Saturday (Oct 6) was Riley’s 7 year anniversary
of his diagnosis. In years past, I would
anticipate the day. I would worry about
how I would handle it and the emotions it brought up. This year I didn’t do that. I am learning to live one day at a time. Each day has enough worry of its own. There is no need to borrow worry from other
days. So, I really gave no other thought
to it other than it was the day of his diagnosis and that we would need to plan
how to acknowledge it like we do every year.
This year Riley had two baseball games that day, making it hard to go
out and “celebrate” like we usually do.
The day started off fine.
But as the day progressed my emotions began to get the best of me. All of a sudden a flash of a memory from that
day 7 years ago would pop into my head.
A flash of crumpling into my husband’s arms and sobbing while my oldest
son cried quietly in the corner. A flash
of the look on the doctor’s face as he gave us the news. A flash of that tiny little hand with that
big old IV sticking out of it. A
remembrance of crawling into the hospital bed that night and waking up next to
him in the morning with fresh tears on my face because it hadn’t been a dream as
I had hoped. Try as I might to push
those thoughts out of my mind they would pop up without notice. It was strange, really. I hadn’t expected to have so much emotion.
I was sitting in the bleachers waiting for Riley’s ballgame
to start and it hit me. I was reading
something on my phone and, out of nowhere, the tears began to sting my
eyes. I sat and blinked them back. Then, I headed to my car so I could compose
myself. I sat in my car and prayed a
prayer of thankfulness. Thankful that
Riley is happy and he is healthy. 7
years ago I never would have dreamed of how full his life would be. He is a great kid with a great attitude. He plays 3 different sports (and plays them
very well, thank you). He’s not been
readmitted to the hospital since diagnosis.
He’s never gone into DKA. He’s
never had a low severe enough to warrant glucagon or to cause a seizure. Health-wise he has been blessed beyond
measure.
But, it’s not just about the health. I’ve wrote about this before. The health stuff, the needles, the carb
counting, all of the stuff that most people think is the big stuff is really
the little stuff. The big stuff is the
emotions, the feeling of being different from all of his peers. The frustration of not being able to
participate in sleep overs (yet). The frustration
of being tethered to a pump 24/7/365. The
emotions of being hungry and not being able to eat because his sugar is too
high.
Riley is blessed beyond measure in that aspect too. Yes, he has times when he yells about
diabetes. He has days when he gets
frustrated by consistent highs or lows.
He has his moments. But, through
it all, he’s got his head on straight. He
has the right perspective about all of it.
About 3 months ago Riley and I were just finishing up
devotion before bed. He was sitting in
the bed next to me, little head propped up on pillows. I looked at him and said, “You know I would
take diabetes away from you if I could.
If I could take it away from you and give it to myself I would.
“I know, Mom.” There
was about a 30 second pause as he stared at his hands. “But, I wouldn’t give it to you.”
“Why wouldn’t you give it to me?” I thought he was going to say because he’s
used to it and he wouldn’t want me to have to learn to live with it. I wasn’t prepared for the wisdom that he was
getting ready to impart.
“Because it is mine. Maybe
God gave me diabetes for a reason. Maybe
it’s a blessing. You don’t know. I want to keep it. “
What has taken me more than 30 years to learn my little man
has learned in 10. What many would see
as a curse, he sees as a blessing.
So, as I sat in my car at the ballgame praying prayers of
thankfulness for Riley’s health I also prayed prayers of thankfulness for the
lessons he’s learned and the strong, beautiful, brave, and wise little boy he
has become.
Diabetes does not define him but it has helped shape who he
is. And, I’m proud of who he is. Would he be that same strong, beautiful,
brave, and wise little boy if diabetes had never touched his life? I don’t know.
And, I’ll never know. My guess is
that even though he would be awesome without diabetes, he’s even more awesome
with it.
