One day closer

Each day that goes by I grow more and more anxious about Aiden's upcoming surgery. I'm not sure if it's the pregnancy hormones that are making me increasingly emotional - or simply the fact that in a little over a week another human being will cut into my baby's head. Someone who will be solely responsible for fixing what needs to be fixed in order to ensure my child's brain will continue to grow uninhibited by his own skull.

And this human being is capable of mistakes.

I don't doubt his abilities. I simply understand that things can and do go wrong. Every time I hand over my child I am letting medical professionals pump his tiny body full of drugs so that their work can be done without my son feeling any pain. Then, they remove and manipulate pieces of his head and face as he lay there helpless on the table. When I start to think of just how much trust I have to put in another individual - that my baby's life is not in my control for those few hours - it is so very anxiety-inducing.

I cannot protect him. I can only have faith in the decisions I've made on his behalf to find the best team of doctors to take on that burden.

Aiden didn't ask for Apert Syndrome. All of the surgeries and medical intervention he will require throughout his life? It just doesn't seem fair. If I can't make sense of it in my own head, how I am going to be strong enough to help him understand?

I pray those answers come to me with time and faith in God.

I wish I could fast-forward through the next few weeks - to know the surgery was necessary and successful, to know that he will return home safe and that he will begin to heal.

And to know that I will make it through this too.

For now, I can only focus on being there for him through this next step in his journey. So that is what I will try my very best to do.