Cool Kids' cute sayings

Yes, now is the time for another entry in the Cool Kids' cute sayings.

Sunday, we fled to Bruce's mom's house while we were having some work done on our house. We stayed for a couple of days. While we were there, Jonah and I had this conversation.

Jonah: "What was Daddy doing in God's bathtub?"

Me: "What?"

Jonah: "What was Daddy doing in God's bathtub?"

Me: "Well, I am not sure." (I racked my brain trying to figure out what he was meaning. Finally, it hit me.)

Me: "That is called the baptismal pool (I couldn't think of baptistry at the time for some reason) and Daddy uses it to baptize people."

Then, Jonah proceeded to talk about someone whom Bruce had baptized. I was perplexed at first because, unfortunately, Bruce hasn't baptized anyone in a while. I mentioned it to Bruce and he said Sunday after church that Jonah was looking in the baptistry which is right behind the pulpit in our church.)

Breaking News!

In this week of breaking news after breaking news, I stop from our crazy busy life to share ours.

Cara did her own "big poke" (finger stick) this morning! What a difference a few weeks makes. The first week or so of this journey, we would hear things like: "I hate you," "Daddy (Mama) take her (him) away," "You're not my mommy (daddy)," "You hurt me," etc. Well, you get the picture. Now, she was a big girl this morning and said she wanted to poke her own finger. It took her a couple of minutes, but she did it. Tomorrow night, Bruce is own his own with her and Jonah. Adriana and I are headed to an overnight Girl Scout camping experience.

In other Cool kids breaking news, Adriana has not sucked her thumb in almost a week. The dentist had a talk with her last week, and I think it is setting in. Yeah, Adriana.

Birthday celebration, finally

We finally had an opportunity to celebrate Bruce's birthday last weekend.

On the day of his birthday, I was going to bake him a cheesecake, but I forgot how long those took to make. Then, Cara and I decided we would pick one up after her doctor's appointment. Needless to say, that didn't happen.

This past weekend I made him a sugar free chocolate pudding pie and that was what we ended up using to celebrate.

New normal once again.



Maybe we will be okay after all.

Perception is worse than the reality

Those were the words of the pediatric endocrinologist (try saying that five times fast). He said that was often times the case with dealing with diabetes.

You know, people who need to put a sock in it well-intentioned people say so many dumb things that make you want to roll your eyes can scare you or you spend endless hours googling and find the worst case scenarios out there.

What we are finding so far is grace from God that we will get through this. And, somehow we will all be better for it. Even with the stress and the pain. Somehow we will be better. God will shine.

Just today, Cara showed how she is rising to the challenge. Cara, Adriana and Jonah walked up town with my brother. In one shop, the owner offered them candy. Cara told her, "I can't have that. I have diabetes." My brother reports that lead to a conversation between the owner and Cara about their shared disease.

God has put many people like that in our paths this last week. Like the guy working at the Wal-Mart down the road from her doctor's office. Somehow we mentioned where we live, which is about two hours from there. I told him we had to go to the doctor and why. He said, "Oh, you'll be fine. I have diabetes, too, and when I am not working here, I am a fire fighter."

I said a silent prayer right then thanking God for putting him in our path and have kept saying those prayers ever since for the others he has lead our way.

Bruce said even her dietitian said she had been praying for us over the weekend.

Of course, she also said that she had never had a parent take pictures the first visit. That was, until she met me. She said Cara will probably have a full PowerPoint presentation by the time she graduates from high school.

Not a bad idea.

Before and after

One week ago today, we were spun into a new world with a diagnosis that has changed our lives forever. Before we received that diagnosis, we were celebrating Bruce's birthday and enjoying celebrating him.

Later, we were in a hospital playroom trying to make sense of everything that the doctor was telling us. I will never forget it because the playroom was full of windows and rain was starting to come down as the sun was shining. I concentrated on that while the doctor was talking to us. I am not quite sure, but I knew I would remember the rain with the sun.

Here are some pictures of that day.


Glad we took care of this before the girls went to school.


Daddy with his three.


Cara played with blocks after all the trauma.



This was the second attempt at a picture that Adriana took while we were waiting for the doctor. Daddy was too upset in the other one. I have a sticker on my shirt that the lady who drew Cara's blood gave me. I think we all deserved stickers after that one. Wonder if the lady still has the bruise on her leg that I think Cara put there.

Tonight, I am ticked

Tonight, I am ticked. I would like to use a more appropriate word that was used by MckMama in her blog post here, but since I am supposed to be setting an example with my words, I will not even though I really, really want to use it.

I am ticked and everyone is catching it. I am sorry that I can't keep trying to see the positive in all of this. I know others have it worse. I know a million parents out there wish they only had diabetes to face. I realize that, but I am still ticked.

As MckMama said in her post, I am not ticked at God or Cara, and I don't want to be ticked at Bruce or our other children. Unfortunately, they all caught it tonight. I have to say I blew it as a parent and a wife. (Mama, be glad you were not around or called.)

Tomorrow, I will be fine and ready to deal with this again, but tonight I am ticked.

As Bruce said, I want to wake up and find out this has all been a bad dream.

I don't want to have to poke my child's finger five times a day and inject her twice, sometimes more, times a day.

I don't want to have to think about her insulin as we travel in the heat this summer.

I don't want to have to worry if she puts one piece of anything that has sugar in her mouth.

I don't want my other children to act out because they are not getting the attention they deserve.

I don't want to hear my daughter say over and over again, "Mama, it hurts."

I don't want her to have to ask me, "Why did I get diabetes?"

I don't want for Bruce and I to be under stress that causes us to snap at each other. (Although I am the one doing most of the snapping.)

I don't want to resent other parents whose children are relatively healthy.

I don't want to be questioning God, asking him has not having had one special needs child enough.

I don't want to crack under pressure like I can sometimes.

I don't want to be wondering why my child, why any child has to be afflicted with this.

I want to go back to my charmed life where all we were worried about this summer was being too busy that the children don't get enough rest before school starts back.

I want to be able to sit on my new deck and just ponder my life with my husband at night while the children are asleep instead of me out here ticked while he is inside making sure Cara is not having an insulin reaction.

I want to be able to go the grocery store and only have to worry about two special diets instead of three.

I want to cook my daughter her beloved macaroni and cheese without worrying that I am putting poison in her body.

In a nutshell, tonight I am ticked. Hang around, tomorrow I will be better, I promise, but tonight I am ticked.

Obviously, she doesn't read my blog

Cara obviously does not read my blog. It's not that she can't, because for a five year old she reads rather well, thankyouverymuch. I guess she chooses not to at this point.

This is how I know. Tonight at dinner she stopped Bruce and I both in our tracks with this question.

"But I'm healthy, why did I get diabetes?"

In all our explaining to everyone else and all the running around of the last week, we had not taken a moment to explain to herwhy she has diabetes.

Now, try explaining that to a five year old.