I think a lot about Joshua. About his situation, about his surgeries, about his life, about his development, and about my emotions and their variations in potential situations.
Every morning, Oceana wakes me up around 6:30 and we get up for her breakfast and my cup of coffee. My mum gets up around the same time, and inevitably we start talking. More often than not our conversation heads toward Joshua and a variation of the paragraph above. Sometimes my opinions change on a dime. Sometimes I have principles that will never change. Sometimes I am angry, others I am understanding.
Some thoughts:
What if Joshua is disabled the rest of his life?
What if I can never have a 2-sided conversation with him?
What if he's blind, and never sees me?
What if I can't bre*stfeed him, and give him the same special time I gave to Oceana?
What if I make him these special blankets and never get to see him in his bed,
at home, wrapped up in them?
What if we have to plan a funeral?
What is the best scenario?
What is the worst scenario?
Could he be part of the 30% of miracle cases that have no mental defect?
What if he's part of the 70%?
What if he has more problems we haven't seen?
Will we ever be able to serve in missions the way we want?
Will we have to stay close to children's hospital with expert surgeons?
Joshua is my son.
He has been given to us, entrusted to us by God. It is not our right, nor responsibility to choose if and when he dies. We have no idea what will happen.
This is not my fault.
But, I didn't take folic acid and I was run-down when I got pregnant and I was still nursing during his most important, formative weeks.
Would this still have happened if I had taken folic acid?
How could sometimes like this happen to him? It's a 1 in 16,666 chance that my son has a posterior encephalocele.
Why am I the mum whose son has to be a one in thousands chance?
Do me a favor and don't leave "cut and dried" answers please. These don't help.
Your prayers do.
But your 'la-de-dahs' don't.
Every morning, Oceana wakes me up around 6:30 and we get up for her breakfast and my cup of coffee. My mum gets up around the same time, and inevitably we start talking. More often than not our conversation heads toward Joshua and a variation of the paragraph above. Sometimes my opinions change on a dime. Sometimes I have principles that will never change. Sometimes I am angry, others I am understanding.
Some thoughts:
What if Joshua is disabled the rest of his life?
What if I can never have a 2-sided conversation with him?
What if he's blind, and never sees me?
What if I can't bre*stfeed him, and give him the same special time I gave to Oceana?
What if I make him these special blankets and never get to see him in his bed,
at home, wrapped up in them?
What if we have to plan a funeral?
What is the best scenario?
What is the worst scenario?
Could he be part of the 30% of miracle cases that have no mental defect?
What if he's part of the 70%?
What if he has more problems we haven't seen?
Will we ever be able to serve in missions the way we want?
Will we have to stay close to children's hospital with expert surgeons?
Joshua is my son.
He has been given to us, entrusted to us by God. It is not our right, nor responsibility to choose if and when he dies. We have no idea what will happen.
This is not my fault.
But, I didn't take folic acid and I was run-down when I got pregnant and I was still nursing during his most important, formative weeks.
Would this still have happened if I had taken folic acid?
How could sometimes like this happen to him? It's a 1 in 16,666 chance that my son has a posterior encephalocele.
Why am I the mum whose son has to be a one in thousands chance?
Do me a favor and don't leave "cut and dried" answers please. These don't help.
Your prayers do.
But your 'la-de-dahs' don't.
Glad you are being honest. I appreciate honesty. People need to hear it. You’ll make it no matter what the answers to these questions end up being. Thinking of you often and praying every time I do.
ReplyDeleteTarah
Thank you, Tarah. Appreciate your comment.
ReplyDelete