Waves

The past 9 years have felt like waves crashing over us. I love the ocean and just about every metaphor that it stands for.... waves of peace, washing things away and making anew, the beauty of it. Still, even in the quiet peace that comes with the ocean, the crashing and often violent waves remind us of its power, its dominance and how nothing in the ocean stays settled for long.
I have wrestled in my mind over how to share what I (sometimes we) have been through in the past 9 years. It seems a daunting task to share it and I don't want to come off negative or depressing. Still, the fact is that we have been through some, um, ish ("ish" = shit, horrible things, things I don't have time for!)and if I weren't to share it, I would not be as candid as I want this blog to be. The biggest reason for sharing these difficult times with you is because each one as shaped me in a way and it is important to know where I am coming from. So, I have made a compromise and will dedicate this one blog to a run down of the waves that have crashed in around me.
Once the twins were born, I knew something was wrong with them. They stayed only a week in the hospital for being jaundiced and then came home. I voiced to the pediatrician that I thought they were vomiting way too much and that they seemed to have chest congestion and trouble breathing at times. For 6 weeks the doctor told me the girls had a cold. I should have listened to my mommy-instinct, but I went with his word, which to me was gold. Finally, at 6 weeks, my mama-bear came out and I insisted for further help for the girls. They were seen by a GI doctor and hospitalized right away. The girls were found to have horrible oxygen levels and the worst reflux that hospital had ever seen. We stayed for 19 days and the girls were sent home on 13 medications each, apnea monitors and oxygen (they had aspirated so many times that they had developed chronic pneumonia and lung disease). It was overwhelming. At 4 months old, they both had surgery for reflux on the same day, by the same surgeon. Kaitlin (though she was hospitalized multiple times in the year that followed for kidney reflux and febrile seizures and has mild asthma now) has been healthy since. Elizabeth, as you know, has not.
When the girls were 5 months old, Walter became sick. He was always tired, coughing up blood and had horrible stomach issues. I was irritated, thinking that he was just tired from having newborns and the stress that we'd been dealing with. I quickly lost compassion and wished for him to get control of mind over matter. A month later, we found the cause.... our home had toxic mold. I think this was around the time I started using the phrase "Are you freaking kidding me?!" We moved out of the house for what we thought would be a week, while the mold was treated..... and we never went back. Literally. We left with a week's worth of clothing and supplies and we never were allowed to step foot back in the house. The mold was caused by a slow leak and was found to be in every wall of the house. That home was our first together and we'd spent only a year in it, but we'd invested so much time and money into it. All of the clothing and stuffed animals and blankets and linens and even some furniture could not be saved. We lost it all. It literally makes my stomach churn to even hear someone speak of mold.
We got through it, though and kept going; kept wading through what had become a very chaotic life, as we were still dealing with Elizabeth's health and faced her second surgery. I could go on and on about her health and the surgeries that followed, but I won't now. And I could share about the waves that have crashed in around our marriage, but I will save that for another day.
There are always going to be waves. I have come to expect that they will just happen, but I also recognize that in my life the waves always end up bringing to me the thing I love most about the ocean... an overwhelming sense of peace.

*** The photos:
*I can still hear the kids' shrieks as they stood in a circle and watched the water cover their feet...waiting for sand crabs to come to the surface and scurry away.
*The second photo, of Elizabeth at about age 3, is one of my favorite. In fact, I have it hanging in my bedroom. You can see how far up on the shore she was, yet she ran from the waves even on the safety of the sand. Those giggles; the delight in her face... mmmm, you can feel it.
*And I chose another photo of Liz to share because in this picture, taken at our beach house just months ago, she is in the middle of the ocean, arms spread wide, inviting the waves to crash all around her. Talk about a metaphor... my Liz, once so afraid, now beckons the waves to crash at her feet. Nothing will sweep her away.