A New Understanding

Jenny, a military friend of mine, lost her son Ben to SUDEP a year ago. He suffered from seizures and it took awhile to move from seizure disorder to epileptic status in his case. Jenny and I have talked about many things but I never asked for specific details. UNTIL TODAY. Zoe has had three seizures and has just been diagnosed with the disorder. The grand mal seizure this week pushed her out of the thoughts by the docs that she will grow out of it into the status of it being a disorder. The other two seizures she had were when she was quite small and were with fevers. This one was not. It was out of the blue and when she was well and playing. I will never forget watching it from start to finish. Horrific but mild compared to others I have witnessed in my life. Horrific because it was my child. My flesh and blood the child that I am responsible for. I know in my head there is nothing I can do to stop them but my heart cries out to let it be me. I called Jenny today to ask many questions at her request. She had recently stated she was turning her blog from remembering Ben into a way to help others. Never at that time did we think I would be her first to ask. It seems the US does not have much research or sites to gain much information on this. She linked me a site in Canada that has much more info available. Even mentioning a diet to try that may help prevent future occurences. We will not know anything further for a few weeks as they want her body to rest before they take an EEG. She has been extremely tired and hungry until food is in front of her and then she takes about three bites and says her belly is hurting. Not going to push her or upset her or anything. Her life will be calm and quiet for days. Prayers are appreciated! for all of us....my hubby is deployed and just happened to be talking to him when it happened and need I tell you how worried he was not being here to see or help, then her 10 year old sister had to deal with calling 911 but she did GREAT. our foreign exchange student got to ride in the ambulance with Zoe and I actually beat them to the hospital in the Expedition. I went by the side gate and they went in the main gate. All I can say is that I am glad we put our kids first and will never have regrets of we should have taken her to the Princess breakfast, or the beach, or wherever................. We did, we loved all our kids above and beyond. The housework waited at times, but the stories were read, the games were played, the kids were loved., theprayers were said.

However, Mommy should have known when Zoe was driving me nuts touching me constantly last week that something was up. although at the time she was not sick or running a fever and said she felt ok........she is a very loving child but this was EXTREME behavior. Now I know this clue that something just does not feel right to her and will be more on guard. A New Understanding of several things was discovered this week. We know that Zoe is a gift of God given to us for a time to help in her upbringing but that she is only loaned to us and belongs to God. We gave her back to him with the commitment that we would be dedicated to raising her to know him as Lord and Saviour. We continue to hold that commitment. After this incident and remembering Ben, Zoe and I had another talk about how God created her and he has a big house in Heaven that someday she can live in and that Mommy and Daddy and many others she knows will be there too. She said she wanted to stay with Mommy and I said that I want that to but know that only one other loves you more than your Mom and Dad and that is God. I have a renewed interest in making sure this little one accepts those facts and believes earlier in life than Kendra did but at the same time I do not want to be one of those parents that shove their faith and ideas into a kids head that they rebel. I know they see John and I as examples of faith in action and hope that they recognize early that we are only human that although we try we goof up and need HIM through everything to make things right. Please pray for us it has been a tough week.