The other night I got to rock my baby to sleep. I haven't done that in almost a year. This transition from toddler to super independent toddler has been a strange and frightening one. However, what I experienced two nights ago, was something I feel was completely different. It was total and complete surrender to dependence.
So Noah has been diagnosed with reactive airway disease which for most just means he's asthmatic, just not old enough to be diagnosed with asthma. What this means for Noah in particular is that anytime he gets a cold, nine out of 10 times it turns into croup and/or an asthmatic episode and a trip to the ER. No matter how hard I try to get ahead of it every time, we still somehow wind up in the hospital. And during these visits he is given a double dose of steroid and an hour-long continuous breathing treatment of Albuterol. He's had these before and done quite well in my opinion. But this last time was completely different. About 40 minutes into the breathing treatment his heart rate was higher than normal and Noah freaked out. He started shaking and screaming. So I removed the mask and gave him a couple minutes to try to calm down and lower his heart rate. The nurse came in at this moment and said we would be stopping the treatment and seeing how he did with what he was able to do.
The next day he was on high alert all day due to the obvious amount of Albuterol and steroid. And something strange began to happen. Every now and then out of the blue he would start screaming at the top of his lungs in short bursts. Not a continuous scream, but short staccato bursts. This happened only once before in January, when he was on the same medications but not as long. My intuition is telling me that he must have felt so miserable inside and completely unaware of how to work through these jitters, that he had no other option than to scream. And me holding him must have been too much sensory stimulation to handle. I honestly have no scientific evidence of this, just purely a mom's intuition. So I ignored the screams and tried to hold him. He refused. Every. Time. We skipped nap time that day so that he could have an early bedtime. I bathed him early to get that fight out of the way sooner rather than later. Which I later realized to be one of the smartest decisions I've made yet as a mom. Ha. Well around 7:00 P.M. the screaming and crying began again. So I scooped him up in my arms and held him tight. He tried to push me away but this time I didn't let go. I held him in the cradle position and began to rock him. I sang our old lullaby and just rocked. And rocked. And rocked. He cried for a couple minutes but eventually he began to surrender. There was so much pain and anguish in his eyes, and all I wanted to do was make it go away. I wanted to take all of his pain so that he never had to hurt again. But I couldn't, so I rocked. I watched him as he surrendered to dependence and I'll never forget it. Noah needed me to fight against his fight for independence in that moment and I'm so glad I did.
There's so much of every day that blurs into the next, but it's moments like these that don't. These precious moments stick with me. I have filed it away in the never-forget file within my crazy busy mind for later viewing when I need to remember why it is I do what I do.
The other night I had the opportunity to rock my son to sleep. My 32 lb, full of life, 2 year old. And it's a memory I will treasure forever.
No comments:
Post a Comment