Still Here. 30 Weeks.

30 weeks today.  Cheers!

I've figured out that Fridays in here are tough.  I came in on a Friday, so each Friday marks another week away from home (three, this Friday).  Each Friday marks a week since the last time our family has been together.  Each Friday has been met with previously un-topped behavioral woes among the children.  Each Friday, it feels like I've been here a really long time, but still have so very much longer to go.

So, on Fridays, I cry.  The rest of the week, I usually do ok, except when Baby Girl glues herself to my lap at the end of their visit, and bawls to stay with me or for me to come home.  Or, when Buddy Boy's lip trembles as he asks Ten more days? and I just can't bear to tell him that it's so many more than that.  Or, when Little Guy has spent hours snuggled at my side, but weeps that he hasn't spent any time with me when it's time to go .  I cry then, too.  But mostly, just Fridays.

Mama and Nanny are earning stars in their heavenly crowns each and every day, managing my three rascals.  The children seemed to sense a power vacuum, once I was firmly established at the hospital and the Mister was back at his desk, and they each have been doing their earnest best to work their way up--through some sort of battle of the baddest, behavioral display of shock and awe-- to alpha dog status or something.  Their world has been all shook up, and I know that accounts for a lot of the turmoil, but it's been disturbing to see just how devious they can be without me around to enforce standards.  So, that's a challenge.  More for Mama, Nanny, and the Mister than for me.  But goodness, reality hurts sometimes.  And there's the tendency to feel like a failure.  How thankful I am to have people willing to see my children through this most difficult time, and to keep on loving them!

Oh!...how I wish I were there for Little Guy losing his first tooth.  The excitement, the milestone, the fairy visit.  

How I wish I were there to find the littles in bed together.

We are used to so much togetherness.

Most importantly, though, the baby is still cooking and, truly, THAT is what I am called to be seeing about right now.  I've had some selfish moments where I've thought, I wish we could just have the baby and start the path toward restoring our family life now.  But I snap out of those pretty quickly when I think of how very badly I hurt for Buddy Boy when he suffers from his conditions, and how very badly I would hurt for this baby if he were to suffer.  More time in this hospital bed makes his suffering less likely.  Baby is where he needs to be.  I am where I need to be.

There must be something all of us are meant to learn from this.  We just haven't fully unearthed it yet.