And yet

Yes, we are lucky, and yet, it's still hard.

It's frustrating to start the day with your child struggling to find the words, "Can I watch TV?"  He starts with, "Can I.... uh... Will you open this?.... Uh... This is too hard for me."  You know what he wants to say, but you've been adviced by the speech therapist to let him work through it.  To give him time.  To encourage him to think.  Some of Liam's favorite phrases...

"I need to think think think."

"Let me show you."

"You'll see when I get there."

It's frustrating to watch him struggle.

It saddens me to remember how talkative he was prior to his stroke.  The day the stroke happened he was swimming and playing catch with his uncle - and taking breaks every once in awhile to go out and have a "talk".  "Time out!" he'd declare and then swim out and talk with his uncle, usually offering some encouraging words, much like what we imagine a catcher in baseball does with the pitcher.  At some point in the conversation, after learning that this uncle thought the Chicago Bears would win the Super Bowl this year he said, "Yeah, you can keep on dreaming that dream.  It's not going to happen."  He was always the talkative child - holding the most interesting and/or funny conversations with anybody that would listen.

It's disheartening to think about his confidence.  Even his speech therapist mentioned how he was becoming a selective mute - all because he's smart enough to know he can't always get the words right.  This is not how I envisioned him starting kindergarten.  He always had a confident personality.

It's trying to be a part of a conversation where parents are complaining about how much their chid talks.  "After our first child we were not anxious for the second to start talking... because we knew he would never stop once he started."

It's time-consuming to match up insurance statements with hospital bills, to fill out forms for assistance with therapy payments, to make multiple doctors and test appointments, and to figure out the logistics of getting to these appointments and keeping any prior commitments to your older son.

It's tiring when you're overcome with all these concerns after the kids are tucked into bed and the house is quiet. 

Things are getting better.  He is improving.  We spent yesterday evening at a 40th birthday party where Liam was off and playing with his old neighbor almost the entire time. 

It's just hard sometimes and I don't want to paint an inaccurate picture.

We are lucky.

And yet, it is hard.