Life on Hold

I try so hard not to fall into the "whys" and "hows" of our situation. Having a child go from remarkably healthy to... Wherever we are now, is just mind boggling. Stepping back, looking at the enormity if it all, I'll just say that it's not helpful even a little bit. We have learned to focus intensely and live as fully in each moment as we can. Seek strength and wisdom wherever we can find it... And drink ridiculous amounts of coffee! Those first couple weeks of sobbing, screaming, aching to the core are well behind us and, as a dear wise friend said, it seems we have moved into acceptance. Acceptance. There's nothing else but that. Openly welcoming whatever trial we have ahead of us, knowing that we are willing to endure whatever it takes to help Nathan recover, opening our hearts to whatever it is that he is ultimately diagnosed with. But this point of uncertainty, five and a half weeks of unknown, it's getting a little tiring to say the least. I can be open and accepting of nothing right now but this moment of complete medical purgatory while our lives are on hold. A child with a very life threatening yet wholly undiagnosable illness. This sweet little boy who still has that smile and joyful spirit and little twinkle in his eye that, despite all he has been through and all the trials that await him, reminds me to look towards the light and keep hope in my heart and know that this is just a bump in the road. Or maybe a giant pothole. Either way. Temporary. Impermanent. Just like everything else. So I sit tonight drinking my lovely mug of tea pondering the day ahead, a day which may bring answers or possibly just a whole bunch more questions. A day which may bring a re-admission to the hospital to begin a round of intense treatment or just another week or so of waiting at our lovely suite at the Ronald McDonald House. I have to be open to both, I have to let go and trust the path we are on. Never in a million years did I think we'd be on this particular path but here we are. There is nothing else but to breathe, and hope!

"Hope" is the thing with feathers— 
That perches in the soul— 
And sings the tune without the words— 
And never stops—at all— 

And sweetest—in the Gale—is heard— 
And sore must be the storm— 
That could abash the little Bird 
That kept so many warm— 

I've heard it in the chillest land— 
And on the strangest Sea— 
Yet, never, in Extremity, 
It asked a crumb—of Me.

~Emily Dickinson