Mom Prob: I Need a BFF

This is embarrassing to write.

I am a grown up woman who is going to whine about how I don't have a best friend.

It's a true statement though no matter how embarrassing. There is a hole in my life where a best friend should be. I feel it most whenever I am going through some struggles in life or a health crisis with my daughter.

Sure, I have a husband. But, we are usually stressed at the same time when there is a child health issue. He is a great listener, but there is a limit to the whines and concerns he can hear from me without losing his mind. Sometimes, I pick up the phone to call someone who has a female brain, but there's no one I can think of that has the time to listen to me.

That's when a thought pops in my head, "I have no friends."

Me with all my close friends : )

But, that's not accurate. I have numerous FaceBook friends who read about my adventures with my daughter and give likes or crying faces when appropriate or write a comment. This makes me feel connected to many people, but it's not enough.

I have a great mom and a few close family members who call or message me during hard times. I need these people in my life offering prayers, encouragement, and assistance in various forms.

I do have a handful of female friends who check on my family, come to my kids' birthday parties, and possibly have dinner with my family a time or two a year. I consider these girls in my inner circle. They understand my life more than most and love my children. We talk about getting together for some girl time, but we never do. Every mom is busy and has a family to take care of first. But not spending time together without kids present really makes it hard to develop a closer friend relationship.

I even have two female friends I have met with 1-2 times a year in person by ourselves for some well deserved female time without children. Amanda will answer a text from me at 5 am. How great is she? Tricia will respond to my very long messages and doesn't judge me when I say I'm struggling. She gets me, and I need her. These two girls are the people who I can count on in a pinch for prayers or encouragement. I hope I do the same for them too. But I doubt Amanda or Tricia would consider me their best friend. I've never been Tricia's house. I don't even know Amanda's favorite color. That's got to be a BFF requirement, right?

See, I DO have friends. But I don't have a female Best Friend.

Part of this is my fault. I have always been the person who just kept 1 or 2 friends in my inner circle. I was never the girl who spent her weekends with a large group of people. I always felt good about just having a friend or two until that friend was sick or missed school. Then I was alone.

After Jaycee was born, I made more mistakes in acquiring and keeping friends. I isolated myself for the first few years of her life. I missed weddings, baby showers, parties, and special events. Sometimes, I was guarding Jaycee from germs. Sometimes, I was avoiding all the social contact. Try socializing with people and making small talk while your child went through two open heart surgeries and needed intensive care at home. Small talk and complaints about mundane things is exhausting and meaningless when your child has been fighting for their life. Even now, this is still true at times for me.

Still, I have made mistakes. I have closed myself away from people. I have hesitated to reach out to people when I have needed to talk to someone. I haven't talked about the things on my heart because I didn't want to burden anyone. Some of my problems with Jaycee are just too much for some people to handle or at least I think they are. Some of my thoughts are just so unrelated to most people; I keep them inside wishing there was someone to release them to.

Perhaps, one day I'll have a female best friend. We'll have lunch. We'll cry. We'll laugh and have inside jokes. We'll buy each other birthday presents. We'll go Christmas shopping together. We'll have babysitters that can keep our kids. Our plans will never be broken because of a sick child. We'll see each other's homes. We'll know each other's favorite colors. It will be awesome!

Until then, I'll be thankful for my caring and patient husband. I'll treasure my mom, my aunt, and the other family members that are close by my side. I'll be thankful for the friends I do have, even if I wish we had more time to develop closer friendships. I'll be thankful for my kids who give me plenty of reasons to smile, and a God that hears my deepest cries when there's no one to talk to.

Who Was I This Summer Break?

Welcome back!

The summer blog pause is over, and I'm back to writing.

Summer break this year was (pause.....think of an adjective) unique.

Many things happened in the two months I have been away from the blog. Some of these intense events were planned, which is why I took a break. I'm not a writer who typically writes about current events in my life that are serious. I need time to process and emotionally work through them. 

There were times this summer when I sat back and asked, "Who am I?"

Seriously. Who was I?

Well, I seemed to be:

A sweet kiss in the hospital

-A Nurse: Being Jaycee's nurse is not a new role for me. I dose out medications and run her medical equipment daily. However, Jaycee had a fairly big surgery at the end of June to make space in her airway to treat her severe sleep apnea. We were told her recovery could be 3-10 days. It took 25 days for Jaycee to make a full recovery! Twenty-five days is long, by the way, when you are trying to give pain medications several times a day to a child who does not want to take extra medications and counting every ounce the child drinks. Not to mention, Jaycee had 2 different post-surgery bleeds that resulted in 2 additional hospital stays during this 25 day recovery. I'll write more on this subject another day, but my mommy nursing skills were challenged this summer!

