It’s the last
thing you expect as a parent: your four-year-old child having a real emotional breakdown.
Parents so often go blithely along
in their lives, doing whatever it is they’re doing, thinking their children are
happily going right along with them, without internal pain or struggle. Their
pasted-on smiles and desire-to-please demeanors often mask what’s really going
on behind those arresting, loving eyes.
That’s what happened to us, and I
should have seen it coming. I should at least have been looking for it, since
the same thing happened after Victoria’s death. Manifested in a different way,
with different symptoms, but it was there.
I was so wrapped up in trying to
save my unborn child; and Chris was so wrapped up in being chronically sick and
tired, and focused on work and keeping me tended to, that we missed it. And
Chris kept missing it even when Parker let it all out. Well, maybe Chris did
get it but thought Parker needed some toughening up. Or he thought that since
it was coming from a little kid, it wasn’t that big of a deal. Being a mom, I
didn’t see it that way, though. And being a man who knows what’s like to suffer
through parental indifference and rejection, Chris should have been sensitive
to it, too…
After arriving home and standing in
our vacuous entryway, gaping around for several minutes, Chris suggested that I
lie down. So I headed in the direction of the guest room, where I would
continue to take up residence so I could pump breast milk throughout the night
and not disturb Chris.
Parker followed me, and he had
vastly different ideas about what was going to happen next.
He wanted attention. He needed
attention. He needed to be held, squeezed, kissed, touched—physically loved. Parker had been forced to wait far too long for
the security of my embrace.
Walking into the guest room, he
lifted his arms and begged to be picked up and carried, just before collapsing
into a state of tearful hysteria. Chris stood behind him, shaking his head,
“No,” at me, while waving at me not to do it; mouthing, “You are not yet strong
enough to lift him up,” words.
But I had to. It was so critical and necessary to validate his special
place in our family by holding and touching him, by reaffirming my love,
devotion and commitment to him. It reminded me once again of Jesus, who so
often met people’s physical needs first, by acknowledging, touching, feeding,
healing—before He provided spiritual needs. Jesus recognized not just the power
in His touch, but the power of a touch. My four-year-old was in
desperate need of that wordless, reaffirming, transforming power, that special
tactile language of love.
Scooping him up, I carried him to
the bathroom, sat down on the toilet seat, and held him tightly, caressing his
head and methodically rocking my body back and forth as I encouraged him to let
the tears flow—the tears he had stoically contained for so long, in order to
protect me. He sobbed relentlessly in my firm grip, huge raking sobs laced with
faint tremors, and I strained to hear his barely audible voice divulge his
deepest, previously un-divulged fears. I could feel the stress pour from his
immature body. Whenever I shifted position slightly, he grasped tighter, as
though afraid a relinquishment of his grip would result in my immediate
evaporation from his embrace.
All he understood was that Mommy was
finally home, and that he no longer had to pretend he had everything under
control; that nothing in the world bothered him. He no longer needed to worry
about upsetting me, bouncing me in the bed and hurting me. He desperately
wanted everything to be just as he had known it to be before: that he was still
irreplaceable to his mother, who had concentrated for so very long on another
life besides his.
Life had not been normal for months,
and it never would really return to Parker’s definition of normal. Very soon,
life for him would never again be the same. But for that moment, he needed
assurance that he had his mother back, and he was the most important thing in
the world to her. And at that critical moment, God provided all of the physical
strength and love I needed to give my son everything he could no longer live
without.
____________________________________
NEXT WEEK: My first night home, and I feel like I'm losing God…
____________________________________
Until next week,
Thanks for
joining me!
Blessings,
Andrea
*For those of you who are doing
Advent studies in preparation for Christmas, here is the link to my 2013
Christmas post: "Without the Cross, There is No Christmas." I think you'll find it an interesting addition to your
devotions!
http://brokenheartsredeemed.blogspot.com/2012/12/without-cross-there-is-no-christmas.html
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