Looking up!

I'm so happy that Paige is feeling better. Perhaps she will try school for a bit tomorrow, although she will most likely wait until Monday to go back.

Its not always easy being the navigator of this ship that sometimes takes us through rough waters. Especially with Paige's very limited verbal skills, I don't often know when she is feeling sick. She has an incredibly high level of pain tolerance, and does not indicate to me that she is not well until she is really not well.

I think I, and probably every mother of a child who is medically fragile, find myself in a constant battle with my instincts. Am I overreacting? Am I taking her symptoms too seriously? Am I worried about her having something really bad when its probably just a cold or a stomach bug?

Or conversely, am I trying to brush it off, hoping she will perk up in a day or two, and we can avoid a long wait at urgent care, or another needle prick, or yet another unpleasant procedure performed on my child who is already feeling miserable.

I don't want to be an alarmist. But I do find myself googling symptoms when she is sick. Could this be "it?" The inevitable shoe dropping that silently hides in the back of my mind - a constant reminder of just how incredibly lucky we are to have this little girl in our lives, how lucky we are that she has received such great medical care, and that she is working hard to thrive.

And...I don't want to be the mother that the doctor looks at in disbelief, that I didn't recognize how sick she was, that I hadn't been in a week before, trying to help her get better.

On top of that, is that maternal ache that every mother feels when her child is sick. I would take 10 times the sickness, 10 times the level of pain, in order to spare her a single moment of it. I fret and wonder, how long has she been feeling unwell? With her cast coming off, we expected some discomfort, and indeed, she has been grumpy and moody for a month now, something very uncharacteristic of Paige. Has she been sick this whole time?

When Paige was younger, I was actually more overprotective of Dakotah, because I always had this sinking feeling that I was going to be so in tune to Paige's medical needs, so on top of them, that I would miss something big in Dakotah, and she would become the child who's life we were begging God to save.

I tell Dakotah all the time that I'm learning to parent her just as she is learning to grow and become independent - that there is no manual, and that we must do the best we can do at this job called life. Each day brings new lessons, new worries, and new joys, and thankfully, most days the joys are so great that the worries and necessary lessons become just a small part of who we are.

I thank God that He has bestowed me with the gifts of my children - constant reminders to never take anything for granted, and to fall to my knees daily and thank Him for the splendor of what He has given me.