Some Mothers Get Babies with Something More.....

Some Mothers Get Babies with Something More.....

by Bridget Ann Bailey on Monday, February 1, 2010 at 6:21pm

SOME MOTHERS GET BABIES WITH SOMETHING MORE… My friend is expecting her first child. People keep asking what she wants. She smiles demurely, shakes her head and gives the answer mothers have given throughout the ages of time. She says it doesn’t matter whether it’s a boy or a girl. She just wants it to have ten fingers and ten toes. Of course, that’s what she says. That’s what mothers have always said. Mothers lie. Truth be told, every mother wants a whole lot more.

Every mother wants a perfectly healthy baby with a round head, rosebud lips, button nose, beautiful eyes and satin skin. Every mother wants a baby so gorgeous that people will pity the Gerber baby for being flat-out ugly. Every mother wants a baby that will roll over, sit up and take those first steps right on schedule. Every mother wants a baby that can see, hear, run, jump and fire neurons by the billions. She wants a kid that can smack the ball out of the park and do toe points that are the envy of the entire ballet class. Call it greed if you want, but we mothers want what we want.

Some mothers get babies with something more. Some mothers get babies with conditions they can’t pronounce, a spine that didn’t fuse, a missing chromosome or a palette that didn’t close. Most of those mothers can remember the time, the place, the shoes they were wearing and the color of the walls in the small, suffocating room where the doctor uttered the words that took their breath away. It felt like recess in the fourth grade when you didn’t see the kick ball coming and it knocked the wind clean out of you. Some mothers leave the hospital with a healthy bundle, then, months, even years later, take him in for a routine visit, or schedule her for a well check, and crash head first into a brick wall as they bear the brunt of devastating news. It can’t be possible! That doesn’t run in our family. Can this really be happening in our lifetime?

I am a woman who watches the Olympics for the sheer thrill of seeing finely sculpted bodies. It’s not a lust thing; it’s a wondrous thing. The athletes appear as specimens without flaw – rippling muscles with nary an ounce of flab or fat, virtual powerhouses of strength with lungs and limbs working in perfect harmony. Then the athlete walks over to a tote bag, rustles through the contents and pulls out an inhaler. As I’ve told my own kids, be it on the way to physical therapy after a third knee surgery, or on a trip home from an echo cardiogram, there’s no such thing as a perfect body. Everybody will bear something at some time or another. Maybe the affliction will be apparent to curious eyes, or maybe it will be unseen, quietly treated with trips to the doctor, medication or surgery.

The health problems our children have experienced have been minimal and manageable, so I watch with keen interest and great admiration the mothers of children with serious disabilities, and wonder how they do it. Frankly, sometimes you mothers scare me. How you lift that child in and out of a wheelchair 20 times a day. How you monitor tests, track medications, regulate diet and serve as the gatekeeper to a hundred specialists yammering in your ear. I wonder how you endure the praise and the platitudes, well-intentioned souls explaining how God is at work when you’ve occasionally questioned if God is on strike.

I even wonder how you endure schmaltzy pieces like this one saluting you, painting you as hero and saint, when you know you’re ordinary. You snap, you bark, you bite. You didn’t volunteer for this. You didn’t jump up and down in the motherhood line yelling, “Choose me, God! Choose me! I’ve got what it takes.”

You’re a woman who doesn’t have time to step back and put things in perspective, so, please, let me do it for you. From where I sit, you’re way ahead of the pack. You’ve developed the strength of a draft horse while holding onto the delicacy of a daffodil. You have a heart that melts like chocolate in a glove box in July, carefully counter-balanced against the stubbornness of an Ozark mule. You can be warm and tender one minute, and when circumstances require intense and aggressive the next. You are the mother, advocate and protector of a child with a disability. You’re a neighbor, a friend, a stranger I pass at the mall. You’re the woman I sit next to at church, my cousin and my sister-in-law. You’re a woman who wanted ten fingers and ten toes, and got something more. You’re a wonder.
author unknown

The reason why I posted this is because it is exactly how I felt when I was lying in the hospital bed, when Courtney came back just after I had given birth to Savannah and, told me that my beautiful daughter has 12 figures and 12 toes, then, again with Xander, every time I watch them take Savannah and Xander away for surgery, at every specialist and therapist appointment, every Sunday when Courtney or I have to walk out of church with a screaming Savannah, every family or friend outing or get together, and every time we go to the park and I watch Savannah playing by herself, and every time Savannah won't look at me.

