Fragility

Sometimes people just feel fragile, don't they?

I feel very fragile, lately. I made a new friend recently, and I want to be excited; but we all know how my friendships turn out, don't we? So I'm uneasy, uncertain, unable to relax. Added to that apprehension, there are things going on in my life right now that absolutely terrify me.

I say a name every day, and it's like a prayer, but I'm not sure what I'm praying for.

One thing I spend a lot of time and energy worrying about, if not praying, is my daughter's health. She looks so tall and strong and healthy, she's such a fierce little thing, but she's only two-and-half. How much can her (comparatively) little body take? Tall and strong at two-and-half, is still only a little over three foot tall. Tall and strong at two-and-a-half, still weighs little enough that it can be carried in your arms like the baby it still is.

Standing, she comes up to my stomach, and she's so desperate and determined I can barely hold her down when she fights me. My hand (comparatively small, with it's short wide palm and stubby fingers) is still large enough to cover her tiny face. Her hands, by comparison, are not yet big enough to grasp the lid of a peanut-butter jar; and they spend so much of their time clenched in fists, as she struggles with pain and frustration and helplessness that I can barely begin to understand.

I know that to the mother of a child with a terminal illness, I would seem lucky by comparison. I know that a little girl with any one of the many fatal diseases and conditions on this earth would likely trade places with my little girl in an instant. I know that there is untold suffering the world over, and I know that some children have suffered in ways my little girl couldn't imagine.

I was a child myself, when I began shedding tears for starving Africans/Romanian orphans/whatever the charity ad of the week was. I KNOW that millions of children have suffered more than my little girl, and my heart goes out to each and every one of them.

But my little girl suffers too. My little girl is still broken, in a way I can't define. She is broken; and she is my heart. So where does that leave me?

I don't care. I would take all this pain and more, if it could help her.