Every Single Morning

I hear Erik talking to himself in his bedroom, and I open his door, which squeaks like an injured mouse. I wince. At first, there is no movement from his bed in the dimness of the room, but his little blond head suddenly pops up, buoyant with curiosity, to determine who has just entered. I make my way across the impressive debris field of toys created before he decided to finally go to sleep the night before. I lean down and crawl around the rail to lie next to him in his tiny bed. I do this every single morning.

"Hi, Mama!"

"Hi, Skooby. Hey, gimmie some pillow. And some blanket, too."

He giggles as I make a giant fuss getting comfortable, jostling him around excessively, grunting, and rudely yanking our favorite oversized baby blanket towards me. I notice that it appears as if he is beginning to actually use the blanket while he sleeps. That's new. I throw my left arm over him and draw him close to my body as if I am slow dancing with the tiniest prom date in the world. He is quiet for just a moment, and his quick breaths tickle my cheek. He begins speaking about trucks, and, as I do every single morning, I wonder what my kid's dreams are made of.

He allows me to hold him like this for some time, and we have the same discussion we always have at this time of day. He names every piece of construction equipment he can, and then he says the same two words to me. They are deliberate and form a statement, but I know him well enough that they really make up a hopeful question, and I answer him accordingly. We do this every single morning.

"Daddy's home."

"Yes, Erik, Daddy's home," I answer. "He's in bed. Stay a bit and cuddle with your mama. You can't go right now because I love you."

He tries his best to lie still while I hold him as tight as I can without crushing his little body. Not knowing what else to do, he starts another familiar monologue as if he is reading from a script he keeps hidden beneath the mattress. As I hear the exact same words on yet another morning, over and over, I feel a squeezing ache inside my chest. I listen to his beautiful little voice and begin wondering what other children his age talk about in the morning. I honestly don't know. The words he chooses and the way he uses them sometimes seem strange, but I couldn't explain how if I tried.

I do this every single morning.

My thoughts are shattered by a pair of large feet kicking in footie pajamas. It appears as if he is attempting to swim away from me. As I reluctantly loosen my grip on him, his coltish legs swing around effortlessly in order for him to back out around the gate out of bed.

He says, "Thank you, Mama."

"You're welcome. Hey, Erik, I love you so much."

He grabs the reeking, drool-soaked carcass of his favorite stuffed animal, Stinky Dog, and crams whats left of its syphilic-looking nose into his mouth. He shakes his head back and forth, loving the poor thing violently as he begins to go find his father.

He pauses just long enough to respond. He removes the soggy animal from his mouth. A smile stretches across his face, and his eyes squint nearly shut. I'm surprised to see this expression appear in the middle of our strange morning ritual. This certainly isn't in the script. I see the same rare, joy-filled, angel-channeling expression overtake him just as it does when he sings a song with his whole body.

He replies, "I LOVE YOU, TOOOOOO!"

Chilly

Samantha & Erik

Our trip over the mountains to visit my soon-to-be 90-year-old grandmother was placed on hold because of an approaching storm that looked like a pulsing, chartreuse booger on our meteorologist's radar screen on last night's news. It did snow here all day Thursday, but we don't have much to show for it now. Thursday was the day we had pool therapy in the morning and a home visit just an hour after we got home from that. It was insane. On top of everything, I grocery shopped, worked, shoveled snow, cooked dinner, and rescued a stray dog that refused to leave our property and sat in the storm all day. I am happy that we survived the week, although I'm now exhausted. I'm glad that our IFSP has been rescheduled for March.

Erik stacked some blocks this morning, but he is more into demolition than construction. Last night I built towers, and he systematically destroyed them Godzilla style. Each time a tower met its demise, he would exclaim, "Oh no!" or "Oh nuts!" He later fell off the love seat like a seasoned stunt double, crawled up onto my lap, and said to himself, "Poor baby!" What a character. I laughed a lot yesterday.

Since my computer's hard drive kicked the bucket, I had to reconstruct an updated backup of my blog to store on a CD. It was interesting, to say the least, to revisit what I have written here. I have nearly 200 pages of written material now. I was genuinely surprised to see just how far I have progressed over the last year. My bad days are few and far between now, although they still sneak up on me. I am glad I have a place to sit and write how I feel. I cannot share my feelings verbally to this degree with anyone, even if I pay them good money to listen. I have always had a difficult time expressing how I feel verbally.

Most of my fear now comes from the unknown, especially when it comes to Erik's future health. I have learned to take one day at a time in that regard and enjoy my moments with him as fully as humanly possible. I can also do nothing in terms of predicting what his level of functioning will be at this point except for hope for the best and attempt to teach him the best I know how. This requires a great deal more creativity than I anticipated in terms of helping him understand the world. I imagine it's hard for some people looking at my life and reading how I feel to understand why I write what I do. I can't describe how difficult it is to simply enjoy things like most mothers when I am being instructed how to teach my child to speak by speech pathologists, how to walk by physical therapists, and how to eat, dress, and even play by occupational therapists. Erik and I are both being evaluated and scored. The truth is, this has simply sucked a lot of the normal out of being a mother. No, I don't enjoy things like most mothers. I never will. However, I feel less and less sorry for myself as time passes. Why? What I discovered long ago is that I actually treasure each smile, word, step, and accomplishment more than most mothers ever will. Watching Erik reach each milestone is simply extraordinary, creating in me a first-man-on-the-moon-type of feeling in my heart, releasing a thousand butterflies in my stomach, and making me feel I could easily walk on air.

I remember being pregnant with Erik and driving home from the hospital after we found out we were going to have a boy. I have always wanted a son, and even though I was alone in the car, I actually said out loud, "God, I'm not worthy of this!" I had tears running down my face, and I was the happiest girl on the planet. I wanted to fall to my knees. At that moment, I was imagining a very different life for our family than the one we live now. I had no idea where Erik would take me and how many wonderful people he would bring to me. Despite all of the challenges that we face, I still feel the same way every day. I'm incredibly blessed to know this little boy, and it's a true honor to be his mother. I'm still not close to being worthy of such an incredible gift and such gigantic responsibility, but I take great comfort in the fact that I know I am doing my very best.

As Erik would say, "All right! All right!"

Sheesh. Somebody pass the freaking Kleenex.

Today I plan on watching the storm swallow the mountains, and I'll start a batch of chili eventually. You are welcome to join me! I wish you all could.

White Chicken Chili

1 T vegetable oil
1 chopped onion
3 cloves crushed garlic
1 can (4 oz) diced jalapeno peppers
1 can (4 oz) chopped green chiles
2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp ground cayenne pepper
2 (14.5 oz) cans chicken broth
3 cups chopped cooked chicken breast
3 (15 oz) cans white beans
1 cup shredded jack cheese

Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium-low heat. Slowly cook and stir the onion until tender. Mix in the garlic, jalapeno, green chiles, cumin, oregano, and cayenne. Continue to cook and stir the mixture until tender, about 3 minutes. Mix in the chicken broth, chicken, and white beans. Simmer 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Remove the mixture from heat. Stir in the cheese until melted. Serve warm.

(You are what you eat. I like mine hella spicy. You can substitute mild green chiles for the jalapenos to tone it town, if you'd like.)