Bittersweet Sacrifice

Have you ever knowingly done something for the benefit for someone else, knowing it would have a negative effect on your life?  I can honestly say I have now.

This past Winter, my family went though a large rough patch (I am sure you remember) and we were helped out in many different ways, by many different people.  We were shown such an abundance of support, that I decided that when we got back on our feet (which we now have), I would pay all of the help we received forward.

So over the last few weeks, I have been slowly trying to spread the love in whichever area needs in most.  Fundraising, advocacy, a helping hand, moral support... I have been trying to basically stay on top of things happening in my community, and just help out in whatever way I can.

Let me tell you, it has been feeling great.

One of the things I have been helping out in, hit close to home, and I found myself in the midst of a hard decision.  I needed to delve in much deeper then I had initially thought I was going to have to, and the outcome could be detrimental.  If I were not to step in, the person I was helping would ultimately suffer.  If I were to step in, a major part of my childrens lives could suffer.

I pondered on not knowing what to do for weeks.  I had to weed through all of the ups and downs I was feeling, and I finally reached the conclusion that the right thing to do would be to step in to try and help out with the task at hand.

I was nervous as I began my pursuits.  I knew that the only sort of personal satisfaction I would feel, would be the knowledge that help would no longer be needed.

It took many conversations with many different people to finally get things lined up and to get every duck in it's semi-perfect row, but there was still one last conversation to have.

I knew that this was the one that could change everything.  I feared it wouldn't, but I know it could.

I made that contact and it took one sentence for the world to crash around me.  It was a beautiful sentence, and I will never regret saying it, because I will never regret speaking the truth.

But with the sentence that was spoke, I knew the day had come that my children lost yet another "fan" since the day they were diagnosed with Special Needs.

What I said was not negative in any way towards my children, but rather described what many do not see when they look at them.

Between you and I, my children are the Sun and the Moon, the Heavens and the Earth.  There is no greater blessing I could have been given, then my precious children.

My decision means I will have to work even harder to make them feel more secure.  I will have to be MORE and do MORE, and I am frankly OK with that.  I am OK with being the hyper, over achieving, smothering parent I need to be in order to make them feel completely and utterly loved.

What cements my utter OK-ness, you ask?

Knowing that there will come a day when they will hopefully be proud of the sort of parent they have, and will want to follow in my footsteps.  Hoping they see that in the conditional sort of situation I was in, I chose the path where good was laid out generously instead of selfishly accepting something that was never truly ours.

I hope my story helps guide you if you are ever in a "rock and a hard place" situation such as this.  In my opinion, swallow the rock and help the other person out of the hard place.  You may ultimately have a rock in your gut, but at least you know you didn't leave someone behind to suffer alone.

Love,
Rachel

Lucky

Tonight I was given the sweetest gift by my husband.

A four hour nap.

Kidding aside, I feel like a million bucks right now!  It is not often that I get that much uninterrupted sleep, and I am extremely grateful for the nap.  I actually feel like I am firing with all of my pistons tonight, and it has been a while since I could say that.

After I finished Cote's "nigh nigh" bottle tonight, I rocked her for a while before brushing her teeth and laying her down.  I finger combed her hair that has grown so long and rubbed her sweet baby skin.  She smiled up at me with her rosebud mouth and exotic shaped eyes.  She has now learned how to actually cling onto me for a hug and I am on cloud 9.

She hugs me constantly now.

I started thinking about all of the stories and pictures that have been on my Facebook friends newsfeeds over the last couple of months.  Little girls Cote's age in dance, having birthday parties, figure skating and a plethora of other exciting things.  I love seeing the pictures and I feel pride for all kiddo's learning, growing and experiencing.  I love being around my friends children and I honestly enjoy the antics of all kids and babies.

As I rocked Cote though, and I looked down at her sweet innocent features, it really hit me how absolutely lucky I am.  As my friends children grow and become more independent,  I have been given the gift of children who love me unconditionally.  Of children with love so pure that they do not discriminate against a persons age, race, sex, cognitve or physical ability or occupation.  They will never base their love on what a person can give them... nor will they shun someone because of their social status.

