Day +4

Amazingly, I have been holding up pretty well (minus the few days we were in the PICU).  This whole process of BMT and coming to Houston was by God’s leading.  In our lack of knowledge and limited understanding, we weren’t sure what we needed to do.  But by His grace, we knew He was leading us to this decision to be here in Texas.  This leading has kept me together.  KNOWING He is in control lifts a huge burden of worrying too much on my own.  Yet, today, I was weighed down.  Timothy has started losing his hair.  He doesn’t have much to begin with and never had a haircut, but the little that he has is shedding.  I love how Timothy looks just as he is.  It’s really hard to imagine him any other way.  Emotions welled up and my composure went out the window.  Loss of his hair is another physical reminder of my own child’s suffering.  All the other “difficulties”, I can handle… being cooped up in a hospital room/unit, eating the same hospital food, not having friends/family around, even our own family being apart for the time being… those are all bearable.  Seeing Timothy suffer in silent ways, that becomes too much.

Before I was married, having kids never appealed to me.  Even after I got married, I wasn’t sold on expanding our family.  By the way, I haven’t shared this with many people… now, I am broadcasting it on my blog.  The reason behind it was, I knew the gravity of raising a child for God.  I didn’t want to mess my kid up.  I didn’t feel adequate nor mature enough to raise a child (who is made in the image of God).  But my husband wanted kids (3 to be exact, but changed his mind after the first :)).  I wrestled and struggled to find meaning in raising a family.  What changed my attitude was this… if I wanted to grow and love God more as an individual, I wanted and needed to understand God in a more intimate way.  God the Father exists within the realm of a relationship, namely Father/Son relationship.  I wanted to know that kind of a relationship.  The intense love of God the Father towards His Son, the inseparable bond between them, the joy and pain of having this relationship… is the reason God changed my heart.  If I was able, then I wanted to experience it or at least a little bit of it.  It gave me courage to have kids.  Now, He is allowing me to experience a little bit of what it means to see your own child suffer.  It hurts, but it also amazes me of His love for us in allowing His own Son to suffer and die for us.  Thank you, God, for gifting me with things I didn’t ask for in becoming a parent.  Thank you for allowing me to understand a glimpse of what You had to endure.  Thank you for loving me, Timothy and my family.