Little Man

I came across this picture of my boys while looking for something else.   
It made me smile.  They are so cute.  We had gone to see Emma participate in the school talent show last June.  Look at that little round face..those pink, full cheeks.  After it made me smile, it then made me sad because I then looked at this:

Same cute kid, but almost exactly one year older.  He doesn’t look that much older to me.  He’s still stinking cute.  But the pink full cheeks are gone and so is the round face and NOT because he’s just aged a year.  But because he just looks so little and unhealthy to me.  I think he might actually weigh close to the same because he’s lost so much weight. He looks so pale in the picture, but even more pale in real life.  He got sunburned and I said to my husband, “I actually like him sunburned, because he looks a little healthier now.”  Too bad it was just temporary. 

This breaks me.  This tugs at me.  This saddens me.  And this truly exhausts me.  I don’t like to talk about it too much because no one really understands.  You have a child who won’t eat?  People judge.  I must be doing something wrong.  I’m too lenient.  They could certainly do better.  I don’t need to hear it.  We’ve tried everything.  Therapy is great, but it is slow. 

In the meantime, I am exhausted.  A child who does not eat is a child who does not sleep well.  Waking up due to hunger is almost a nightly occurrence, one that just makes me so sad.  I can’t send my child back to bed with his stomach growling.  I can’t.  I can’t make him understand that if he eats when he is hungry, it would make him feel better.  I can’t do that either.  What I can do is give him drinks heavily supplemented and just hold his skinny little body until he falls back asleep.  That is something I can do. 

I’m exhausted.  When my baby goes back to sleep, that’s not always possible for mommy.  Mommy has to get up to get the other kids ready for school and then work.  Little guy can nap, mom doesn’t have that luxury.  Therapy, supplements, vitamins, and, don’t forget, Cheetos, oh the Cheetos, all cost money.  Mommy’s got to work. 

I’m exhausted.  Maybe more than the physical exhaustion is the mental exhaustion.  It’s so much.  I was talking to my sister and had mailed her birthday card late.  I told her that I just gave up apologizing for things I was late with, little things I had forgotten, all the things I’ve had to say no to.  It’s the sad state of my life right now, but hopefully just a temporary one. 

I don’t want or need sympathy.  Just maybe less judgment, more understanding, more support, more love.