-A Travelor: My family took two mini-vacations. We fulfilled my son's dream to visit our state capital (Springfield, IL) and enjoyed a three day history lesson. Well, my son and I enjoyed it. My daughter and husband maybe not as much. Our second little trip was to visit my family in Indiana. Family visits may seem boring, but my extended family is super fun. We had lots of laughs. My son got to see another state capital too, so he was in Heaven! We didn't travel far or have a large budget, but I did get to travel somewhere. I was thankful to be anywhere besides a hospital!

Jaycee at Lincoln's tomb with some assistance with Daddy

-A Mom of a Princess: My sweet little girl participated in a pageant for people with intellectual disabilities for the second time in her life. We loved watching Jaycee perform on stage and getting all dolled up. She absolutely loves it too! (You can read about last year's pageant here.) I like being the mom of a princess, and it's a memory we will treasure! 

Post Pageant picture with the family

-A Mom of another Child with a Diagnosis...AGAIN!: Most of my writings have been regarding my daughter's health issues and diagnoses. My other child, Elijah, has had (what I have always considered) minor issues with his motor skills and muscles. In June, it was confirmed that his issues won't be something that he will outgrow as he was diagnosed with a connective tissue disorder called Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. I'll write more on this subject another time, but I had some emotional issues to work through when I discovered that both of my children had life long diagnoses.

-Someone who Struggled: There were some happy times this summer. But, the hard times were hard. During Jaycee's time in the hospital, I struggled with anger. No really, I wanted to slap a few staff who I didn't feel were treating my daughter properly or professionally. How do you walk into a room and not know what surgery a kid just had? And how does that happen more than once? There were very frustrating moments during Jaycee's longer than expected recovery. It was stressful on my husband and I, and we didn't get a break for three weeks. In a crisis, I have this tendency to want to throw a pity party when things aren't going well. Those parties spiral me down into despair farther, which isn't helpful at all. Anyway, I struggled some this summer. But, now that some time has passed, I am feeling more optimistic and almost back to my normal self.


Well, that was me in a nutshell during my blogging pause. It feels good to be blogging again and back to my normal regular self. I'm ready to share some experiences and thoughts with you every week again.



See you on Thursdays for Therapy Thursday, my weekly tip on a therapy related subject. Tuesdays is my general blogging day on parenting and my life. As always, thanks for reading!

Moms in My Two Parenting Worlds

I live in two different worlds of parenting. The moms in these worlds are similar in some ways, but extremely different in others.

When my first child, Jaycee, was born, I entered the minority world of parenting a child with special and medical needs. With I was around other moms with children without special needs, I felt so different. I was a mom of a baby with Down syndrome and heart and lung issues. Before Jaycee turned 3 years old, my parenting revolved around doctors, therapy appointments, heart surgeries, minor surgeries, figuring out how to get Jaycee to take her daily medications, and isolating my child from germs. The world I was in was my "normal" even though it was quite different.

When I found myself in public situations around a small or large groups of moms, I was lost. My mothering woes weren't even on their radar. While they were conversing about the difficulty of nursing, I was worrying about Jaycee's congestive heart failure worsening. They were discussing potty training methods when Jaycee was just learning to walk. From the beginning, I just felt out of place.

There wasn't much about my mothering experience with Jaycee that was typical especially those first few years. Consequently, I did not feel comfortable in social situations with most other moms. When they discussed the horrors of an ear infection, I kept my mouth shut. When they bragged about their toddler counting, naming colors, or saying some long sentence, what was I to say? My Jaycee struggled in many areas. The normal mommy bragging and discussion of problems made me feel cut off from other mothers. I felt very out of place in social situations and felt more at ease speaking with other mothers who had children with special or medical needs.

When Elijah was born, I was actually outside my comfort zone when I had a typically developing, healthy child. I felt odd in this new world. I had no emergencies with him or a medical crisis to consume my thoughts. I had no surgeries to plan for or doctor's appointments to fill up our calendar. It felt strange.

When other mothers talked about their child, I now felt I could join in on some of the conversations with other new moms. I could now relate to a child with common issues. But, I had a different perspective than most because of Jaycee. I knew a "big" problem from a "little" problem, and I had trouble at times with moms who discussed things that they described as "the worst." Our "worsts" were still far away from each other.

With my children being 10 and 6 years old now, I have met many, many moms in both of these parenting worlds. There are many moms I can't connect with at all, but I have found a few gems.

I am grateful for the moms from each of the worlds who understand me. I am thankful for the mom who doesn't make fun of me for saying I can't have Jaycee out after 8 pm, because she understands Jaycee needs to be on her bi-pap before she falls asleep. I'm thankful for the mom who doesn't make a comment about my parenting when I ask for their help when Jaycee has thrown herself down and is refusing to move. I'm thankful for the mom who takes the time to say, "No, you're not," when I say that I'm fine. I'm thankful for the mom who asks questions (Why does Jaycee have a hard time talking?) instead of offering assumptions (She could probably talk if she wanted to.). When one of my mommy friends checks with me after an appointment with Jaycee, I'm grateful that they cared.

Navigating these two parenting worlds can be difficult. So to those moms who make it a little easier for me: Thank you!