I have to keep my sanity. This is no time to be falling off my rocker, so to speak. 

I keep pleading with Poppy. “Please stop crying.” I can’t (but I can) take it. She has so much grief to endure in the coming months and years, I struggle to stomach her small (in scale) woes of the present.

Today she had a runny nose. Sort of. I wiped it once. My heart felt like it would surely burst at the sight of the tiniest bit of clear fluid at the base of her right nostril. Last time she had a runny nose we ended up in the hospital for seven days, three of which were in the pediatric ICU. 

I am so blessed with her, and yet… this isn’t fair. 

She cannot get sick. Any illness that may be lingering inside her tiny body could be extremely dangerous at the time of her cranial surgery. My insides turn cold thinking about it. 

I have to think about it. I have to expose myself to reality bit by bit, a little more each day. I cannot handle being engulfed in the unknown again. The day Poppy Avalon entered this world was my darkest hour. Only in hindsight was it also my greatest joy and accomplishment. Only in hindsight am I able to see through it.

So I read a few pages about her syndrome. I look at a few photos of her upcoming surgery. I count the staples that close the zig-zag incision from ear to ear on some other mother’s baby.

It won’t be long now. Soon the first surgery will be over and we will have another stretch of time where life can be lived, rather than tiptoed upon like it is now. 

It feels too thin to trust just yet.

I am going to fall asleep praying that it was not a runny nose I saw this morning. And just because I believe in miracles, I think I’ll pray for Poppy’s crying to subside sometime very soon.