I feel like a broken record. Each day for the past two months (exactly two months on today's date- the 13th) I have had this inner dialogue: Lord, please just heal this ear. We will be forever grateful. Hasn't Corbin endured enough? Aren't the lessons borne from this sufficient? We have been forced into a deeper compassion for families of children suffering illnesses and birth defects. We have been coerced to see the silver lining in the dimmest of situations...." yadda yadda. Not only do I spin this wheel in my own head, but I'm also pretty good at projecting my worry outwards. My sister gave me the Guatemalan worry people for a reason ;)
Anyway, I realized today (when Kristen Wachob stopped by the house to say hi) that I have been deliberately avoiding people because I am well aware that I am completely consumed with the status of my son's ear. It's no lie. I wake up, take off the ear cup, wash the ear, put on bacitracin, hem and haw over the blood spots on his pajamas, seek Matt's opinion, take pictures of the ear, email them to the doctor, and then I'm either out the door to go to work or furiously attacking house chores. At work, people ask "how is your son?" And I launch into how worried we are.

It's tough work being worried. Intellectually I understand that my worry does absolutely nothing to solve the problems and that my time could be better spent praying to God that he will take on the burden; that this "ear thing" will play out the way it's meant to go. But, ya know what? That ain't how I roll. I'm the mama to this precious little boy. It's my job to make sure he has the best we can give him in life. And, damn it, if this ear doesn't pan out to be glorious for him, I'm going to be mighty sad. Frankly, we elected this treatment for him because we want him to have a full,happy life. We've barely scratched the surface on fixing Corbin's hearing. We'll do referrals for fitting a soft band bone-anchored hearing aid. He will try that for a while at preschool, and then when his 5th birthday rolls around, we'll be deciding again if Corbin should undergo surgery. Will we implant a permanent hearing aid or will we just coax him into wearing a headband when he's at school? This is all very daunting to me. There are those who say, "Count your blessings. It could be worse. He could be born with mental disabilities...etc" That is all absolutely true. And when I do stop to think about how great we've got it, I ground myself a bit. But it would be dishonest to say that I have not been wallowing in our tiny little set of sorrows lately. I like to type these things out. It's healthy to journal. Now, if you're still reading, just know that Corbin is totally happy and running around this house as usual. He does not complain when we have to put a strap and cup on his ear every. single. night. He is really teaching me so much. In his words, "no big deal, Mama."
I guess in the grand scheme of things, it really isn't.