WHY NOT ME..

12/5/18 The next step in treatment became a series of castings. One therapist would position her feet as close to neutral as possible with their hands, while the other one padded and wrapped her feet with plaster cast. The casts were changed regularly to prevent pressure sores and to gradually stretch her muscles. Through all this Angie was a trooper. She didn’t cry. She watched. I hoped. When they removed the casts, her feet pulled in as before. She went through series casting for quite a long time, but in the end, her doctor and therapists decided that the only solution was surgery. So off we went to see the orthopedic surgeon. Meanwhile, my parents offered continual support in day to day activities. My friends and family also supported us by inviting John to play groups while I took Angie to therapy and UCP Preschool. One day a week I took John with me when I took Angie to preschool because the hospital in Cincinnati is very near the Cincinnati Zoo. John and I wondered around the zoo as often as possible (We had a yearly pass!). Later, he used to tell people that he went to the zoo so often that he knew all the animals by their first names. We were happy. I had support from my parents and extended family, my church and my hospital friends. In addition, a group of mothers from the hospital had formed an organization called “Mothers of Special Children.” Mothers of Special Children was wonderful. It was the place we could talk about our “special needs” kids with people who really understood our situation. It was the place where I got to meet parents of children who were older. As a group, we planned fun events for our children and for our whole families, we had fund raisers for projects we cared about, and we had small gatherings at people’s homes where we could chat informally. I remember one such meeting where our hostess shared the story of her ten or eleven-year-old son’s grave condition. He had a condition where he would die before he became a teenager. This story was heartbreaking, but from her sharing, we all had the occasion to discuss ways to cope and ways to think differently about parenting our kids. I’ll never forget this day because it was here that I was challenged to stop asking, “Why me?” and start asking “Why not me?”