Waiting

Life as a mother has often been about these moments held in suspension. Waiting each second for something. All around life dances in a fast forward blur while the special effects of your mind bring you to a stand still. I find it hard to do anything in those moments when I am consciously waiting. I never feel like I am done waiting but something the waiting takes on an urgency. And when those times arrive, I find myself held immobile under the pressure of something about to be.

Last night, my son came to us, wide eyed, quivering. The violent storms that rolled upon like us woke him up. Always a dangerous thing for my beloved boy. My husband lead him trembling to the bedroom and laid down with him until he fell asleep under the safe eye of his father. But I lay awake. Waiting as I have waited so many times for the tell tale thumbing on the floor, the hectic labored breathing that comes with each seizure. I listened to the storm, scared at its violence, worrying about tornadoes and how I would save my family. Finally with the coming of dawn, the waiting gave out to the exhaustion, and I slept fitfully because the waiting never really ends. It just sometimes becomes a side thought to something more urgent.

And then the waiting ends. The moment that you are waiting for, gut clenched, nerves stretched taut, comes, and you are unprepared. The waiting does nothing to prepare you for that second when you hear child on the floor convulsing, twisted limbs. And as you hold him, whispering to him that you are hear, you hope that the tension in your muscles will ease. But it doesn't. You will go back to waiting because you just don't know. You can never see into that fog which is the future.