I spent last week with a guest speaker my work brought in to speak at several area schools. My job was basically to chauffeur him from place to place and be sure and pick up his Starbucks coffee each morning. Hey, this is what I spent 5 years in college for! I’m sure my parents are proud.

I listened to the same presentation to teens 12 times in four days and each time I picked up on something different. Thankfully, he was a handsome 6 foot 9 previous basketball player and wasn’t hard to look at. He had a unique story, but in a reality many of us have stories we just don’t know it.

At one part of his talk he spoke about how we all have this banner above our heads that says, “Please put up with me. I’m trying.” The first few times I ignored that part of the presentation, then it kind of sunk in.

Yesterday, was not one of my finest parenting moments. I’m not going to explain what happened, because quite honestly I’m ashamed of my behavior. It was one of those moments I hope doesn’t define me in his eyes. I have a few of those from my father - memories of the way he reacted. It kills my heart to think Ethan would ever believe I parent out of anything but love.

The day before I got some unexpected news regarding my infected ankle and although it doesn’t require surgery (right now), the new plan is for me to carry around a 20 pound wound vac that will be sucking out the bad stuff 24/7 for the next 2-3 weeks. For now I’ll have this tube connected from my ankle to a machine in a bag that I’ll carry around. All I need is more baggage.

I’ll admit I’m overwhelmed and feeling very broken. Physically, emotionally, spiritually, in every sense. I came home late last night from a work event having not eaten all day and preformed my saran wrap ritual. Once I stepped in the shower I broke down. All the stress and worry and guilt just hit me.

I’m most certainly not perfect in any light and I am not the brave person everyone believes I am. Standing in the shower last night I remembered what the banner we all have over our heads. Please put up with me. I’m trying.

I’m trying to be a good mom. I’m trying to keep everyone happy. I’m trying to remember all that my husband does for me and not focus on what he doesn’t do right. I’m trying to keep up with my work. I’m trying to accept help and be thankful that it’s there. I’m trying to be in good spirits and remember that everything happens for a reason. I’m trying to believe that there will be an end to all of this. I’m trying.

But everyone else is trying as well and I need to remember that.

On a lighter note, Props & Pans is giving away some beautiful items from Tomo & Edie. We recently reviewed their new line of Japanese hair accessories and last month their baby kimono. You can head over and see the items for yourself, then choose which you’d like to win!

My son and I were sitting in a CVS parking lot last Friday afternoon waiting on my husband, when I started asking him about his day at school. He responded with his usual ramblings…Garrett did this…Owen did that…we ate pizza for lunch…oh, and we talked about why God takes people from us.

I asked more about the last statement he revealed. Ethan talked about how God decides when it’s time to die and that as people get older it’s just their time to go to Heaven. I agreed with him and then came a question that I was not prepared for.

“Stephanie was young, so why did God want her in Heaven right now?”

It’s hard to know what to tell a 5 year old when it comes to death. I’ve struggled with that immensely. He’s so young and impressionable, that I certainly don’t want to scare him. Afterall, it is my job to protect him.

My earliest memory of death was in second grade when my grandfather passed away. I’m not sure I totally understood it then, but I accepted the fact he was gone from our daily lives. My exposure to loss after that was minimal and in a way naive. I was shielded from grief until I was much older.

Ethan has already been faced with more trauma than any child should be exposed to. After all, he still recites vivid details from the car accident when he wasn’t quite 2 years old. I often forget that the tragic ordeal didn’t just happen to me, because sometimes memories can be more hurtful than injuries. From the backseat he saw more than I did.

Nine months after that accident, we buried my cousin (his God-mother) and my grandmother. He doesn’t talk about their funerals or any specific details, but there are moments when he’ll ask a question or make a statement that leads me to believe he does remember.

I explained as best I could, with tears forming in my eyes, that sometimes people get sick and they get so sick that God can’t even help them get better. So, instead of letting them suffer and be in pain, He brings them to be with Him. And although it’s hard for us because we miss them, we know they are watching over us and we’ll see them again.

Then came something I will never forget. Ever.

“Mom, I’m glad that when that lady hit our car and it spun around and you were hurt so bad, that God didn’t decide you needed to go to Heaven then. I’m sorry you miss Stephanie, but I’m glad we have an angel looking over us. She won’t let you get hurt again.”

I wasn’t even able to respond. There are times when Ethan has such an insightful heart, that I know he will go on to serve this world in a capacity beyond my expectations. (Even if he does pick his nose and eat it.)

You know what’s truly humbling? Yesterday, I showered for the first time in 10 days. To do so, my husband had to wrap my arm (from finger tips to arm pit) in Glad saran wrap. Tape the ends. Wrap the same arm in a Glad trash bag. Tape the ends. And add another trash bag for good measure. Tape the ends.

We repeated the same process on my leg from the knee down. There is nothing quite like being naked with an audience of your son and dog. Privacy around here is minimal on a good day.

