Challenges

12/3/11
  
Good day everyone. I say that because it's morning for me right now, but it may be a different time of day for each one of you who reads this. I wanted to take a moment and talk about challenges. What a word. What do you think about when you think of that word? I personally think PROBLEMS. But really they are just challenges. Something to rise above. Something to work through. And when you do, you are a better person. You learn something about yourself. You learn what your made of. It can actually enrich your life. I know, what a load of crap!!! But no it's not. Let me tell you about my day yesterday after I posted my blog. My son has been struggling with his breathing all week. I figured he caught the same cold virus his sister had. So I didn't panic. I treated him all week with his breathing treatments. ( both kids have asthma). On Thursday I even gave him a double breathing treatment. Which the Dr. instructed me to do when it gets really bad. Well, no help. He never improved. So I scheduled an appointment for him at 1:15 yesterday afternoon. I pulled him and his sister out of school so we could go. Well the Dr. said I had been doing everything right all week. He took a listen to his lungs. Well then the news came. You must take him to the hospital for a chest x-ray. It sounds like he has pneumonia. We need to be sure. He told me to come right back to the office once we did that. So after an hour of sitting at the outpatient center, we got his x-ray done. Anyone with kids should know they hate sitting and waiting for long periods of time. So all I heard was, mom how long have we been here? Are we going to be here for a long time? Mom I want to go home? That was fine, we had to do what we had to do. My kids are generally well behaved. So they sat pretty still through it all. So we went back to the Dr. Which is only across the street from the hospital. Then we had to wait some more. The hospital had to call the results in to the Dr. So it was probably another 30 minutes waiting before the Dr called us back. Before we even made it into the exam room, he said... well he certainly does have pneumonia in the lower lobe on one side, the upper on the other side. And it's creeping into the other two lobes. He wanted an oxygen saturation immediately. Thank God it was 97. If it was 94 or below he would be in children's hospital right now. Instead he gave my son one of the most awful shots ever. He warned me that it would be very painful. And that he doesn't give this shot unless absolutely necessary. He said it would be equivalent to an over night stay in the hospital with I.V. medicine. Needless to say I had to hold my son by the arms so he wouldn't hit the nurse. He was laid out on the exam table, they had to give him this in his thigh. The syringe was full of medicine. So not like an immunization shot! He screamed so loud the whole place could hear him. He was yelling out... Mom please, make them stop. Mom please, it's so painful, please make them stop. It was the worst thing in the world. The Dr. came back in and apologized to my little guy for hurting him. He cried so badly for like 10 minutes after. The Dr. said it was no joke, that shot hurts a lot. Basically the Dr said he was almost at double pneumonia and this was nothing to shrug off. This was why his breathing treatments weren't helping. He can't do much this weekend. But it's better than the hospital. Well I got home 4 hours after I left. I felt sad and relieved. I get through the evening. Then my husband comes home from work. He's about 20 minutes late. He said hello to our son. But he looked like something was wrong. He had tried to rush coming home. And got pulled over. So now we have a traffic ticket to worry about. Normally I would have lost it. I would have run my mouth. But I didn't. I asked what happened. I could see Mike was very upset. I just gave him a hug. What are you going to do? It's done. You can't go back and change it. We will get through these challenges. I said yesterday I chose to be happy. And I was. I was happy my son was home and not in the hospital. I was happy Mike was home safe. We all were together. We will figure out the rest. For me that is a lot of CHANGE. You have to try to get through things gracefully. At least that's my thought. Mike said I was so worried you were going to be mad. And instead your making me laugh. He said my attitude helped him feel a little better about it. You never know how much you may be helping someone else as you try to feel your way through life's challenges. It could be someone right in your own home. So today I am grateful for my family. And I am grateful for the choice to be positive or negative. I choose to be positive.

Here is my thought for the day.........
We can be sure that the greatest hope for maintaining balance in the face of any situation rests within ourselves.

We always have a choice. What's yours for today?