I'm going to tell you about what might happen to siblings of kids with complex medical needs. No matter how conscious you are about giving them equal time, things slip through the cracks, stuff is blown off, "little stuff" is overlooked. Oliver complained about pain in his finger for a year. I acknowledged it, but I also blew it off. I blamed it on diet or inflammation. You need to stop eating junk, I might have said. How bad could it be? Both Oliver and his brother Henry are strong in every way. They are strong and sensitive. They are honest and funny as hell. Like their sister, except they haven't gotten as much attention. It turned out that Oliver has an aneurysmal bone cyst. Benign but tricky. Today he had a second surgery to remove it as the one in December didn't work. The tumor came back, began eating into his bone. Hopefully, today's intervention will last. I sat by the bedside in the recovery room for hours, running my hand through his hair, watching my nearly grown boy sleep off the drugs they gave him. He made jokes in his sleep, smoothed all my rough edges worn thin by time in hospitals those weird hours ticking by. Precious child. Brave children.
I'll be catching shit for the "inflammation" and "too much sugar" talk -- but that's okay. We all need to be humbled and set straight.
Power to the siblings.
