Brave boy

Today I received a sad email from my youngest son’s school. It was sent out to let parents know that a former student had passed away from a rare auto immune disease and that the school would be honoring this child next week.

I asked my son about the student when he arrived home from school…as the name sounded familiar. He replied that was his friend…and I could see the wheels in his mind starting to work. He started asking me questions..about what he died from, when did he die, what happened. I replied as honestly as I could…and told him that he could certainly ask his principle or his school counselor any more questions tomorrow.

This isn’t the first time we have discussed death. My son has told me, in casual conversation, about the infants that would die back in the orphanage in Africa…how they would get sick and just die. He said he saw a lot of dead babies and kids. I’m quite certain this is true. It’s only some of the tragic memories he has of his early years there.

Just now we watched a contestant on “America’s Got Talent” sing a song, dedicated to his son that he lost to pediatric cancer. My son turned to me and started asking more questions about his friend that just passed away. Clearly, he is still mulling this over….clearly this is still bothering him. He is sitting on the couch, his proud, stoic face watching the television…but inside I know he is really thinking about his friend.

I am so grateful that my son has empathy and compassion…especially given his early years. I am sad that he is sad…but happy that he is capable of feeling this emotion…as odd as that may sound.

I am grateful he is healthy. I am grateful he is my son.

I am grateful.

They say I have a few issues….

I suppose I should start by saying hi. So, hi. Or, hey, if you’re like me and from the midwest. I’m living here in Michigan, the Great Lakes State. Cherry Capitol of the world. We like to say we don’t have an accent, but we do. Mine comes out more when I’m mad, and it’s different than the dialect here in the Detroit area.  But I digress. I do that a lot. Anyway, I’m 47 years old, and I am the mother of 4 children. Two girls and two boys. I would fight a bear for my kids but there are days….there are days I could just get into my car and just drive away…anywhere…just for a day…just to clear my head…for a minute of clarity….I never would, or I would have done it by now. A million and one times by now. My oldest daughter is a 25. She is a teacher and lives out of state. My 17 year old son is autistic. And not in the Rainman savant, so it’s really not that bad kind of way. He is autistic in the if he gets angry he can break some shit sort of way. I will write more on these two later. There is so much more to them. My autistic son is also my most affectionate child, so there’s that. I also have two more children that I adopted from Africa. Because, why wouldn’t I add more to my plate? My daughter is 17 and my son is 10. They were 14 and 10 when we were finally able to bring them home. Oh, yeah, did I mention I was going through treatment for breast cancer when we had to travel to get the children from Sierra Leone? Yeah, that was cool…or that I’m a registered nurse? With PTSD from an interesting childhood and life events? Or that I have some depression on occasion….no kidding… Yeah….so….I figure, I can only see my therapist once a week…and writing makes me feel better. I’ve got some shit to say. I’ve seen some things. I’ve learned a few lessons. I’m still learning them. So, I’m pulling up the laptop and tapping out some stuff here. Most of it should be funny, because I have a fairly disturbed, darkly twisted sense of humor. That happens when you’re raised by wolves in a small town. I have learned to see the humor in nearly every instance, as a means of survival. So, if you spin a little differently than the average bear; if you have a child with special needs; if you have a multi racial family; adoption issues; mother issues; abandonment issues; anger issues–stay tuned, buckle up, and enjoy the ride. This is about to get real.