warning- bad moments still exist

oh dear.

there was a very bad moment near bedtime.  bad.  bad like i could have won an oscar for my performance in a lifetime movie about the struggling parent of a special child. bad like even after i'd walked around the block to calm down, i still did the crazy- angry-turned-to-weeping thing, in front of her.  just plain bad.  i will spare you the gory details, but it left me spinney headed and grappling.  

i went to the hopeless place first.  the "i really can't **%&^$^ believe this is my life".  it's like that movie 'groundhog day', stuck in repeat.  it's never ever, really, going to get any better. little things yes, but really, it never will.  i'm way out of my league.  i don't know how to frame this.  we go forward, we jump backwards.  gain ground, lose ground.  it's never ending.  i feel the lines on my face deepen.

i went to the angry place, OK, i'd already been there with her, but i went back.  angry at her for being so challenged sometimes, causing me to feel so sorry for her, so worried for her future, for my future.  these words actually came from my mouth, " why can't you be normal!!!"  angry at myself for letting all that ugly out and into her ears.  angry at God- because i've had enough- really.

and i went to the pity place.  poor poor me.  poor zoe. poor mike.  poor boys.  what a lot we've all been dealt.  nobody understands how hard this is.  nobody gets it. it will never get any better.

then to the place of fear.  what does all this mean? what if things really don't ever get better- what if things keep getting worse?  what if she fully decompensates in Africa?   will life ever feel normal?  when will this not be so hard?

i tried to go to my happy place- escaping-  imaging being on a plane- being far away, somewhere warm- being alone.

then i went to the 'try to be rational' place.  you got off the 'normal' path long ago- don't keep trying to get back on- your life, her life will never be this typical path you expected. there are people who "get" her, people who have degree's in this sort of thing- call them.

i went to the bargaining place. what would i trade in for her to be less challenged?  definitely money and things- i'd give it all up.  what about one of my limbs?  maybe.  as if i could- as if this mental exercise does any good at all.  it's generated out of all the other places- out of hopelessness, desperation, pity, grappling.

then i stumbled and fell down at the cross. then i remembered what i wrote just two days ago.  what i said to zoe last week when she asked my 'why?  why is she like this?'   i said that she is perfectly made.  that she is exactly who God wants her to be. 

so i told myself that this life, with her in it, in all it's struggle and frustration, and joys and humor, is exactly the life i am supposed to live.  it is messy and broken but it's divinely orchestrated. i can't do what God wants me to do, without being shaped by this, by her.

just then a message popped up on facebook from someone who'd read 'the question' post, someone who's sister has downs syndrome.  it was a story about her sister asking her mother 'the question' and her mother giving a very similar answer- but more.  her mother reminding her of what she does have- legs to walk and arms to wave and a voice to speak and eyes to see.  and her sister began to dance saying 'i'm so happy i have these things- i'm thanking God that i have them!'

so i finally landed in the arms of a God who can handle my fragmented pieces.  who can handle all our brokenness.  who did make her just right.  who put us together in this family- for a reason. who will not abandon, whose Grace is sufficient.