Caeden and I.

I have not posted much here in the last few months.  It's not so much that I don't have something to say, as that I'm not that sure it is interesting enough for people to read it. 

It was inevitable, and therefore, not unexpected to me, that around the time of Joel's final illness and death, my blog had a huge surge of activity.  My "readership" grew enormously.  And then, in the months after Joel's death it slowly died down once again. 

And I expected that for many people, that would sort of be "the story" they were reading.  Joel's life, his impending death, death, and immediately after.  That makes sense to me, that others would feel most interested in that.  Of course, to keep "readership" up, posting more frequently helps, but even before I started to "slack off" in the past few months, readership was down.

I am OK with that.  It's one of the reasons that I have been less frequent about posting.  I just post when I feel like it, and when I think I have something interesting to say, when I have the time and the energy.   "When the stars align" as the saying goes.  And all those things do not happen simultaneously very often.  So it seems.

Still, I will keep posting a bit longer, while I still have something to say on here.  Eventually, I think, this blog will end.  I'm thinking about starting a new blog, though.  Because, like so many other vain people, I enjoy hearing myself think!  Ha ha ha!  That blog would be different.  It would just be about what I am thinking about, which might often be Joel, but also might be other things.  But that would be later on.

Today, I think I will write about Caeden.  I know people wonder about him.  Hmmm.  Even I wonder about him!

He is mostly happy.  He's a very up and down kind of kid.  0 to 60 in under a minute.  Quicksilver.  So one minute he is miserably complaining like a peach colour Oscar the Grouch that he DIDN'T want bacon in his scrambled eggs, he wanted BACON apart from his eggs (we only had some bacon bits, not strips, but it was REAL BACON, in my defense!) and then the next minute he is happily gobbling them down, humming all the while with a totally contented face.  Yes, I realize this is a characteristic of all children, but in my child it seems hugely magnified.  My writing can not possibly capture the real life drama of every moment in my house.

The thing about Caeden is that I have sure had my struggles with mothering my son in the last few months.  He is human, and less than perfect.  In fact, as many children are, he is often bossy, grouchy, greedy, explosive, and persistent in his nagging.  He doesn't have many requests, but boy, does he ever have a list of demands.

Just being honest.  At the risk of being criticised, because yes, I know, how grateful should I be for having such a happy, healthy child, when some people don't have even ONE?  I am grateful.  I love him to pieces.  And he has many, many good points.  But the truth is the truth.  Sometimes he is difficult.  Very difficult.  Sometimes I am not a very good, patient, understanding, etc., mother.

And there are other things that get into the mix.  Because even though you might think that having Joel would make me so grateful for Caeden, would make me aspire to do all I can to experience and cherish his preschool years, in fact,... well...in the past few months it has not.  In fact, in some ways Joel's death has just made it very hard to be a mother to Caeden.  I have, for example, struggled with resenting him...

Well, not exactly him.  But it would make me so irate when he would complain about things.  Because, of course, he has no idea how fortunate he is.  (and yes, this is always, silently, compared to Joel.  Compared to the other sick kids out there...)  His seeming ingratitude drove me nuts, I wanted him to be so grateful for his good health, his abilities, the comforts of his life.

And then there is the part of me that resented his intrusion on my grief process.  Yes.  Being honest.  At times when I was tired or sad, I resented his needs.  Or maybe even more, his wants.  He wants me to play, he wants me to do everything for him and with him.  And I want a few hours to curl into a ball and be silent, be sad, think, rest, in short, to grieve.  A huge conflict between my wants and needs and his.  But I am his mother, so how can I refuse him.  If I do, I feel guilty and then resentful.  If I don't, then it is straight to resentment.

It is hard for Caeden and I, because Joel is always there, between us, in a way.  And this past few months, I have been learning how to live with Joel, without him coming between me and my other son.  I am learning how to keep a son on each side of me.  It is a day by day, in the strength of the Lord, kind of thing.  If there is one thing that this has all really taught me, it is about my own weakness.  But that is another story.



And with this, I am also better able to love my son.  Oh, I don't mean emotionally.  Emotionally I always felt connected to him.  I mean practically.  I feel better able to love my son, practically.  And I know he needs it.  He dictated an email to me, for his Nana and Papa.  In his dictation he said "Please keep Papa from getting sick."  Telling words, for how he is also still thinking of illness and death.

 At times, I am even grieving for what I lost with Caeden in the times that Joel had so many needs.  Especially that first year with Joel.  It is a year that is lost to me, with regard to Caeden.  I didn't even have respite.  I have almost nothing of Caeden from that first year, and it makes me sad.

So I am happy to be able to come out of myself.  I am happy to be able to start to appreciate this last year at home with my son.  I know it is precious.  So precious.

It's partly that I might be coming out of a certain season in my grief.  Yes, surely, that is possible.  I think it is partly, too, a grace of God I am feeling, working in my heart.  My eyes being opened to my need of help to be a mother to my son.  And as I make my heart willing, confess my failure, weakness, and selfishness, I see a grace growing in me.  The ability to do the thing I wish to do, but find beyond my own strength.  Grace.  A gift. 

I don't usually put up pictures of myself, because I don't really like them.  If I never see a picture of myself, I find I imagine myself a lot better looking.  Soon as I see myself in actual picture form, the illusion is shattered.   It seems I am exactly "that manner of man" who looks into a mirror, then goes away an immediately forgets what I look like!   But I will put up a picture here, for you.  It's Caeden and I, proud of a jigsaw puzzle we did together.  Me and my beautiful, healthy, happy, passionate son.