The day I had to change the way I raise my child

At 6pm on a Monday evening, we were cozied down for a family night of movies and pizza.  We had just bought two new movies that day and were watching the first one.  Sometime during the movie, my oldest daughter got up and went to the bathroom.  She came out a couple of minutes later saying she couldn't see.  Anything.  After doing a few preliminary checks with her, my husband had me call 911.

From that moment on, we were caught up in a whirlwind of paramedics, emergency room staff, nurses, doctors and tests.  When the paramedics left our home we took her to the emergency room.  By the time we got her there she had disintegrated from a happy 9-year-old to being practically unresponsive.  They had her hooked up to machines and they kept giving her dose after dose of medication.  They kept throwing the word "seizure" around.  Seizures?  How is that possible?  I lived in a surreal state as they worked on my child.  One of the nurses was impressed that I was holding it all together.  What she didn't realize was that inside I was in peices.

Then I heard the words every mother dreads hearing:  "We're going to have to LifeFlight her..."  What?  Don't take my baby!  And I couldn't go.  We had to make the agonizing 45 minute drive up to the hospital without her.

When we finally got there, sometime around midnight, she was sleeping.  They'd given her some medication to calm her body down.  Over the next few days we waited agonizing hours as we listened to our daughter say and do strange things.  She didn't recognize me or her father.  She repeated words and phrases over and over, many of them not making sense.  She saw things that weren't there.  And they ran test after test.  We waited to hear the results of each one, hoping that each would come back negative, but at the same time hoping something would come back with an answer.

That began our journey as parents of a child with epilepsy.  It is strange, even now, to say it.  With each seizure that takes over her mind, and sometimes her body, we watch, we wait.  Most of the time, she pulls through just fine.  But sometimes...we end up in the ER again.

And then, she's my little sunshine again.  The storm is gone.  The clouds roll away.  And she's off to play, without a care in the world.

Onward and Upward

So, I have disenrolled my kids from our Alternative Learning Program (ALP) and have decided (with much encouragement from hubby) to go it alone.  I must admit that I have been pretty nervous about it, but now I am excited to be able to do it.
So, what kept me from doing it?  I think mostly fear.  Fear of not teaching the right things.  Fear of not being a good teacher.  Fear that I might not get it right.
You see, I'm a perfectionist, and I'm bound and determined to raise perfect kids!  Yeah, right.  I've really got to let go of that one.
So, for now, I'm going to do the best that I can, and trust that God will make up for my shortcomings.  Besides, the idea is not to teach them everything before they graduate high school, but to instill in them a love of learning for the rest of their lives.  And when they are ready to learn, hopefully I will have taught them everything they need to know about learning...and that is that it's fun!