I know I look like the crazy overprotective mother, who is picky about what her children eat, and runs to hide in a closet or leave somewhere because I just burst into tears and can't stop crying at any given moment.

When people come up to me and say " I don't know how you do that." I just think "so would you if you had to, any mother would , I love my children so I do anything I can for them." I am a women who wanted perfect babies with 10 figures and ten toes. I just got something more. But, I wouldn't trade them in for anything! They teach me every day. I think I love them even more because of it. Sometimes I feel like I've lost the dream that every mother has. I ask myself all the time. Will Savannah grow up and play sports? Will she ever go on a date? Will she ever drive a car?Will she go to college? Will she fall in love and get married? Will she have children? But, If Savannah and Xander weren't this way I wouldn't of have ever seen this other side of life. I wouldn't of met all of these truly amazing people who are now my friends who help me get through this. People who feel just like me and who are going through some of the same things. Because I would still be crying every day if it wasn't for them, because no one else knows, no one else can know. But, with them, I can go on and keep trying a THOUSAND times because it's worth it!

For Chosen Mothers

I found this story on http://printable.tipjunkie.com/for-chosen-mothers/. I was looking for some crafts to do with Savannah and came across this. I just had to post it for all of the wonderful mothers that have children with special needs. It makes you realize how blessed we are to be entrusted with these perfect, very special children, and to remember to also take some time for yourself, because as I have learned over this past year, you can't make it if you don't. If you can't take care of yourself than you can't take care of your precious children.

For Chosen Mothers

I received this poem framed as a gift from a wonderful friend. It effected me in ways I can’t explain. I display it in my bedroom and refer to it on those less than wonderful days. I hope you’ll give it to someone if your life who has the same type of struggles.

For Chosen Mothers

Most women become mothers by accident, some by choice, a few by social pressures, and a couple by habit. This year, nearly 100,000 women will become mothers of a child with special needs. Did you ever wonder how mothers like this are chosen?

Somehow I visualize God hovering over earth selecting His instruments for propagation with great care and deliberation. As he observes, He instructs His angels to make notes in a giant ledger.

“Armstrong, Beth, son. Patron saint, Matthew. Forrest, Marjorie, daughter. Patron saint, Cecelia. Rudledge, Carrie, twins. Patron saint… give her Jude. He’s used to profanity.”

Finally, He passes a name to an angel and smiles, “Give her a child with special needs.”

The angel curious. “Why this one, God? She’s so happy.” “Exactly”, smiles God. “Could I give a child with special needs a mother who does not know laughter? That would be cruel.”

“But has she patience?” asked the angel. “I don’t want her to have too much patience or she will drown in a seal of self-pity and despair. Once the shock and resentment wears off, she’ll handle it.

“I watched her today. She has that feeling of self and independence that is so rare and so necessary in a mother. You see, the child I’m going to give her has his own world She has to make him live in her world and that is not going to be easy.”

“This one is perfect. She has just enough selfishness.” The angels gasps, “Selfishness? Is that a virtue?” God nods. “If she can’t separate herself from the child occasionally, she’ll never survive. Yes, here is a woman whom I will bless with a child less than perfect. She doesn’t realize it yet, but she’s to be envied. She will never take for granted a ‘spoken word’. She will never consider a ‘step’ ordinary. When her child says “Mama’ for the first time she will be present at a miracle and know it! When she describes a tree or sunset to her child, she will see it as few people ever see my creations.

“I will permit her to see clearly the things I see… ignorance, cruelty, prejudice… and allow her to rise above them. She will never be alone. I will be at her side every minute of every day of her life because she is doing my work as surely as she is here by my side.

“And what about her patron saint?” asks the angel, her pen poised in mid-air.

God smiles. “A mirror will suffice.”