For a long time I have sat back and been upset when my children have not been invited to playdates or birthday parties.  I have cried in private over the fact that my children have basically one shared friend.  I have cried as I have wished for a way to help them fit in with their peers.  I have literally made myself ill worrying about their futures and how they will be treated.

I looked into Cote's eyes tonight and my faith in the future was renewed.

At this point in her and her brothers tiny lives, they don't care about much else outside of me and playing.  They all love me so deeply that it is almost smothering.  I am so absolutely smothered in my childrens love... that is something that not everyone is given the gift of.  It is something that I sometimes take for granted, and it is sometimes left in the dust in our pursuit of meeting goals.  Cote is now following me with her eyes as I clean, both Bo and Cote can say a mumbled "mama" and Bo and Gage follow me around like my pockets are stuffed with candy.  They all love to sleep with me and cuddle and all three of them love shopping days and excursions with Mommy.

Bo and Cote may not ever get to be in skating, dance, sports or any other sort of traditional exciting activity, but I know in my heart that they are ahead of the pack in terms of love.  Gage may not be the very best at sports, but you will not find another kid out there having more fun or being more social than him.

They will find their way in life, and I know that in time more and more people will see what I see.  Until then, I will continue to pour myself into giving them the best life I possibly can.  It is an honor and I am both proud as well as lucky to have been given three amazing kiddo's who actually think I am cool.

Anywho I better call it a night for now.  Bo is starting to fuss, so I have a feeling another round of rocking is in the cards for tonight.  Twist my arm.

Goodnight and lots of love,
Rachel

Hello, Hello Again....

I know, I know.  It truly has been forever since I sat here and poured all of my hysteria into a blog entry.  To be honest, these last few months have been mojo drainers.  My motivation drives me to make it to the next day and little else.

The kids have caught what I am guessing to be every single strain of the flu.  We have spent quite a bit of time at home recuperating, and basically counting down the days until Spring.  

Bo is eating like a rockstar and has been trying a lot of new textures.  One of the major hits has been Pop-tarts as well as pureed Mac and Cheese, Goober and fruit!  He is doing a lot of climbing and standing, but still no walking.

Cote can drink from a juice box!!!  She can actually drink the juice right out of that tiny little straw as long as I hold the juice box itself!  She also has a pretty adorable demeanor lately and has actually been being loving to me.  She is doing farther distances with her army crawling and can officially say "No".

Gage is doing really well with Homeschooling and is now able to distinguish quite a few sight words, do light reading, add and subtract.  He has come leaps and bounds since this past Fall and I couldn't be more pleased.

On a downer note, Gage's Sensory Processing Disorder has taken a bit of a dangerous curve.  It has pushed me to a new place in terms of stress, and is thus the main reason I have been much less outgoing.

Around Christmas time this year, Gage's sleep schedule declined severely.  He started going to bed about 10:00pm and waking daily about 1:00-2:00am every day, full of intense energy.  We were struggling to keep him off of the video games and TV and he was gravitating towards things that would wind him up such as riling up the dog, running at cars when they would come up our driveway, the tv, radio and video games, throwing balls against the walls...ect.  It probably seems strange to read it and try and comprehend what the problem with this would be... imagine the Tazmanian Devil from the Looney Tunes.  Enough said.

Well, over the course of a few weeks, things got progressively worse.  Then one night a couple of weeks ago, one of my worst nightmares came true.  

We had had a tough day, and it was one of those nasty nights that was like a million degrees below zero.  I finally got all of the naughtiness put to sleep at about 12:00am, and I drug my old bones up to bed.  Gage was passed out hard in his bed and I skulked over to my room.  I turned on my box fan for some white noise and layed down with high hopes of passing out hard.

I laid there for about an hour and a half before I finally decided to just give up and go lay downstairs on the couch.  I was freezing my tush off and was fantasizing about curling around a heat vent.  Before I went back downstairs I stopped to check in on Gage.  He was not in his bed.  I was instantly livid as I had visions of him sitting on the couch watching Power Rangers.  I stomped down the stairs and got into battle mode.  I turned the corner and found....

