahead.*
When Olivia passed away, my wife and I were broken. We could hardly pull ourselves out of bed. I wanted to die. Our daughter was gone and the pain of her loss was too much to carry. The most we could do during those months was to allow ourselves to breathe—not an easy thing to do. But we were breathing. In and out. Even though we were in the worst pain of our lives, we were no less alive than ever before. In fact, we may have been *more* alive than ever before. Looking back, I now can see that we were beautifully alive. And as my wife and I sang these words at concerts, I couldn't believe how true the words had become for us:
*We're still here. We're breathing out. We're breathing in. We're alive. And maybe life is still ahead.*
After more of these concerts, I realized that many of our friends were grieving with us. The concerts became a place for us to share those moments of grief together. And as my wife and I sang these words, I looked up and realized that the original purpose of this song had come to being.
*We're still here. We're breathing out. We're breathing in. We're alive. And maybe life is still ahead.*
lyrics
When it's been far too long and I'm this close to giving up,
When the sun doesn't shine; it's far too gone and so am I.
When it feels all the time like your best is all behind,
You're counting days, you're killing time, you're all but gone, and so am I.
But you're still here, you're breathing out, you're breathing in, you're alive. And maybe life is still ahead; it's there for you and so am I.
We're still here, we're breathing out, we're breathing in, we're alive. And maybe life is still ahead.
credits
from So Am I,
released June 23, 2017
Written, recorded, performed, produced by Nathan Peterson
Mixed by Matt Rausch, Nashville
Mastered by Tom Baker, LA
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