Have you seen my little boy? He's four years and ten months of energy, cuteness, awesome and just enough devilry to remind us that he is not really an angel. If you ever listen to country music and know the song by Alabama: "Close Enough to Perfect"? Well, that's him. He isn't easy, he's a tough kid with a medical challenges that baffle the apparent medical board that oversees his care. He's got a personality that likes to be funny, but sometimes he just wants it his way or the highway...and believe me when we clash...there is Hell to pay! He's tough. He's tough to handle sometimes, he's tough on the inside, and he can be tough to predict. When it comes down to it, it can be tough to keep him healthy, it can be tough to pull him through all the medical stuff he goes through. And it's difficult, because there are times that he is just being a tough kid to deal with because he is a little person with this really strong and stubborn personality; and then there are times when he is just a little kid with tough things going on in his body: pain, over stimulation...things like that - and he can't tell you what is going on, nor can you always tell there is something going on until it is too late. And by too late, I mean the point where the parental frustration level has reached a climax. Your kid that was just fine yesterday, this morning, an hour ago...is suddenly not fine. And by the time you have determined that he is not; in fact, just throwing a tantrum, he is in fact, not well...he is miserably frantic, you are guiltily frantic and there is no middle happy place. If you think that is bad, consider the other: he's ill, been ill, you think he's ill...but no, he's just being a little turkey butt of a four year old kid. You want to give him some leeway here, but then you realize he's just pushing you to push back and get his own way. You realize this too late and yet again he has gotten his way in a place where he should not have.
Raise him like you would your other kids. Right...just have to repeat and repeat and repeat. And then sometimes he feels so bad, the lesson has to wait and we will start over from the beginning when he does feel better because he didn't get the repetition and he forgot. No, there's no burnout here. It's super easy to find the endless supply of patience and understanding necessary to make sure that he gets all these lessons down...again and again.
Actually, No. Patience gets frayed, and the understanding grows quiet as you sit and try to regroup, trying to find the ability to get up and try again, and then again...And it can be really, really tough. But here's the way it goes in my world. There are days that knock me down, I get frustrated and I get left feeling lost. I worry and feel overwhelmed because I worry about his today, his tomorrows, they all boil over in my head. When that happens that typically makes me cry, and that inevitably makes me mad, and when I get that mad...I start researching. I read everything I can, I learn something new...I look for another way to get through the muck. Because underneath it all, I know that I love this little boy, and if there is a way I'm going to find it. It may not happen today or tomorrow, but some tomorrow it will or I will either understand why, or I will find peace with the acceptance of why not. At least this is what I try to convince myself.
But I will always fight for this little boy because the light in his eyes, the love that shines from his soul, it fills you up on the inside until it flows out of you. Every fight, every tear, every thing, just every thing...it's worth it for him.
I may want more than I can get, but we're going to keep pushing for the next step because the possibilities in tomorrow are endless. There is no giving up and there is no quitting, there is just finding a way to keep moving, backwards, forwards, sideways...always moving. No matter how tough.
Meet my son, this is my Bradley, and he brings chaos. He brings trouble and worry, and he brings joy and love. He brings everything you expect a four year old whirlwind to bring with him,,,and most things you wouldn't. He isn't a mistake, he IS. He is part of a Plan, and he bring no Regrets. Becoming his Mom was the third greatest miracle in my life, because I definitely got lucky when he chose me to be his Mom.
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