There are certain things in life that you know are going to affect your child, and are going to go down like a lead balloon; going to school, eating vegetables, bed time, brushing teeth. When you have a fae child this list is more extensive, but may not include the normal things on it. Our daughter will go to bed without fuss, and brush her teeth provided it is done in the correct way, because it is routine. She loves school, and cries when it stops for the holidays. She doesn’t eat vegetables, but to be honest she doesn’t really eat anything.
What she really struggles with is anything that breaks her patterns or systems.
So, you can probably empathise with my dread that, in the next month, I have to go into hospital for at least an overnight stay. This will disrupt her morning routine, her bedtime routine, drop off and school collection, as well as every extra curricula activity I ferry her to (and there are a lot!)
I have let the various staff members know; I am frantically explaining and writing lists of what to do in different circumstances. This comes with the problem that either she will mask and be fine right up until I get back – at which point she will turn into a scream daemon that I won’t have the energy to cope with having undergone a surgery; OR she won’t mask and will be a screaming daemon that no one will cope with the entire time I am away. There is no third option where she copes, it’s not going to happen.
Oh, and to add to the joy and games, I’m going to miss her birthday. Wonderful.
At this point, all I can do is start to introduce to her slowly the idea that I won’t be around for a day or so – which in the grand scheme of things is not that long, and she will be able to come see me – and hope that the idea percolates over time so is not a shock, and hope for the best. This is like trying to step off a land mine slowly, knowing that the mistake was already made and that you are only prolonging the inevitable.
I’m not sleeping because of the anxiety; she’s not sleeping because she fears she’s missing out; my husband isn’t sleeping because he has a bad case of plot bunnies. So all in all the entire house is cranky, sleep deprived and functional only on near toxic levels of caffeine. This is not sustainable, but hey, a general anaesthetic is like sleep right? And I’m sure my husband will shoot the bunnies (metaphorically) soon. So that will only leave her. Maybe we can find the ingredients for the Victorian children’s sleep tonic*? That stuff worked.
*of course it did, it was a mixture of opium, brandy and chloroform
Raising the Modern Fae 