exposed

it all started the day she ate three earth worms.  that was the day that i knew i needed to write out my life. to speak the things that felt like they were killing me slowly. to stop just feeling like i was always living with my underwear showing and actually admit that it is. that is what life with zoe often feels like. exposed.

i used to go to overnight summer camp.  there was a girl's camp and a boy's camp and we ate our meals together in the common dinning hall. every night after dinner, there was a time, a most dreaded and feared time, when the head counselors distributed the various items they'd found in the bath house to be claimed by their rightful owners . it started with goggles and swim caps and it always ended with underwear. they would hold up someones abandoned panties and that poor person was supposed to fetch them- right there in front of everyone. and because it was camp, and everything was labelled, if you didn't get them, they would read the name attached to the underwear.  i don't know which was worse, everyone seeing your underpants? or knowing that you were walking around with out any on.

i was a shy kid and this was my idea of a nightmare. so even though i was always sure to check the bath house and my pants before leaving the swimming area, i was sure that somehow, my underwear would magically end up back there and i'd be called out after dinner. it never happened, but for 30 nights straight, i had a knot in my stomach between finishing my pudding and walking to the cabin. i didn't want to be exposed. vulnerable. laughed at.

going through life with someone 'special', exposes all the vulnerability everyone feels but is so good at hiding. zoe says and does exactly and whatever she is feeling or thinking, no matter where we are. and that makes people very uncomfortable- except for a few who find it refreshing that pure honesty still exists. zoe lets out the hurt, the frustration, the fear, the anxiety, the side-splitting humor that all of our days are made of, without filtering it.  it's just raw. so i spend a lot of time trying and failing to help her work out the stuff that the rest of us not so special people, do on our own and keep to ourselves.  her internal battles are loud and intrusive and external and hard to deal with. she doesn't just wear her heart on her sleeve, she wears her brain on her sleeve.

for 5 years, i have written here about our life- exposed. about what it feels like to have the challenges of living with and parenting someone with a differently-abled brain. about the pain of it, the humor in it, and the lessons learned - which are mostly me seeing my own brokenness and being so thankful for the Grace of God.

i was in the car the other day with the kids, and i turned around to ask if everyone was being gentle with the inchworm that bryn had found.

that is when i had a moment. 

"i ate it mom." zoe said.

zoe who is now almost 16.

"i hope it was good." that was my response.

and that was when i had my moment.  i remembered the earthworm incident. i remembered the bewilderment and the despair that ensued- the feeling of oh dear God, what is next?

but instead of having that mind numbing feeling of complete bafflement, of who does that? and why would you? and what does this mean for the rest of my/ our life? i could finally see that it just is what it is. only.

and that is what, in a lot of ways, life with your underwear showing becomes. it just is what it is. as it is. no matter what. we are all weird and fascinating, odd and amazing, we live small moments and very large ones. we share breathing and waking and hurting and longing- making surprisingly bad choices and astonishingly good ones too. we share fear and joy, loss and growth, regretted memories and cherished times. 

maybe the exposure is the gift. it strips off the layers we hide behind. it lets us see life and people differently. the truth of us. broken and held. band-aided together and trying.