Welcome to Holland

Today, the lady from kids on the move came because I am not able to make it to make it to the support groups during the day. She asked me what is one of the hardest things for you with children with special needs. I told her When I'm with my friends and around other mothers, and their children, sometimes even younger than Savannah are doing things like having a small conversation with their mom, telling them how their day at school was, or not having melt down after melt down.It's all of the little things. It brakes my heart. She told me about how parents with children with special needs have to go through the grieving proses, and even though I think I have, then something small like that happens, and I start to cry and fall apart. I wonder if Savannah will ever get there or do those things, or understand. Sometimes I can't help but compare, and then I hate myself for it, because I feel so bad. I love my sweet children so much, no matter what. She left me with this story of another mother with a child with special needs. As I read it I started to cry, because I feel the same way. She put my feelings onto that page.

WELCOME TO HOLLAND

by
Emily Perl Kingsley.

c1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. All rights reserved

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

The Importance of Life, Young Women's Lesson story

“My name’s Cindy. I laugh a lot. I like flowers and dogs and cats, even though Daddy says I love them too hard. And I like to blow out candles on birthday cakes. I’m twenty years old now. I watch Mickey Mouse on TV and other cartoons too. I can tie my shoelaces all by myself. It makes me happy when I hear other people laugh. Then I laugh.

“You know what makes me smile most? When Mama says she called me her little china doll—I was a baby then. I don’t remember much about that but I remember some kids saying, ‘Cindy, Cindy, Cindy, yeah, yeah, yeah,’ and making funny faces, and Mama shooing them away and then holding me against her and crying. I don’t understand it yet.

“I can go real high in the swing, and I like to have a shower bath and let the water run over my head.

“I remember when Daddy worked on the new chapel in the evenings and he took me with him. He was a bishop then. He gave me a little bucket and I’d pick up things. Daddy would put me on his shoulders when we’d go home. That would make me laugh too.

“ ‘Cindy’s helping build the chapel,’ he’d tell Mama and swing me down. ‘It’s Cindy’s chapel too.’

“That made me feel funny inside, and sometimes I’d feel like I was bursting; but try as hard as I could, my words wouldn’t come out right, and Mama would look sad and turn away. I would be sad too because they couldn’t understand what I was saying.

“I’ve been riding on a horse, and I’ve seen a circus. I was afraid of the big elephant. But I wasn’t afraid of the clowns. They fell down and I laughed.

“I remember when a strange man came to our house when the chapel was finished. He was from Salt Lake.

“ ‘He’s an apostle of God,’ Daddy told me. I stood and stared at him and pinched his arm until Mama pulled me away.

“ ‘Don’t bother Brother Kirkham, Cindy,’ she said.

“ ‘It’s all right, Sister Abbott,’ he said. His eyes twinkled and he lifted me onto his lap. He put one hand on my hand.

“ ‘Cindy’s no bother.’ He smiled, and I felt something warm inside of me. ‘Brother and Sister Abbott, this spirit is so special in God’s eyes,’ he went on, ‘that she was sent to earth for her mortal body in such a way that she cannot be tempted by this world. She will return to God as pure as she came. You have been chosen to take care of this special spirit. Try to understand her for she certainly holds hands with God.’

“Mama didn’t cry as much after the apostle went away, and Daddy began to whistle. The children didn’t say, ‘Cindy, Cindy, Cindy, yeah, yeah, yeah’ anymore. They took my hand and said, ‘Come and play with us, Cindy.’

“Once I followed the children to school, but they wouldn’t let me stay in school, so Mama bought me a book with pictures in it. There were pictures of Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery and Brigham Young, and I looked and looked at them while Mama told me stories, and sometimes at night I’d think about the book and try to remember what Mama said.

“In church I’d hear a name and I’d find the picture in my book and pull on Mama’s sleeve.

“ ‘That’s very good, Cindy.’ She would smile.

“I wanted to stand up in testimony meeting and tell everyone I knew the Church was true too, but when I tried to stand up, Mama and Daddy held me down.

“ ‘The children will laugh at you, Cindy,’ they said. I would cry until Mama had to take me out.

