Who Knew...

Who knew I'd find happy after being so sad for so long.

Who knew I'd want to stay in a state that for years I wanted to leave, I've found peace here.

Who knew that I'd find my way, find me, and have the power to act.

Who knew that I'd day dream again, find hope, be hungry for things again.

Who knew I'd become strong, find a voice, and fly.

As though being a mom is not hard enough, throw in having a child with any type of special needs.  Now I know today, everything constitutes a “special need” but 11, almost 12, years ago it was pretty cut and dry.

 

My oldest was born with numerous heart defects.  We’re not talking one hole, but 4…and narrowing of arteries from her heart and her lungs.  We found all this out when she was three months old.  Imagine it please.  Or actually, don’t.  It was the hardest thing I’d ever dealt with at the age of 24.

I was left in a holding pattern.  Told to watch for signs of heart failure.  Told that they wouldn’t know for certain if surgery was in our future.  It’s a humbling thing to be in a waiting room of a children’s hospital, that’s for certain.

 

The time between visits to her cardiologist were some of the longest periods of my life.  I was exhausted to my core, feeling so unbelievably helpless I could barely function.  My life revolved around my precious tiny girl, my girl who never asked for her health issues, who laughed and smiled and was happy.  I held her tiny little self in my arms and listened to a geneticist tell me that she’d never amount to anything, that she’d probably never function normally.  I remember looking down at her precious innocent face and just not understanding how he could know that already.  How could he sit there and tell me things that haven’t been written yet?

I took her home that day, feeling completely alone and confused. 

I spent the next week researching and learning all that I could, and then one morning I looked over and saw her smiling at me.  That was it for me. That was the moment it all clicked into place.

I shut the computer off, picked up my perfect baby girl and never looked back.

Sure, every single day presents a new set of challenges, but we deal with them together looking dead at them in the eyes instead of sticking our heads in the sand.  Yes, you mourn the loss of what you think of as “normal”….but if you’re lucky you can learn to appreciate the normal that is, not what isn’t.

 

Gravity

Life is funny.  You hear over and over again that you're only as good as the company that you keep.  I finally, after all these years, fully understand that.   

The people that are around me, the few that I let into my life and open the doors to my soul for, they are the ones that when I become a flighty silly air filled balloon, pull me back down to solid ground.  Sure, sometimes they deflate me and that's okay because there are those times they see my need to float and they let me.....holding firmly to my string to pull me back down again.

They are my own personal form of gravity, rooting me in place....reminding me of what's truly important in life.   I lost that once, and I never want to again.  

Hi, Nice to See You Again....

I took a road trip recently that literally changed me, or, brought me back...I'm not sure which.

It was a 6 hour one way drive...longest I had taken since before I was married...and I was driving.

My music?  Soundtrack from the movie Elizabethtown.  So with my girls, good music and my thoughts that I had been ignoring we got on the road.

In those 6 hours I allowed myself to hear my thoughts, really hear them.  The thoughts that I never wanted to admit I had.  I listened to myself finally and by the time I pulled into the driveway I knew...hadn't fully admitted to myself, but knew.

I spent days enjoying great company, watching my girls smile, realizing that I was also smiling...by the time we left I was there.  Wounds that I thought would never heal, are.  Happiness that I never thought I would feel again, I do.  My girls notice.  Maddi said that she missed my smiles and Alli has told me over and over again that she's glad that I'm back, and that I'm happy.

People keep asking me if I've met someone, and I have.  

I've met me again.