Chop Wood, Carry Water

 

Dear Evan and Lulu,

 

This week you both had your tonsils out. The hospital had figured out a system so the two of you never had to be without a parent except for the 20 minutes you were actually in surgery. You checked in together. You put on your gowns together. Your dad walked one into the surgery room while I stayed with the other. An assembly line of caring nurses and doctors planned and coordinated the tonsilpocolypse of 2014.

It is 3 days post surgery and the same question keeps echoing through my thoughts, rattling between whimpers and whines, and sitting heavy on my chest every few hours when I have to force medicine down your burning throats.

What was I thinking?!

I know what I was thinking. I was thinking about how sick you get, every single winter, and the countless amounts of school/work/ and fun we have to miss out on.

I was thinking about my own long battle with chronic strep, and how nothing stopped it until I got my own tonsils out at age 21.

I was thinking “why go through this twice when we can get it over with in one week?”

But here is what I was not thinking. 

I wasn’t thinking that Mike would be out of town when I scheduled the surgery, and for the 6 nights following it.  Not only that he would be gone, but that he would be in HAWAII while we are trapped in our own house. (My fault, his trip was already planned and I forgot.)

I wasn’t thinking that the two of you would become these crazy, irrational, sobbing messes that have lost all ability to control your emotions. That you would demand I get you water,then you would cry hysterically when the water wasn’t the right temperature. That you would curse every doctor and nurse who did this to you. How you would call all of them, and myself, the stupidest people you ever met. That NOBODY would take the heat more than “whatever horrible people make medicine that tastes like this for children!”  I wasn’t thinking about any of that.

I wasn’t thinking that after sleepless nights I would join you in that state.

I wasn’t thinking what it is like to wake up every 3 hours, night after night, only to fight with you about medicine and then plead with you to go back to sleep. But when I plead with you this is what I say.

“This is one second of your life. One second and it is over with.” 

So I guess I have to trust my own advice and know that this week is only one second of my life, in the big picture.

So here is what I’m going to think from now on. 

I’m going to thank the universe, time and time again, that I don’t have to do this all the time. I know I have no business complaining when this is what some must endure every day, with no end in sight.

I’m going to do everything I can to help out other mamas/dads/grandparents/step folks when it is their time to question “what was I thinking?”

I’m going to trust the past me who made this decision. She had more sleep and showered more often. She probably knew what she was doing.

I’m going to trust the current me who is doing just fine. She has an army of people helping, and she will get through this second just like you will survive (whether you want to or not) your 14 doses of medicine every day.

I’m going to trust the future me, who will look back on this time and laugh at all the horrible and hilarious memories we are forming.

That is what I’m thiking.