Someone once formed the words and asked the question:
“Well, you aren’t complaining about everything, right? Because you made your choices. You chose to have three children and live your life, so it’s not like you didn’t know what you were getting into, right?”
My reaction, “Well of course not. We made our choices, we decided to have the family that we have, I’m just talking about the difficulties, not dodging responsibility for my chosen life.”
But.
But now, I’m going to take the time to amend that. There’s an essential set of truths that were missing from my initial reaction to her question. A set of truths she was somewhat aware of, making this question even more surprising. A set of truths that weren’t taken into account. A set of truths that include more than 1 happy surprise, more than 1 loss, and a life-altering, brain-altering set of truths that have forever shaped our futures.
We DID NOT ask for our losses.
We DID NOT ask for our son’s Cerebral Palsy. We did not ask that if CP wasn’t enough that he be also hit with additional challenges. We never uttered the words, much less the thoughts, “Hey, Autism is all abuzz. We sure wish our son had that too.”
Sensory Processing Disorder wasn’t in our vocabulary. ADHD we knew about but never thought we’d experience first hand. Developmental Delays and epilepsy certainly weren’t on our list along with 10 fingers and 10 toes.
So, no. I won’t take responsibility for those items. Those items weren’t on my list. They were beyond my control, beyond our control. I wasn’t given that drop down menu, and no person in their right mind would ask that their child’s life be filled with this.
I love my children. I love my husband. I love our family.
I don’t love Autism. I don’t love CP. I don’t love the desperation of managing the behaviors that even Behaviorists run from, and a team of specialists can’t figure out.
I don’t love seeing my life become an utterly uncontrollable chaos, seeing myself become a mother other that what I thought I would be. I don’t love seeing my husband’s exhaustion from being more of a father than many fathers or because our son didn’t sleep for 5 years and barely sleeps now; or what the sleep deprivation does to our son.
I don’t like having to force medication in his system 3 times a day or the dark, etched circles they enforce on his face. I don’t love seeing the marks that rampant, unpredictable behavior leaves on all of us.
I’ve realized my writing might be ripe with complaint. As some would see it. My words are filled with feeling, sorrow, happiness and thought. My words are filled with a desire for others to know that they aren’t alone in the private corners of their thoughts; for still others to understand why their neighbor seems to uptight, worried, exhausted, lost in thought, overwhelmed, distracted.
I write to have a forum to get it out. To find my own understanding of my life. I write, many times with a sarcastic humor (a delivery I need to work on).
So if I sound like I’m complaining, I’m not. And I am.
(Photo By: Rport)
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So much of our lives is out of our control. We can only control our response to what happens. And who isn’t going to have complaints and concerns and questions about a life that is full of pain and struggle when that pain and struggle is beyond your control? There are some situations that are very difficult to put a positive spin on and yet, Mia, you manage to do that with your honesty, your dedication, and your bravery in sharing your life in your beautiful writings.
Talon~ Therein lies my next post….
Nobody knows what life will hand them. As our family discovered each new diagnosis with Alex, I remember thinking, “When did I sign up for this? How can I possibly get through it?” Children are such a huge emotional risk. No way around that. Sometimes I catch myself wondering why some people seem to have so little adversity in their lives, and others are steeped in it, through no fault of their own.
I met a couple who’s son was born with no left ventricle and the doctor created one from the child’s intestines. I met a mother who was in the process of signing organ donation papers for her three year old daughter, because something went wrong in surgery and she was not expected to live (she did). I witnessed a child in PICU go into cardiac arrest, and the attending physician, while attempting to perform CPR, ruptured the sutures and the boys chest opened up like a down jacket unzipping. And just over Christmas a colleague’s two and a half yr. old boy died in his mothers arms after she and her husband made the painful decision to remove him from life support after he fell backward onto a tiled floor in his highchair.
I think about these people from time to time, as I do you. It helps me put things into perspective. And through meeting them and reading your blog Mia, I’ve discovered that there are a lot of unwitting heroes in this world.
hi mai,
thanks for stopping by! i feel your “words” and “pain.” there were many times i wondered how i could get thru this thing called “cerebral palsy” but somehow after throwing things around the house and a few screaming matches between myself and god i manage to calm down, well what else can we do? lol anyhow stop by anytime!
hugs,
shelley
ps if you are having problems with your meds email me maybe i can help you guys.
I don’t have anything to add but ((Hugs)) to you.
Somebody said that specifically to you?
Michele T.~ It’s can sometimes be a task to lift yourself out of your own sorrow, take a look around and remember that so, so many have things so much worse than you. It’s not a task we take lightly. It’s not a task we refuse to do. We remember this almost every day. The examples you gave, I’m certain, are but a few of the families having struggles that overshadow ours as the Grand Canyon. Thank you so much.
Shelley~ “What else can we do” LOL. That’s what I’m thinking. Thanks!
Secret Mom Thoughts~ Gracias!
Jannie Funster~ THANKS for catching that. Yeah. My thoughts exactly. Nice, right!
Can’t wait to read it, Mia!
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