Comments on: Working Through It

By: Jerry

Jerry — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 16:13:34 +0000

I find it amazing how resilient very small children are. What tears us up as parents (like the IV experience you describe above) they seem to forget as soon as it is over. But we (parents) hang onto those experiences – sometimes too long, I think. We start to worry about the next time – we think too much. Don’t forget to trust your instincts more – not just the logic. You know more than you realize. And the joys make the hard times easier to take – as long as you don’t dwell on the bad things too long.
You also owe it to yourself, spouse and kids to keep yourself happy too. Everything can’t center around the kids all the time. Even though this might be easy advice to give, I find it hard to live. For example, every now and then Yvette and I get to go out and have a meal alone. We enjoy it immensely, but end up talking about the girls and thinking about them more in our time away. The results are great though, Yvette and I reconnect, miss our kids for a while, and go home to them refreshed and recharged.
I’m really glad Maddie came through this OK – and you did too.

By: jim

jim — Wed, 08 Feb 2006 01:32:08 +0000

Martha:

Thanks for sharing such difficult experiences with all of us. Antonella and I were truly shaken by the news of Maddy, not only from knowing her adorable, happy self, but also from the larger feeling of vulnerability that seeps into your soul when a young child is unwell. I truly understand the elation of parenting, but through your words I am reminded of its accompanying reality of terror. I get the abbreviated bursts of dread every so often, but it has no correlative yet -it just seems an overly vivid imigination dreaming up the worst. I take strength from your ability to examine these emotions as a way of negotiating these feelings rather than pretending to overcome them- these are words to hold on to and draw from for those strange, nebulous parental experiences that lie ahead.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Tue, 07 Feb 2006 23:28:23 +0000

Martha,
I’m not much further along this path of parenting than you, so I don’t have the benefit of Gardner’s experience, nor thankfully has Kate been as sick as Maddy. But I can say that I know exactly that mixture of anxiety and wonder and desire to just spend a few days away from being a parent (I don’t even need to be in Tahiti, though that would be nice). From talking to my parents, I get the sense that part of that anxiety never goes away. What is it C. S. Lewis wrote? “To love is to be vulnerable.” Something like that. Thankfully, from what I can tell, the wonder doesn’t go away either.

I don’t know that I can put it better than Gardner (who can?), but I can say you’re not alone….

By: Gardner

Gardner — Tue, 07 Feb 2006 21:18:17 +0000

In my experience, you will come to terms with these anxieties, but those terms are not ones of comfort. I wish it were otherwise. I remember the moment I was sure, beyond doubt of any kind, that I would die for Ian. I remember the moment I felt exactly that way about Jenny. I remember many sleepless and frightened nights with very sick children (though never to the extent you experienced). I am sure all those anxieties will come crowding back in even greater force once our kids get their drivers’ licenses. I remember my father, a man prone to tears, weeping as he explained to me and my brother than it would kill him to have anything at all happen to us.

Parenthood is the most sublime and terrifying of all vocations, I think.