Worn.

Worn. And wearing thin. That's how I feel today. I can't stop thinking about the future for Layla, the future for our family. Right now she just looks like a big baby. She looks like she's sleeping as she lays flat across my arms. She's not. She's actually a terrible sleeper. But what's going to happen in the next couple months as she get bigger and bigger, still laying flat across my arms? What will the comments switch to? What will the looks switch to?

I've been meaning to write down this conversation I had with a woman in the mall a few months ago. It's one of many just like it and I'm sure there are many more to come. We had just been released from the children's hospital and I was so eager to have opportunities to take Layla out in public after she'd been stuck in the four walls of a hospital room for so long. We walked into this home store in Ontario where I loved looking at all their chalk painted furniture. This woman walked over to see Layla laying across my arms. The woman noticed "A sleeping baby!" To which I replied "Oh no, she's actually awake. She just likes to look down a lot." "She must be pretty new hey? How old is she?" She asked. "She is 10 months old." I responded. She gave me this puzzled look and asked "Really? She must've been premature then?" With my simple response. "No." Her puzzled look changed "Hm.. Oh. Well, she looks like she's in a coma."
I stood there in shock for a moment with absolutely no idea what to say. I felt like my feet were glued to the floor and my eyes were stuck wide open. My brain was trying to process how someone could think that was an okay thing to say... Even as I reminisce I still don't know what I would say. I have to just chalk her comment up to verbal diarrhea. Or maybe it's just ignorance.

 Some days I'm strong. Some days I forget that other people's 14 month old babies are not at all like mine. As my only child, she is all that I know. Other days I am far from strong. I think about what Layla would be like if she was a typical 14 month old. To imagine her walking, talking, eating.. all those things that just seem so foreign to me. I love her with all my heart but there are days.. too often.. where I think that I'm not cut out for the job of parenting her. It's so hard. I hate that our normal is doctors, specialist, emergency rooms, physio therapists, occupational therapists, social workers.. I'm trying so hard not to get bitter against God and other people that get to have "normal" children. When we first got married we wanted to have 3 or 4 kids.. now, we don't think we'll have any more. It's sad. To imagine a child running into your arms screaming "mommy!" or playing sports with Aaron in the backyard, makes me too emotional. Why can't we have that? Or maybe the question is Why can't it be easier for us to have that? I know that we can go the route of adoption and I do believe we likely will one day. But that road is also very emotional and expensive.
I hate being a negative Nancy but my normal positivity is harder to find these days.