People will ask what my motivation was for getting better.

I wanted to get out of the hospital for sure.

Walking again has always been something I tried to do.

But mostly, the number one thing has always been my kids.

The kids that make me laugh.

The kids that make me try one more time.

The kids that never allow me to give up.

The kids that love me regardless of my weaknesses.

The kids that are incredible.  That mean so much.  That are my whole world.

You ask what motivates me.

Stupid question, really.

I need to learn to love my body.

I’ve had this body for thirty-five years and it’s never fully made me happy.

The shoulders are too broad.

The hips are too narrow.

The belly is too squishy.

The feet are too wide.

The legs are too short.

The chins are too many.

And I have this child.

She’s eight.

She is everything smart and funny and bright and exhilarating in the world.

She has the eight year old version of this same body.

And? SHE.IS.GLORIOUS.

I need to stop telling her that she’s NOT.

I need to stop telling her she’s not glorious by constantly mentioning how I need to lose weight..which I do, but she doesn’t need to hear about it.

I need to stop telling her she’s not glorious by picking at my muffin top.

I need to stop telling her she’s not glorious by wincing at the ole’ bingo flaps.

I need to stop telling her she’s not glorious by bitching about how the pants aren’t too long, my legs are just too stumpy.

I need to stop telling her she’s not glorious by telling her I hate pictures of myself…when everyone tells her we look so much alike.

I need to learn to love this body.

Because she shows me how beautiful we are, every day.

My son is eleven.

He has been kicking my butt in games for about, oh, ten years now.

He’s THAT good.

You name the game and he’s schooled me on it.

HOWEVER!!!

I have finally found the game that I can win.

Yes. I am bragging because I can finally defeat my child in something.

Don’t judge me for dancing around in victory and having a little song that I sing called “I beat you, I  beat you, you suuuuuuck!”….I learned it from him.

You’ve never played Guitar Hero and had him pat your shoulder and say “Aww, Mom, you’re doing much better…keep practicing” or sat down to Halo and heard him give you advice on “not picking up the ammo because you’re WASTING IT BY NOT HITTING THE TARGETS”.

{Don’t forget, I birthed you, boy, I can shoot wildly into the air at nothing and you will LIKE it!}

So, I win. FINALLY.

I own him in Monopoly.

I could probably kick his scrawny behind in Trivial Pursuit as well….or at least the 80′s edition. As long as there’s no math involved.

So, what of it?

Why think badly of me for giggling a little when he lands on my property and I have to watch him mortgage himself to the hilt? What IF I do get joy from watching my kid fork over his last dollars and walk away from the table totally destitute and defeated?

Anissa!  He’s your child, you should let him win once in a while.

Halo, Star Wars, Age of Empires, Wii Eveything, Guitar Hero, Connect 4, Uno, Chess (which, is an exaggeration, I don’t even know how to play), Chinese Checkers, REGULAR Checkers, Sorry, Life…these are just a few examples of the many games in which my boy child has shamed me.

Repeatedly.

I will take my happiness where I can.

Which is somewhere between Boardwalk and Indiana Ave.

The girls got their hair cut today.

Tomorrow’s picture day at school…sort of a big deal.

One that Peyton will miss.

Again.

I can’t even tell you how much that sucks.

Instead, we’ll be going for an eye exam with an ophthalmologist.

Peyton has eye problems? You might ask.

No. Peyton has headaches. She has what she describes as “tingling” in her head. She has suspicious crap going on in her noggin.

And that means I get to drink the crazy kool-aid.

Big, gulping swallows of it.

Our new doctor at Children’s Healthcare of ATL should be known as Dr. Crazy. Because that’s what he deals with all day.  More crazy walks in his door every day than Dr. Phil ever dreamed of.

Dr. Crazy listened to my recitation of Peyton’s issues….me thinking I was doing a pretty decent job of being not-insane about it…but Dr. Crazy’s specialty is Leukemia Relapse and Long-Term Survivorship.  What a great bi-polar job to have.

He can smell my brand of crazy from a mile away.

After checking Peyton from head-to-toe, going over all the random weirdness again, he said the best thing EVER.

” I believe everything is fine…” <—that’s not it

“…but I can see you’re worried…” <—nope, still not it

“…so we’re going to run some tests and if we can’t figure out what it is, at least we’ll know what it isn’t.” <—officially nominated best doctor in the world

He GETS it.

On a level that most people, even doctors, just don’t understand.

I don’t need you to tell me she’s fine.  I give myself pep talks all the time.

I need proof.

And Dr. Crazy can give me that.

So, over the next few weeks, we’ll be checking for different things.

Tomorrow we’ll go check her eyes….we’ll be able to see if there seems to be any abnormal pressure that would speak of any not-supposed-to-be-there-things going on.  Or maybe she just needs glasses.

She’ll be having a CT scan sometime in the next week.

And? A spinal tap during our next appointment.

It’s a search for things that hopefully won’t be there.

Pressure in the brain.

Anything resembling a tumor.

Return of the cancer.

Things I don’t want to think about, but have to rule out.

*sigh*

But her hair looks really cute, right?