Which hurts worse?

A.) Being a 5-year-old who has to get 4 shots in his arm? -or- B.) Being the mom of a 5-year-old who has to get 4 shots in his arm?


The answer is B. I figured that out a little over 5 years ago when I held a brand new little being in my arms, and for the first time in my life my heart hurt. Hurt because I loved him so much. A kind of love that just swells up inside and sometimes you don't know how to wrap your mind around it. It's a different kind of love. I guess that's why sometimes as parents we question whether or not to add to our families because it's hard to fathom that you could actually feel that kind of love to the same extent for other children without your heart literally bursting open. But thank goodness, we are given the capacity to love in such a way whether it be 1, 2, or 10 kids. So for over 5 years now my heart has been hurting...in a good way.


But it kind of hurt in a bad way yesterday as I was preparing to send Grayson off to the doctor's office. It hurt so bad that I couldn't even be the one to take him. Daddy had to. True, I've learned how to deal with skinned knees, bloody lips, crushed spirits, wheezing, and vomit from head to toe (on me!), but to watch a stranger jab 4 needles into my son's arms--the thought of that was a little too hurtful to bare.


So I waited at home. And waited. And imagined just how awful it was in the exam room right at that minute. The screams, the crying, the tears, and the look that he gets in his eyes when someone has let him down. I might as well have been there because I was just certain that I had accurately imagined the scene to a "T".


No, I wasn't there, but I prepared for it to be just as bad when Grayson walked thru the door at home. I knew he'd probably walk in with a brave face, one that he had tried to keep plastered on his face the whole drive home. You know those looks? Those ones you have to work so hard at that they actually make your face hurt? But then I had a feeling that the second he saw me he'd break down. Mamas seem to have that effect. He'd crumble into my arms, and the tears would start flowing. The kind of tears that you can't stop, and the ones that stain cheeks and dampen your shoulder. I would be the only person who could make his pain go away even though my heart, at that minute, would be aching terribly.


Huh. What fantasyland do I live in? Thinking that I would be saver of my son's universe, the hero, the rescuer...

G: "Mom! What's my surprise?!?" (as he came bursting thru the door, definitely no evidence of hurting or sorrow in his eyes or a face that was sore from a plastered look of bravery)
Me: "Oh honey, are you okay? (running over to my post, arms outstretched and ready to catch him)
G: "Yep." (running past me to see if a "surprise" was anywhere in sight)
Me: "Did you get the shots?"
G: "Yep. I didn't cry."
Me: "Did you a little?"
G: "Nope."
Me: "Did you get the special cream to make it hurt not as bad?"
G: "Nope. That would have taken too long."
Me: "So you're okay?"
G: "Yep. Now what's my surprise, Mom?"

Alrightythen, now that's not much of a story to tell, is it? Apparently Grayson does not have the same flare for dramatics as his mother!!!