As each year passes and she continues to thrive and grow with her incredible post-Fontan one ventricle circulation, I am given the gift of celebrating the next milestone of my child like any other parent. I get to focus on Frozen decorations and an Elsa cake. All because, she didn't have any surgeries when she was four, she didn't suffer any major setbacks, we didn't face any life threatening situations because she lives with half a heart. We had a completely normal and uneventful 4th year of her life. And today, we celebrate all that she DID accomplish -- she didn't have to "survive" the age of 4 -- like she did the ages of 1, 2, and 3 instead she simply had to THRIVE. And she did exactly that and more.
As she gets older, I look forward to seeing how she likes to celebrate her own birthday celebrations. I want her to celebrate as she sees fit with me, her father and her siblings in the wings showering her with love and appreciation for all the amazing things she does and says and puts her heart and mind to year after year. I want to be careful that as her mother I never selfishly define her birthday each year as a memorial to her heart condition, of all she endured, of everything she survived, of all the near misses and uncertanties that her future held in the beginning...the slow three year trek we made together with "there are no guaranties" slowly emerging into magical certainties as each successful surgery passed. The slow and steady realization that something we were never certain we could have might just end up being the very thing we had always dreamed of -- a healthy, normal, childhood and life for our little girl.
And yet, while I look at my happy healthy smiley five year old daughter -- I can't deny that about two bars into the tune of Happy Birthday the tears are already in my eyes. I can't soon forget that during some of our darkest hours during the pregnancy and at the hospital during the first several months of her life, my husband and I would white knuckle each other's hands and try to visualize a little girl dancing, running, spinning around, and laughing out loud with her siblings -- we were literally attempting to will her into existence away from the reality we were living with all the tubes, wires, blood and gore, florescent lights and the incessant sound of beeping machines around our brand new baby girl. And so today, when I saw my five year old wave to me from the bus on her way to school on her fifth birthday -- it's quite literally watching a dream come true -- she IS the child we envisioned that we hoped and prayed would someday be: five.years.old.
So, in that sense, I think it is worth taking a a moment, if even just a small moment, to remember her heart condition, to remember her journey, to remember that nothing was guaranteed, out of respect for the beautiful life we have together today -- in that sense it is important to remember. We must respect how we got to today. How we got to FIVE.
Because every year, every minute, with any of my children, it's a gift. Thankfully in the case of Ronan and Tommy -- it hasn't been so directly threatened as it has been with Haven. My heart aches at the mere notion that Ronan or Tommy could ever be taken from me. With Haven, my heart did ache because that threat was very real. Her mortality will forever be a very real thing. I have to pay respect to that fact or otherwise, I would feel like I was shirking the good fortune that has been allotted to us -- and that so many, many other heart families simply do not have. Those families -- they would give anything to live in our shoes for just one day of normalcy. At the risk of "dwelling" on Haven's heart condition as she gets older -- I think it would be disrespectful to move on without each year thanking our lucky stars. Literally.
So here's to the truth of your life, my sweet Haven. The fact and reality of your heart condition and the journey we've shared together to get through each and every day to have you here today. Let me just say, if this is what you've endured in your short little time here so far....if this is your beginning... I can only imagine what you have in store for your middle and your end, sweet girl -- the world will only benefit from having you so preciously and carefully kept within it:
And in honor of all the lovely, fabulous, things you bring to our lives and the lives around you on a daily basis -- and in honor of the "normalcy" of not only your birthday -- but your life -- Happy Birthday Haven, the world wouldn't be half the place it is without you in it. We will be forever thankful:
