The Million Dollar Question

Part of human nature is to second-guess ourselves.  We spend a great deal of time wondering "what-if."  We look back with the knowledge of today on decisions made when we were less informed and berate ourselves for the choices we made or opportunitites missed.  I thought about this a lot this week while I was at the hospital with Jellybean.

This time last week, I was barrelling down the freeway, headed for Detroit to take Jellybean to the ER.  He had been lethargic all day and started to have difficulty breathing.  During the wee hours of the morning, they admitted him and, ultimately, determined he had bronchiolitis.  He was placed on oxygen while they assessed him.  His cough got worse, and he began vomiting worse than usual.  With the vomiting came dehydration, so they hooked him up to an IV to make sure he had enough fluid to keep his shunt working.  

Over the course of the next four days, Phil and I both caught a horrendous stomach virus.  FYI:  Juggling one healthy child is hard enough when you are sick--two, one of whom is in the hospital, presents more challenges.  Trying to pump and get milk to Jellybean when I was queasy, dehydrated, and not allowed to visit in case I was contagious--that was a whole new level of difficulty I didn't need to know about.  Fun times!  Ultimately, he got released once he was off oxygen and holding feeds down.  Of course, since his first feed home, he's been vomiting again.  We can't seem get enough food in him to keep up his calorie count, but at least we get enough in to keep him hydrated.  I have struggled this weekend with whether to take him back, but I worry he is more likely to catch something else at the hospital, so I am erring on the side of keeping him at home.

Of course, this week is Holy Week.  Having entered what is arguably the busiest week in the church calendar, finding time for all the doctor visits we already had scheduled, plus those we missed last week that need to be rescheduled, and new ones to check up on how he's doing, is not easy.  I totally understand how parents end up quitting work.  Taking care of special needs children is a full-time job.  And that's been frustrating for me.  I worked hard to become a lawyer, and I would like to use the degree I'm still paying for.  But more than that, I LOVE my job and my coworkers.  Even if, financially, I could give it up, I don't want to.  And so I struggle to do it all.  My house isn't as clean as I would like.  We eat way too much junk food, which is catching up to me (but that's a story for another time).  My life is one big ball of chaos.

So, as I sat in the hospital, holding a restless infant who was hooked up to dozens of wires in one hand, I surfed the internet with the other.  I don't remember where I saw it, or who wrote it, but I read a blog post written by a parent who was asked by a friend if having children was worth it.  It reminded me of back when we were first discussing whether we wanted children--long before we knew about the infertility, the CHDs, or anything else.  Back when we weren't sure if we even wanted run-of-the-mill "regular" kids.  I closed my eyes and asked myself the million-dollar question:  If I could do it all again, knowing what I know now, would I?

The joy of watching my children grow; watching them learn; feeling that first hug; hearing that first "I love you, mommy."  Experiencing all of those beautiful moments, knowing the joy and strength they give me, my heart says "of course I would."  But, at the same time, if I am being honest, I can tell you that, if I had been told at the outset that I would have two children who needed open-heart surgery, I would have opted for a child-free life.  I would not have known that I had it in me to survive this stuff.  I would never have believed it of myself.  But, making the decision with the knowledge I have now would require me to balance those disparate things--the joy and amazement with the extreme difficulties--and I have no idea, even with hindsight, how I would have weighed those experiences against each other and what decision I would have reached.

What I do know is that I love my children with all my heart, and I will be the best mother I can to them, for however long I get to have them.  And, I am grateful that we don't get to know everything before making big decisions because I might have decided not to have kids, and I would have missed out on some amazing moments.  What I learned from the million-dollar question was not whether children were the right decision.  I learned that a life worth living is a life with risk.  Without risk, there is no challenge to overcome, and, without challenge, there is no growth.  I don't like it.  As a risk-averse person, I will probably always struggle with it.  It doesn't make it any less true.  I will try to remember it, the next time I "wish I had known..."