Gage NOT on the couch.  OK... so I started looking around.  Not in the bathroom.  Not in the dining room. Not in the kitchen.  Not in the entry.  So, I headed back upstairs.  Not in his room... not in mine.  

I ran back down the stairs and began searching frantically....

Not in Bo's crib, not under the crib.  Not in the tub.  Not under the table.  Not in the basement.  Not behind the dryer.

I ran back up the stairs....  not in Cote's crib... not under her crib.  Not in the closet.  

He was no where.  I ran down the stairs in a hysteria.  I grabbed the phone.  My mind went to places that have been the roots of many nightmares.  Child Abduction.  1:30am.  Who would I call.  I was spinning in the kitchen when I noticed the front door.  It was cracked just slightly.  I threw on my coat and boots and ran outside.  I ran around the yard screaming his name.  It was so black out and so severely cold that it felt like my lungs were bleeding.  Max stood up from his sleepy slumber and looked at me like I had lost my mind.  It was then that I saw a flash of white down the gravel road.  I took off running and about a half a mile down the road was Gage walking....

in absolutely nothing but his little Pull-Up.

No shoes.  No clothes.  Nothing.  I knew then that one of my nasty fears had ultimately come true.  My child was in the middle of a Night Terror in the middle of Winter.  I ran to him, and threw all 67 pounds of him over my shoulder and literally ran all the way back to the house.  I couldn't cry and I couldn't breathe.  All I could do is run and say silent prayers to every Religious icon I had ever heard of.  We got to the house and I ran to the living room to wrap him up in as many blankets as I could find.  He was still asleep... in the midst of his Night Terror... and all I could to is curl myself around him.  

After a little while I carefully dressed my son, picked him up like when he was a wee babe, and carried him up to his bed.  I took every blanket I could find and made him a cozy nest.  I laid with him for a bit, but then reached a breaking point and knew I needed to get downstairs.

I made it to the kitchen, fell to my knees and absolutely lost it.  The thoughts were pounding  into my brain from every direction...

What if I would have toughed it out and stayed upstairs instead of coming downstairs?  What if I would have not checked on him?  He would have died out there.  He would have frozen to death or would have literally been eaten by something.  I wouldn't have known anything was amiss until the alarm clock went off.  He was out there basically naked and probably wouldn't have lasted more than a couple of hours tops.

I then proceeded to run to the bathroom and toss every single cookie.

I sat awake in the recliner that entire night standing guard.  His Night Terror lasted until about 5:00am and he came down twice more and had to be carried back to bed.

The next morning, we put a new doorknob on the door equipped with a lock that Gage can't turn.  We have a door alarm on order, and will be putting up a major fence and gating our driveway much sooner than we anticipated.

We made some enormous changes in our "day to day" as well.  The TV has been taken out of Gage's room.  Video games are only allowed on the weekend IF his week has gone without major hiccups and we are keeping the activity a little more slower paced.

Gage's struggles are still in full force.  These days he will not sleep alone.  He has decided that the idea of barber shears is basically equal to death.  He is falling quite a bit again.  

We will make it through though, because we always do.  

As for me... it will take a long time to recover.  It was honestly the worst experience of my life, which could have taken an Earth shattering turn.  I am trying to hold on to that last scrap of me that is care-free and patient but it is quickly diminishing.  I am angry and I am hurt that life keeps handing me balls of catastrophes to try and figure out.  I am angry that my stress load never lets up.

At this point... I am just trying to survive and keep the kiddo's afloat.  I know now that I need to seriously work on our support team.  I recently had an email meeting with the kids Pediatrician and he gave me some of the best advice I have gotten in a long time...

"Families with a Special Needs child thrive with the help of their families and friends.  They need their entire Community to show them kindness and support.  You have this need three times over, and therefore need to surround yourself with only the best people life has to offer.  You have lived a life of trauma for over 7 years.  It's time to go looking for people who will support you guys, and help carry the stress load".

So via Facebook about a week ago I basically asked if there were people out there that wanted to be a part of our extended family...  I am reaching out to you all.  I need help and I need support, and my kiddos need love and friends.  If you think this is something your backbone can take... throw me a line and I will take the hook graciously.