It's All Gonna Be Okay

Now that we have a nice, long surgery break (fingers and toes crossed) it's time to start looking into therapy for Caroline. We are currently in the middle of the evaluation process. It's a strange thing watching your child be evaluated for therapy. On one hand, you know she needs it but on the other you feel a bit of resentment at the thought of someone judging your child. Hello? She's obviously perfect, but yeah we need help. The thing is I know Caroline is delayed- and with all of her surgeries, hospitalizations, and anomalies, she has good reason to be. I also know that I need help teaching her. The first session didn't go so well, meaning that Caroline screamed at her for the first hour. Eventually, she did warm up to the stranger enough to allow her to sit on her play mat, but not too close. I apologized and said, "she just really doesn't like people." After all, most of the time when she meets someone new it is either a doctor or a nurse. I actually found myself apologizing a lot through out the session. I have this aggravating desire to please people. I really want you to like me. I want you to like my child. I want you to approve of me and my parenting. I want to pass all of your tests. Then the other side of Katie says, "don't you dare judge me or my baby." Isn't my mind a scary place? At the slightest frown or furrowed brow of the therapist, my iron wall of defense is up. I knew the first session would be difficult. I had tried to prepare myself for the worst, but it doesn't ease the worries that creep into your mind or the aches your mama heart feels at the sight of real tears rolling down your baby's cheeks. Thankfully, the next therapy evaluation was a success. Not so much because Caroline "passed" her tests, but rather that she passed Caroline's. Although she started out by clinging onto me for dear life, in no time at all she was sitting by the therapist and reaching for her. I thought I might feel a twinge of sadness at Caroline reaching for a stranger, but I didn't. I felt a little hope begin to rise. Hope that she wouldn't always be afraid of people. Hope that she would develop physically, mentally, and socially.

A little hope is empowering. Hope can grow in dark places if you let it, but the thing I have learned is that for hope to grow, I can't focus on the worries and aches. I can't think of the "what-ifs" I have to focus on the "but-hopefullys." Our doctors always told us with Caroline to "hope for the best but prepare for the worst." We soon learned that was an impossible task. Once you start preparing for the worst, it takes us all the place in your heart for any hope.

My dad is a hope-filled person. He is my biggest champion. Remember my Clairee told me to marry a man like my dad? That's because those kind-hearted, soft-spoken, gentle men make the very best husbands and dads. Ever since I was little, my dad was the one I went to when something was wrong. He'd say "have you been cryin'?" and he would take all the time it took to listen and sort out the problem. Then he would say "it's all gonna be okay." That is my dad's mantra. To this day, when any of us has a problem, big or small, we go to Dad. I still need to hear him say, "it's all gonna be okay." Even in those scariest times when I really didn't know if it would be okay, my dad would say it and I would believe it. I truly believe I got the very best dad, I'm sorry. I know most people feel that way, but I really did get the best.

Our family is dealing with some hard stuff right now. We are numb with sadness. Thursday evening when Josh told me the sad news, I began crying and then Caroline saw me and started crying, too. Although that doesn't sound very positive, her therapist assured me she is ahead developmentally in that aspect. She said the most important things we can teach our children are compassion and empathy. She explained if they aren't learned by age 6, then they are never truly learned. So, there you go, even in the midst of grief, He allows a little light to shine through. Last night, I asked the Father, "how do I know it's all gonna be okay?"

"And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as His adopted children, including the new bodies He has promised us. We were given this hope when we were saved…
Can anything ever separate us from Christ's love? Does it mean He no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ who loved us."
~ Romans 8: 23-24, 35, 37

I know it's all gonna be okay because of this simple truth- Jesus saved me from the very worst. As a Christian, I don't have to prepare for the worst, only wait with eager hope for the very best.