Mother's Day Thoughts

Ok, I’m prepared for Mother’s Day for my mom, who I get to be with this year, and for my mother-in-law, whom I’ll also be with. But I’m not prepared for it for myself. What I mean is I’ve been in the trenches and don’t have the time to dedicate a day to myself to do nothing. I’ll need to be in significant catch-up mode on Sunday, but I’ll cut out some time to allow the girls to make me feel extra special. 

Last week, we shared my strawberry shortcake recipe, and I’ll make it Sunday! 

But first, we have my older two’s final middle school dance together. We are hosting all their friends and parents for a little pre-dance light bites and pictures. I am so thankful to be able to do this and enjoy every moment with both of my girls. But that means about 50 people in and out of our house this evening. And we will have an early morning with my youngest's first communion on Saturday morning, which we’re looking forward to! It feels like we just went through this holy sacrament together with my oldest. Speaking of my oldest, she’s put me in a reflective state lately. Not only going to high school, switching to an out-of-zone school, sports tryouts, and ALL the changes. But she sent us into quite a tizzy on Sunday…

We were about five minutes away from leaving her game for an early anniversary trip. Grandpa was planning to bring her home afterward. As I was walking towards my husband, I was watching the game at the same time and saw Maggie go down. My heart stopped… the field conditions were awful, and honestly, we have no excellent fields, which is a crying shame! But she went down, which is super unusual because she is strong as you know what. She quickly jumped up, fell to her knees, and held her arm. I started a full-blown sprint around the field to the bench as I watched the other girls and her coach run over to her, covering their faces in grimaces as the injury was brutally apparent. 

Her coach started waving me over immediately and I quickly exchanged plans with my husband. Get the truck; we need to get to the ER. I had several other angel parents helping me get her to the car while I grabbed her things, and my headspace became extreme Mom mode at that point. I wasn’t thinking about the flight we would miss or anything else, just getting my baby out of pain. I’m in tears as I write this because seeing our children in agony and being so helpless is the worst thing you can feel as a mom. Our children are our babies, no matter how old or big they get. She kept crying out to me, and I just placed my hands on her to pray. Thankfully, we had some Motrin in the car, but that windy drive to the hospital was taking forever. 

Our ER experience could not have gone better. They immediately got her in and eased the pain with modern medicine. It was very clear the orthopedic surgeon would have to reset the bone, and wouldn’t you know, the one on call was the upper extremity specialist. As so many of you have experienced, watching your baby be treated in an emergency situation with all the tubes, IVs, people, and so forth isn’t for the faint of heart. As they administered the IV with Zofran to help her from nausea with all the meds, I made a joke that I might need some of that. I was on the verge of losing my stomach and my mind.

As they got her comfortable and out of pain, we had to sign papers to allow the reset of the bone process. The doctors shared that it should be a pretty straightforward process, but he may have to snap the bones all the way (yes, multiple bones broken) to reset, and if it doesn’t go well, it could end up in surgery. They put her to sleep and asked us to leave the room. I lost it. Crying, scared, calling out to God. My husband is much better in situations like this than I am. He prayed with me and reminded me that it could still be protection even when bad things happen. A broken arm heals much quicker than a knee, leg, back, or hip injury. Maybe, just maybe, this is protection, and one thing is sure: it requires her to have rest and a break. 

We returned about 10 minutes later, and she was all wrapped up and woken back up. The doctor was super proud of how well he aligned the bones back up, and we were on our way to healing. She has a very high pain tolerance so I know every time she cries in pain, it hurts terribly, but all in all, we’ve had a great week, and the follow-up a few days ago indicated that she’s healing well and quickly. 

We also have all the remedies at home for quick body rejuvenation, and she is the most fantastic patient you could ever have. As we work through the healing, I promise to follow up on the therapies we used, the supplements, food, and more. 

I will also share how we remediated all the mediations she had to have for this to be fixed. She was worried about it because she isn’t much of a medication gal, but I kept reminding her that this is what it’s for and that we can reset the body later. I’ll share this process, too, as we’re still in it! 

Thankfully, all of this is on the mend, but what a reminder of what being a mother is. Y’all know we have four daughters, and when you have a lot of kids, the tendency is to be attentive to the one who needs you most, but yesterday, I was reminded by one of the middles that she needs me too and could use some “mom time.” She came about it like a complete psycho, but an hour later, that’s how the conversation ended, so I plan to get one-on-one with each of them somehow this weekend. Both the middles have managed to sleep with me multiple times this week, so it’s always telling when kids want more of Mama!

Being a mom is more than just the reward… the work, the pain, the hardship, the suffering… it makes the reward great. I’m just so thankful this Mother's Day weekend! I hope you feel the same!