God’s Good Design in “Mommy Guilt”

Friday we had a normal day. We lounged around waiting for Mr. Incredible to come home, and my friend, (Lammy), to come over for a visit. Mr. Incredible bought a new truck that day and after visiting with Lammy we went for a “joy ride.” ;)

Before Lammy left, I gave her the grand tour of our house with Sweetpea on my hip. At the end of the tour I showed her the monster bathroom. As I turned to head out of the room and complete the tour, Sweetpea’s head collided with the wall.

When I heard the impact, I knew it was bad. She fussed, but didn’t seem as upset as you would expect. Mr. Incredible and I went for our “joy ride,” and about an hour after her accident, Sweetpea became inconsolable. If you have spent any time with her, you know that Sweetpea is such a happy, easy going baby. We knew something was wrong.

I immediately assumed it was my fault for her accident earlier. After letting her cry for a little bit to properly asses the situation, we decided to take her to the ER.

Mommy Guilt was in full swing as you can imagine. On the way to the hospital I knew she would be ok, but head injuries must be taken seriously!

After triage and while we were waiting in our room, I started getting a strange idea.

Almost 4 months prior, she spent two weeks in the hospital to drain a cyst on her brain. We have not had a follow up CT scan since the day we were released from the hospital.

I started thinking, “what if there is something wrong with her cyst, so God had me bonk her head to scare us so we would take her into the hospital.”

At first I thought it was just wishful thinking, ya know, so I didn’t have to endure the Mommy Guilt. Then I started feeling that it was for sure her cyst because God is crazy awesome like that. I just knew that is what it was.

After a CT and Xray, I got the news that I was expecting. I caused no damage, but her cyst was troubling. When we got news we were transferred by ambulance to the med center.

When we got there we waited in the ER until about 6am when we visited with a neurosurgeon. He said he wanted to watch her for a day or so. While the cyst was troubling, he didn’t want to act too soon. He said that if I hadn’t bonked her, I wouldn’t have noticed the cyst so she must not be that bad.

Up until that point I was entrenched with Mommy Guilt. Then the fog became to clear. While Lammy was visiting, Sweetpea cried a few times for no reason- not her personality. She is cutting about 9 teeth so naturally I assumed that was the culprit.

So, as God would have it, instead of watching Sweetpea suffer at home and having to decide to take her in or not, He made it so that we took her in immediately. By 8, 2 other surgeons came in and I told them she was not acting normal. They called O.R. and got us in immediately.

Surgery went well and they ended up inserting a second shut, (so they had to cut open her head and her tummy).

They said we would go home this morning if all was well. I did not like that too much, but when they visited her, I told them she was still not herself, so they said they would keep us another night, and leave in the morning. Good choice. She hasn’t eaten much today, and is still not herself. I honestly do not expect to go home in the AM considering she is still not herself. It is possible we could go home tomorrow if she improves, but I am not holding my breath, nor am I concerned. I’d rather be here than at home.

I am in awe of what God orchestrated to get us here.

Mommy Guilt got us here within a few hours of not only her accident, but also within hours of her first crying outburst, (the first tell tale sign something was wrong).

Had I not hit her head, I would have put her to bed at normal time. When she woke up in the middle of the night crying I would have assumed she was cutting teeth. I would have given her medicine and brought her in my bed so she could sleep soundly.* When she slept in the next morning, (as she did in the hospital- she was either sleeping or crying in the hospital), I would not have thought anything of it. She is a really good sleeper, who sleeps to 10 on occasions. Saturday she would have become sleepier and I would have once again assumed it was her teeth.

Bottom line, if I did not have Mommy Guilt, we would not have noticed something was truly wrong with Sweetpea until Saturday afternoon at the earliest. Then we would have taken time to debate taking her to the hospital. I would say that we would take her to the hospital either Saturday night or Sunday after she woke up, (depending how bad her symptoms had become). Then we would have driven to the hospital, (quite worried), spent a few hours there, then get transferred downtown, spend a few more hours there, and THEN have her surgery. So we would be looking at a Sunday morning- Monday morning surgery.

Sweetpea’s surgery was completed by 10:30 am on Saturday morning!!! She had just begun going down hill. Her discomfort was a minimum and we got her taken care of very quickly.

When she hit her head, I felt so badly! Now, I am rejoicing in that accident!! My favorite Bible Verse is Romans 8:28 and it is situations like this that show you why!

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

God is crazy amazing sometimes!! Praise God for holding the whole world in His hands!!



*Sweetpea never gets to sleep with us. She did once when she was in a lot of pain for her teeth. I would rather her get some sleep then keep her out of our bed, (also she has no problem returning to her bed when she feels better). I refuse to sleep with our kids regularly. That’s Mommy and Daddy’s bed, thank you very much! ;)