Illness

Colt is laying in the floor of the bathroom with his pillow and blankets. He's been sick since yesterday about 5 pm when he went to bed with very little cajoling. We knew he was sick on that fact alone. He woke up around 4 am and hasn't returned to his bed since. Poor thing. Through it all, we have heard various comments from the cold floor of the bathroom. Once, he was talking to himself saying, "Don't throw up, Colton. Don't throw up." Around 10 am, he began screaming for food, as if we had him locked down in some cold, dark dungeon. When I explained that his stomach could not tolerate the food, he accused me of starving him. I really just sat there in disbelief.

I'm a bad Mom because I decided I would let him find out the hard way. I gave him some water, like a good jail guard would. I explained that he must drink it slowly because it is like his stomach is angry. It does not want anything in it for awhile. Of course, within a few minutes, he was sick again ... and apologizing to his angry stomach, "I'm sorry, stomach. I'm sorry." When David prayed over him, Colt suddenly turned very Pentecostal with "yes, Lord" responses to every thought uttered. If you could see the serious furrowed look on his face ... His Pentecostalism slips in at times like these. I remember another time when he was laying in his sick cell, begging God to "take me from my misery." He's never quiet. Every heave and hoe comes with a deliberate cry for help, "Please, someone comfort me!"

Parenting is hard. I've spent the last 24 hours wanting to scream from my own cell - and that was before Colt was sick. There is so much I do not know how to do, how to train, how to ingrain in their hearts and souls. I watch, I listen. I talk and explain. I just want them to be happy. When they are not, I want to clang my tin cup against the bars of my cell. It feels so hopeless after I feel like I have done so much.

My mother laughs at me. She feels some vengeful sense of God getting even. I wish she wouldn't. I'd rather have her help. David is mystified, claiming he doesn't care if they like him or, in essence, if they are happy. He thinks our job is beyond that. I told him if that is the case, I wished HE would get the brunt of their unhappiness then. I tried to explain that, in fact, he SHOULD get the brunt of it because he is the mean one in the house. Unfortunately, they never seem unhappy when he is around.

He looked at me the way I looked at Colt this morning when he accused me of starving him (NOT that I am like Colton!!).

I'm now thinking I'll go shave my head and get a tattoo. That will teach 'em all!