Sick Day

Yesterday's word count: 1,441

Today's word count: 300

Today my youngest woke with a terrible cold. We took a sick day, which included me having to ditch most of my writing time. A tiny part of me is frustrated with this, but mostly I think, this is what is great about being a writer and a mom. I get to do both. And be one more than the other if necessary. Today it was necessary to be more mom than writer.

I did spend an hour with some new emails from parents who wrote me about their experiences with their children's diagnosis, which were extremely helpful. These parents continue to amaze me with what they go through every day, and the incredible trauma before diagnosis. If my children ever develop diabetes, I will be so, so thankful that I have it; that I will know the signs before it gets too bad, and that I can say, "I have been there. It will get easier, and feel more normal, and you will survive and live a great life." I tell some of the moms who write me this, who only know what it is like to have a child with the disease and see only the uncertainty of the future and the frustration and fear in each day.

Is it bad that I really want this book to make a difference in the world? That I want, through a story of one fictional family, to educate many, to give hope to some? To let people know it can be life altering, but not life ending? That crisis can make you stronger? That faith will sustain you, even when your friends won't?

I spent my precious little quiet time today reading about children who almost died before being diagnosed, whose pathetic, arrogant doctors misdiagnosed or undermedicated or simply didn't care enough. I wrote back to parents who wrote to me about their fears of their children seizing and dying in the night while they were asleep.

Then I went and held my daughter on my lap and watched Little Bear and wiped her tears and read her books, and thanked God all she had was a terrible cold.