Sometimes you just have to take a stand!

I realize we are at a pivotal era in parenting and our discipline methods are becoming more and more important, but they certainly aren't getting any easier. You know the old cliche phrase "this is gonna hurt me more than it will hurt you?" Well, it's true and it doesn't always relate to corporal punishment, which is something we avoid at all costs anyway.

Saturday started off normal enough, Zach snuggled, errr, played in our bed for about a half hour before we got up and then we all went downstairs to make "moatmeal." Breakfast passed without a tantrum..yeah we were doing great! I needed to run to Walmart for a few things and Zach wanted to go with me. Usually telling him it's time to get dressed to go anywhere starts a tirade, so I decided to use walmart as a bargaining tool. I told him if he got dressed quick, he could go with me. Amazingly, it worked. He was dressed in warp speed and all we had to do was brush the hair, which takes all of two minutes max to untangle his little curls. With the mention of "fix hair," Zach went into all-out tantrum mode screaming "NO I NOT FIX HAIR NO MORE." He went about the house hitting the walls, yelling at the cats and kicking anything in his path.

So I thought if walmart bargaining worked on the clothes, maybe it would work for the hair. Wrong. I told him he would only go to walmart when he let me brush his hair. He continued screaming and kicking, etc. I thought okay, if I pretend to leave, he will know I'm serious. I walked out the door and the crying did not stop. So I walked back in and told him one last time that he could only go to walmart after his hair was brushed. Screaming continued and I told David I was sorry he had to stay and deal with it, but I had to take a stand. So I told Zach I loved him and I'm sorry he could not calm down enough to go to walmart and then I walked out the door with confidence - on the outside.

As I got into the car and began to drive away, I started crying a little. I hated that I had to leave him there and that he was sad. I wanted to run back in and scoop him up, but I fought the urge and hoped it would show him that I mean what I say.

God must've seen my inner struggle and decided to plant someone in my path at walmart who would understand my plight. When I rounded a corner, there was Alecia Ward. We said our hellos and then she asked the predictable "how are you?" Usually I just say "fine," even when I'm not. But for some reason I just got honest and told her that I'd just had to take a stand with Zach. I explained what happened and she affirmed my decision and like any good, experienced mother would do, told me it had to be done and the sooner he realizes I mean what I say, the better. We didn't linger, we both had things to do, but I walked away feeling confident in my decision and knowing I'd done the right thing. I was thanking God for placing someone there for me who would understand and empathize a bit.

When I got home, Zach was calm, but very red-eyed. David said he'd cried for close to 30 minutes of the 40 I was away. He had to sit on the stairs (our time out spot) for quite awhile because he was being aggressive with David, hitting, kicking, etc. It was so sad, Zach came up to me with tears still in his voice "Mommy, (sniff, sniff, sniff) I wanna go walmart with mommy." I explained to him that I'd had to go without him because he wouldn't let me brush his hair. He just said "yeah." I did scoop him up then and tell him how much I love him, but that we still needed to brush his hair. He reluctantly let me.

It makes me think of the fits I throw when I don't want to do something I know God wants me to do. They may not be manifested in screams, kicks and the like (or maybe they are) but it's the same struggle with our human desire to sin. I'm not talking about "awful" things either, but even gossiping, impatience, gluttony, selfishness and on and on. It's all the same to Him and sometimes he has to take things away from me to prove a point - an opportunity, a friend, etc.

I love the verse "train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it," Proverbs 22:6. I wonder if that applies to more than just people young in age. Perhaps it applies to all of us as God's children and he's constantly training us up. I know He is still training me and sometimes, more often than I'd like to admit, He has to take a stand too.

Catching Up, Celiac and Lots of Needles

I just realized I haven't blogged in forever...well okay, two weeks, but it feels like forever. I just haven't felt really well and I got behind. I've been a pretty healthy person most of my life so the last 7 weeks or so have been extremely miserable and annoying for me. It all started out with my heart racing when I laid down at night. I went to the dr. and they did an EKG and said it was fine. I've been known to produce a little too much adrenaline so they put me on a beta blocker and drew some blood. That's where the fun begins. My labs came back showing elevated liver enzymes, which prompted my dr. to draw MORE blood and schedule a liver ultrasound. In the meantime I was sick with bronchitis, walking pneumonia and some awful stomach symptoms that I won't detail here.

I felt okay after the Z-pack, but my cough never really went away and a week later I started spiking a fever again. So, off the to the urgent treatment center I went where the dr. told me that she wasn't concerned with my 100 degree temp and that it was probably all allergies. WRONG ANSWER. She told me to call back if my fever didn't go down or if I felt worse. Well a week later, I was still coughing, still feverish so I called. She called in a 10 day course of high-dose amoxycillin. That should've killed basically any bug in my body, right? Eight days into that, I still had fever at night and they did a monospot test on me, which came back negative.

Meanwhile, I had the ultrasound that showed my liver was fine, but my spleen was enlarged. At my followup with my real dr. she said she thought I could still have mono and they had not tested me for the right things at the UTC (imagine that). So you guessed it, more blood drawn. This time the results came back showing I had elevated lymphocytes in my blood, which my dr. thought pointed even more to a viral infection. The Epstein Barr virus test (for mono) came back negative, so we're stumped. She was ready to punt me to hematology, but when I told her I hadn't had fever in 4 or 5 days and that I was feeling a lot better, she decided to ...you guessed it, draw more blood. SO tomorrow I have to get another CBC with differential to determine if the lymphocytes have improved.

Oh and I have to mention that in the midst of all this I went gluten-free and it solved all my stomach issues that I've had since Zachary was born. My dr. has not yet fully addressed the gluten problem, but I'll likely get a celiac disease diagnosis before this is all over. So now my theory is that the celiac disease (gluten intolerance) has depressed my immune system so much that my body was just fed up and decided to protest by accepting each and every infection to cross my path. Eating gluten free is a challenge and at times very depressing, however, I'm dealing with it and it's been a month of strict adherence and I KNOW it's helped already.

Yes I'm still nervous about my big ol' spleen and my high lymphocytes, but I truly believe the prayers of God's people have carried me this far and He is not going to let me go now. Whatever is to come, I will face it with the Lord holding me the whole way. I pray that God answers the prayers so many of you and other friends and family have lifted up for my complete healing very soon. I know it's working! I even had the energy to cook supper last night and play outside with Zach. Lately all I've wanted to do is sit on the couch or sleep so this is a huge step.