circle the wagons

I was making tiny pancakes. Spooning batter from an 1/8 cup measuring cup onto the griddle while baby B and I argued. He walked in circles around the kitchen island with his blanket draped over his big head saying, "I like pancakes but I don't like hot cakes." While I tried to explain that they are the same thing and he chanted over me, "I like pancakes; I don't like hot cakes." 

Within a few hours I was sitting in an exam room listening to my options: all of them bad. Now I am telling you right up front I am going to be one of those jerks who is going to hang something out there on the line but never tell you what it really is.  Insert here one of those obscure cliffhanging comments so popular with the kids these days, any of them will do, now get past it because isn't about what caused the SOS to go out from my camp, it is about the response I got.

I remember the look on the PA's face when I told her "no". The silence in the room. And again just so we all understood what I was saying, "I'm just being honest. What you are asking is impossible and I could lie to you and say I will but there is no way I go down for 3 days, no way I can be admitted.... I am alone."

And in case you have ever wondered how deep my sense of humor runs, it is this deep: I left the room crying. Exited through the busy waiting room and as I fumbled for my sunglasses I was thinking, oh this is brilliant you know how many people you could mess with by just randomly bursting into tears and running from the room?

I cried the whole way home but it wasn't for the bad news, that after all is just a hiccup, a road bump something to get over. Why I was really crying was the alone part. 


See I can't tell the sweet PA the reasons behind my refusal to give up control to them. I can't tell the doctor the size of the cavern beneath my busy life and why mine is too busy to put on hold....

Like any mom I have kids who need me.  One who right now needs to be loved and supported for who she is.  And the other who needs me to be what I have always been for him, a stable, predictable place to land.

But within hours of my refusal to rest the women in my circle, most without even knowing why, stepped up for me.  Just like that. 

Three days later I'm tired but well rested and a little embarrassed for all the help.  I may not be completely out of the woods but I am standing in a clearing.  And from here I see the wagons of the sisterhood holding down the fort.   Thank You~