Somewhere in the wrapping process of one of my limbs, my husband noted that some people use saran wrap for kinky stuff. Not too funny to someone who’s completely naked and trying to preserve some of her dignity.

He didn’t think it was too kinky that I asked him to shave my armpit later.

As a side note, Props & Pans is giving away a pair of Polliwalks shoes for kids. I reviewed a pair and they are super cute. Go over and leave a quick comment to enter sometime between Tuesday and Saturday!

Thank you for all the well-wishes. I have been very neglectful in my blog reading lately. You’d think a person who spends all day sitting in the same place, with no real work to do and nothing but Project Runway re-runs on would have time.

Truth is I’m still busy. Filling syringes. Even sick people have stuff to take care of.

Thankfully, it turns out I do not have MRSA. That is a blessing in itself, but I do have a rather nasty staph infection that I can’t say, let alone type the name of on here. Nasty enough that they inserted a PICC line (not fun at all), and I will be on IV antibiotics every 8 hours until February 11th. Sound like fun?

As I listened to the home health nurse explain to us last night how to draw up syringes of this medicine and that medicine, I thought about all the medical care really sick people go through. Especially those who have the responsibility of caring for a sick child and all the work that it entails.

I spent one summer during college working at a place called Bradford Woods. They hosted 1-2 week camps all summer for children with various illnesses and disabilities from Riley Children’s Hospital in Indianapolis. For 11 weeks I lived in a cabin that was not air-conditioned and took care of 8 campers at a time who required 24 hour care. I did this with 4-5 other counselors.

They called us counselors, which was really a joke. Our main role was as a nurse. The various camps included a week of children with down syndrome, a week for children with cancer, two weeks of children with cerebral palsy and several two week sessions that included a broad range of diagnosis’s (that included everything from AIDS to spina-bifida to children assessed at a cognitive level of 48 months).

There were very few campers who did not require constant attention, but to see their faces light up when they arrived in “the woods” as they called it, was priceless. Most of them had only known the inside of their own homes and hospital rooms as scenery. To live in an actual cabin and trek through the miles of paved hiking trails, was a dream come true. This was chance to be a regular kid by camping out under the stars.

The amount of physical work that went into this job was unreal and taxing on my own body. If only for a mere 7 days, I knew what it was like to be their caregiver on a 24 hour basis and it was hard - physically, emotionally, mentally, even spiritually. One of the areas they did not touch upon during our 3 week training was how affected you would be by these children.

I found myself falling into love with each of them, but in-particular there would be one in each session that just stole my heart. You wanted to make them all better and fix their problems, but the issues were well beyond my control. Learning that took most of the summer.

If anything the experience made me appreciate my own health. I was offered a chance to return the following summer to work there, but as much as my heart grew during the previous summer, it also ached. Instead I choose to follow other interests and I always wished I’d given those children one more summer of my time. Now more than ever, as I sit here trying not to wallow in the physical abilities I don’t have, I wished I’d chosen differently. Because my limits are temporary and theirs were for a lifetime.

Some people make resolutions for the new year, but I’ve never been good at making promises to myself. This year our family has made some goals to move on with our lives.

Our biggest goal is to sell our home and buy a larger one. In some ways I am sad to move because this was our first house and we’ve created a lot of memories in this small brick space.

It was in our small outdated kitchen that I told Nate we were having a baby. It was in our living room that Ethan took his first steps and in our backyard that we’ve celebrated many of his birthdays. It was from this front porch that we’ve watched many storms roll in and out. It was this front yard that held a welcome home sign from the neighbors when I came home from the hospital. It was this sliding glass door that my mother came through to tell me we’d lost my grandmother and cousin. It was in this home where my husband and I learned exactly what love and sacrifice entail.

But as much as I love this house, it doesn’t love me back in the same way. Our laundry is in the basement and I don’t do stairs very well with an ankle that doesn’t bend quite as it should. I’ve fallen a few times, once resulting in an ER visit and subsequently a surgery on my elbow a year ago.

My biggest reason for wanting to move is a noise. (No, it’s not the old lady next door who runs her leaf blower every single time we have people over to grill out.)

We live about 2 blocks from one of the hospitals I frequent. Each day you can hear a helicopter coming in and out, hovering above our home. Maybe I’m more sensitive to the sound, but it brings feelings and emotions to a boil on certain days. All from the sound of the blades.

There were very few things that I remembered from the car accident, and the vivid memories I did have seem to intensify times ten. One distinct memory I recall is listening to the helicopter land in the field near me at the scene. I knew it was for me.

While my life hung in the unknown, my body was stuck in a vehicle. My mind traveled while I listened intently, wondering if what I was hearing would be the last sound. Turns out the last sound I remembered was of the helicopter taking off and ironically I hear that same noise every single day.

Every time I hear that same sound from the comfort of my safe home, it brings up a world of emotions that even three years later I am not fully equipped to handle.

It is just a daily reminder of where I once was, trapped in a car waiting to be airlifted to a place where my life would be examined by medical professionals, who probably never stopped to listen to the sound of a helicopter’s blades cutting through the air.