Choir

I don't know if I was totally oblivious before, or if this is something new. Something in the last year only?
It seems as though our church is teeming with new moms and their precious little bundles of joy. 
While my husband joyfully helps with the slides for worship and sermon notes every Sunday, I sit protected in the sound booth, behind the little plexiglass "sneeze guard." I am safe from the hugs of the expectant bellies and the offers to hold newborns. I stand in my box, behind the swinging door, with a forcefield between me and what I desire to be. Finding that I can only become vulnerable through emails to this particular crowd, I can fake my smile and offer a "good morning" and "things are great," without the pressure building too tightly in my chest that screams at me to run out the door and not look back. 
At the end of the service, families are asked to retrieve their little ones from the nursery so that the Sunday School teachers can set up for the incoming crowds that are the next service's population. This is where I fall apart. This is the time where the things around me become more than I can bear. As the worship leader strums the last few chords of the last song, and the pastor reaches the pulpit to give the final convocation, it begins. The voices and instruments slowly fade and a new sound is heard. All around, as if the volume on an intense surround sound system is turned up to the point that it screeches and squeals, the choir performs and resonates all the way to my soul. It always begins with a slight whimper or whine, and then the peers join in with their cries. By the end of the pastor's prayer, there are at least ten babies crying their eyes out as loud as their little lungs can manage, and I sit, clenching my husband's strong hand as tightly as a broken woman can. The cries remind me of what I don't have yet, and my soul cries to the Lord "You are good, God, but why do I have to go through this in a place that I should be able to leave my grief at your feet? Why do you let them cry so loud... And so many?!"
Today was different though. I was not allowed to sit in my little cage to hide behind the shield of the sound booth. My husband was training a new person, and there is just simply not enough room for all of us. 
I sat close by, in the back. I made it through half of the first worship song when an Ergo wielding new mom asked if the seat next to me was taken. As the song faded, and the worship pastor encouraged everyone to "turn around and meet someone" a new sound was heard. Nursing. The sound of a little life bonding with Mom.
Instead of being polite and introducing myself, I ran. I ran right to my husband and said I would be in the car. I grabbed my things without making eye contact with the new mom who knew nothing of her infraction, and I walked as fast as a person who is holding back a full fledged sprint can walk.
So, here I am in the car. Pouring my heart out into a journal entry that I'm pretty sure only two people, other than me, will ever read. My dear husband has text messaged me the verses that the pastor is giving his message on today so that we can discuss them when he arrives at the fort I've built in the car. Doors are locked, and my eyes are ever downcast to avoid seeing anyone we know passing by. 
Sometimes coping skills and tools I've learned to use to guard my heart, are just not enough and I must retreat to solitude with my Lord, to cry and scream and release the choir of my own sadness.