Sometimes hospital feels like a battlefield..... sometimes with the system, sometimes with people who don't know as much about your child's illness as you, sometimes with sleep deprivation and poor decisions - yours and the doctors, and sometimes simply against the infection that threatens to take your child away from you.
I know this battlefield, I am a honed, skilled and powerful warrior.... forever attuned to this environment, ready, primed for any unexpected danger that may swoop from my blindside...... I charcoal my eyes to focus my vision........
My girl is okay now.... the battle has subsided.... subsided, not ended, never won...... will it ever be won? The weariness and grief come once safe.... unbidden but expected, so many battles, so much grief. My body courses with a cocktail of adrenalin, grief, fear..... and tears.... she is safe for now and I am grateful, wounded, weary and grateful.
Is this what childhood is for her? Constant fear of an infection that one day, not caught early enough, might take her? Is this the childhood for her brother and sister? Parents who can't quite settle, can't quite let go, can't quite take their eyes off her, incase another battle ensues?
I am Warrior, I know this battle, I will fight to the end.....