“I can ride a bike and go to a school now. I’ve learned to stuff envelopes and I have some money in a bank.

“Every testimony day I tried to stand up, and Mama kept taking me out. One Sunday night after fast meeting, after I had cried all afternoon, Mama said she didn’t know what to do about me; maybe they shouldn’t take me to fast meeting anymore. No one seemed to understand. The turmoil inside me was more than I could stand, and I didn’t know what to do about it, but I knew I had to stand up and bear my testimony. Then all of a sudden there was a light in my room, but I knew Mama had turned out the lights. I got up to see if the moon was shining. I felt so strange; the light around me was warm and I got on my knees and prayed. Then I felt a hand touch mine, soft and warm like the light in my room.

“ ‘Cindy, Cindy, what is it?’ I heard Mama’s voice. She helped me up, and Daddy put his arms around me because I was crying. For a long time Daddy and Mama sat on the bed talking about how they could help me; I wanted to tell them about the light and the hand that touched mine.

“ ‘If Cindy feels that deeply about bearing her testimony,’ Daddy said, ‘then next month she must stand up. We surely can’t deny her the right or privilege to share her testimony with others.’

“I felt calm inside and went to sleep.

“I go on picnics with the school, and we go on big yellow busses. I have friends and we laugh at each other.

“It seemed like a long long time before testimony meeting came around again, and I sat there calm and listened. Then Mama handed me the microphone and smiled. I stood up.

“ ‘I love my Daddy. I love my Mother and I love my brothers and sisters. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.’

“It was just like I’d heard the other children say it. No one laughed. It was quiet for a long time. Mama was crying. Daddy too. Then a man stood up in front.

“ ‘These spirits are special in God’s eyes,’ he said. ‘They are sent to earth for their mortal bodies in such a way they can’t be tempted by this world. Cindy will return to God as pure as she came. We don’t know how deep their emotions run, but we do know these special children hold hands with God.’

“I felt a warm soft hand close over mine. This time it was my daddy’s hand” (Cindy Abbott, as told to Verna W. Holt, “Hold Hands with God,” New Era, Feb. 1973, pp. 48–49).

The Importance of Life

Heavenly Father has a plan for us. I know that he is with us during our trials. We have to look to him. I was planning my young women s lesson for next week (The importance of Life) and came across this video. It touched my heart. What a beautiful person and story. Life is so precious to me. It can so very easily slip away. I should be more positive and enjoy and cherish every moment that I have with my family and loved ones. I am so very blessed and thankful for my beautiful children and how much they have taut me and helped me grow. I am thankful for my loving husband and his understanding, love and support he has for me, and all that he sacrifices for us. I am so thankful for my wonderful family and friends and all of their thoughts and prayers, who are there for me and my family, who care for us. I love you all and words can't say how thankful I am for all of you and thank you for listening to me and giving me comfort, and friendship. This morning I was reading the scriptures and found these verses.
Mosiah 24:13-14
And it came to pass that the voice of the Lord came to them in their afflictions, saying:Lift up your heads and be of good comfort, for I know of the covenant which ye have made unto me; and I will covenant with my people and deliver them out of bondage.
And I will also ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders; that even you cannot feel them upon your backs, even while you are in bondage; and this I will do that ye may stand as witnesses for me hereafter, and that ye may know of a surety that I, the Lord God, do visit my people in their afflictions.
Most of all I am thankful for my Heavenly father and, also Jesus Christ for dying on the cross for me so that I can return to him and be with my loving companion and my children for eternity. We will rejoice with no fears, worries, and no more pain. I look forward to that day. I believe that on the day of the resurrection we will all be judge of our good works. I was also reading in 3 Nephi 17;9 and the words touched me.
And it came to pass that when he had thus spoken, all the multitude, which one accord, did go forth with their sick and their afflicted, and their lame, and with their blind, and with their dumb, and with all them that were afflicted in any manner: and he did heal them every one as they were brought forth unto him.
The answers that I find in the scriptures and the spirit of the Holy Ghost. are also a great confort to me, and get me through each day.

My New Life