Perspectives

This post is not for the squeamish.

Two nights ago, I was awakened at 4:23 a.m. to my daughter calling me. Her father had been gone to work for only about a half hour. I bolted out of bed and over to her room, where she asked me very calmly to please clean her bed because she threw up. In fact, she had thrown up "like three times", but hadn't bothered to actually wake up and let me know until the last time. Go ahead, use your imagination. There would be no wiping her down and changing the sheets. EVERYTHING had to come off the bed, and I had to put her in the bathtub so I could scrub the clumps out of her hair. It was HORRIBLE. Fortunately, we both got the giggles so that helped. After two rounds of Herbal Essence organic experiences, the chunks were gone but the odor lingered. I didn't want to torture her any more, so I gave up and decided we would start again in the morning. By this point, I was wide awake, so I got her back into bed with a sleeping bag, and called my husband at work and my mom in Georgia (at times like these you appreciate the time difference). I thought to myself THIS must positively be one of the absolute worst experiences of parenthood. There couldn't possibly be anything more miserable than scrubbing regurgitated chicken chunks out of your kid's hair at ridiculous hours of the morning. I whined and moaned to my mom that it just wasn't fair . . . she had never ONCE done this to her father.

Last night, I got a giant slap of reality and everything was put into perspective. While reading our local newspaper online, I saw an obituary for a 3-year-old little girl. I opened the full text, and it was accompanied by two pictures of a bouncing, vibrant blonde-haired blue-eyed dimpled little angel grinning from ear to ear. Her face didn't match her setting . . . she was sitting in a hospital bed connected to tubes and wires, with a giant scar running up and down her whole little torso. She was born with a congenital heart defect and spent the last 6 months of her life in a hospital bed. But she looked so happy!! She was quite literally bouncing on the bed. She had no idea of her mortality, she was just living in the moment. I sat and cried for this little girl and her family, and I felt teeny-tiny for feeling sorry for myself because I had to clean my own little girl up when I would rather be asleep. I will gladly take care of my baby, and thank God I have the chance to do it. And I will take a lesson from little Madeline and quit worrying about minor inconveniences and what might happen down the road, and I will try my very best to live in the moment.

God bless Madeline and her family.