Good Morning

Everybody who has been through something, anything, has that moment that is forever etched, the life changer. For me that is December 9, 2009. Bernie would say December 8, but for me it was the 9th. It was waking up with that sense of dread and for the shortest second reeling to remember what I was trying to forget. And then it hit me, my little girl was dying inside of me. Yesterday I saw her. There was a space between the bridge or her nose and her skin. It was filled with fluid. I could see it. There was a space between her heart and the wall of her chest. More fluid. Her brain, they just weren't sure. They threw out words and conditions. This looks like Trisomy 18 or maybe twin-twin transfusion. And then I was partly educated on a these words and conditions and none of them were good. None of them made any sense to the doctors so certainly not to me. It was all happening so fast and they couldn't tell us what or why and there was this little girl dying and these other precious babies, so blissfully unaware, were not. What does this mean for all of them? How am I ever going to get out of bed? When I woke up on December 8th, everything was perfect and full of hope and joy. December 9th was different.

We have had more moments like this, the life changers, packed into these last 3 years. They told us we would have to choose, between these babies. They told us they would come too early. They showed us her brain. They diagnosed her seizures. At times it feels like it will never end, that we will forever jump from crisis to crisis. Surgeries loom and illnesses are always threatening. Mya is the only child I have ever known who can choke on an empty stomach and she does it regularly. We live on an alert that has become normal. I have had more days when I didn't want to get out of bed, and there were times when I didn't. I don't think I was chosen, like God has this giant list of U-turns to hand out to His people. Like, see that one over there, I'm going to shake it up a bit for her. I don't think He does that because He would not do this to a child. Instead I think He helps us through it. He helped us get to today and He will help us through tomorrow, whatever it brings. Our lives have been touched in so many ways that they never would have been if we had been allowed to go straight.

The other night my maniacs were yelling. They were playing a game and streaking through the playroom being airplanes. When they flew by their sister she turned her head and she yelled too. I got out my phone and tried to convince them the repeat the act so that I could catch her squeal on video, but those little stinkers wanted to see themselves in the camera. So I can't share it here, but trust me when I say it was awesome. I get to wake up to this every day and it's something I never would have thought to ask for.