Happy Thanksgiving!!! There is so much to be thankful for this year…..some things I didn’t even know to be thankful for a year ago. Last Thanksgiving, Peyton was 4 weeks old, keeping us up at night and I was recovering from a C-section. I thought life was tough…..HAHAHAHA….little did I know!!! This past year has had ups, downs, heart aches, heart breaks, fun times, hard times, sad times, happy times but thru all of it I have learned that no matter what life throws at you, that you really can survive it. You can pick yourself up, PRAY, dust yourself off, PRAY, put on your big girl panties, PRAY some more and move forward. You can look around you and realize that there are so many blessings out there and you just have to find them. Some days, you have to delve deep into your soul, but you will find a blessing and something to be thankful for.
I have learned to do the next thing. Back when this all started, and we were home between hospital stays, I wasn’t functioning well and wasn’t coping well. I wasn’t getting any sleep and at one point all I could do was sit and stare into space. I remember my wise mama (who stayed with us for so much of those beginning days) saying to me…”Heather, you need to do the next thing, whether it’s brushing your teeth or putting a fork in the dishwasher, just do the next thing” So, I did the next thing and kept doing the next thing and that was my mantra many times over the next few months…..just do the next thing. Sometimes, it was as simple as putting something in the laundry basket or emptying the dishwasher, but doing the next thing helped me….helped me realize in all the chaos and uncertainty and fear that I was still me, Ed was still Ed, the kids were still the kids and Peyton was our very special blessing. God entrusted her care to our family and our job is to love her, care for her, teach her, fight for her and be thankful that she is in our lives. No one ever expects things like this to happen, but when it happens, you find out real quick what you’re made of and sometimes you don’t like what you find, but you learn so much from an experience like this, that you learn to forgive yourself for your failures and you strive to be a better person, a more humble person, and a more thankful person.
I guess after all my ramblings that I should update you on sweet Peyton. She is still having more good days than bad. She had her first illness (besides the seizures) since birth. She caught a tummy virus that went thru our house like a tornado!!! She handled it probably better than the rest of us and never even ran a fever with it like the rest of us. I have been so scared that when she did get sick for the first time that the seizures would just go crazy and we would end up back in the hospital, but it was a very non-eventful illness and she is feeling lots better. Still trying to hold her sweet head up and spending more time in her stander and kid cart. She seems to be doing more with her hands and will attempt to reach and grasp things, but can’t quite make her hands do what she wants them to. She is more responsive to our voices than we have seen, especially Ed’s voice. If Ed has been gone for a while and he comes in the room and she hears his voice, her little head turns and she isn’t happy till he’s come over to play with her for a minute. She is most definitely a Daddy’s girl.
I hope everyone has a wonderful day tomorrow, full of good food, good family, good friends and the ability to recognize all the blessings in our lives.
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