What I want my boys to know concerning their sister

There are so many times that our life revolves around this girl of ours.  It may be a hospital stay or a sickness that keeps one of us home with her.  We can't just walk out the door and go somewhere at a moments notice and we never travel lightly.  Right or wrong, we will run ourselves ragged to keep things as normal as possible for these boys...to take them places and make sure they are still able to do things with their friends.  Things get really serious around here at times and hospitalizations occur and things get turned upside down and schedules get tossed out the window and then things settle down again and we get back to a "normal" of sorts and we are able to settle into a routine again. 

Whether it's crazy or calm around here I want you boys to always remember...

1. You matter.  The first thing that pops into my mind when I find out your sister is being admitted to the hospital is y'all.  It may be nothing more than pure survival but it is all for y'all....who will you stay with, what poor soul will have to feed all of y'all (ha ha), how will you get to school, practice, etc, when will one of us be able to get home to see y'all and tell you what is going on.  Even if both of us are needed at the hospital we can't stop thinking about where you are, what you are doing and how and when we are going to be able to get to you.  You matter big time.

2. You are prayed for as much as she is.  When your sister is sick and/or in the hospital I know you must think all we care about is that she gets better and that has to be our only prayer.  It isn't.  We pray that we will be able to help y'all have an understanding that is appropriate to your years. We pray that as you see us care for your sister you will understand what it means and what it looks like to put your own needs aside for someone else.  We pray that what satan has intended to tear us apart would instead bind us together in Christ and in love stronger than we were the day before.  We pray for you.

3.  You guys are always on my mind.  With every medicine I give, every feeding I administer, every diaper I change, your day and your schedule is on my mind.  I know you probably think that it's the other way around, that it is her schedule that runs our life, but I know different.  Yes, I have to do things for her out in public.  I have to feed her at football games or give her water and meds at a get together with friends or even change her diaper in some of the most remote areas of Disney World, but I do them so that we can be where we need to be for y'all.  I do that so I don't have to miss a game or so that you don't have to have time with friends cut short or so that we don't have stay home when we could be at Disney World.  Your schedule is why I do what I do.

4.  I would do the same thing I do for her for each one of you if you needed me to...please know that.  She is not more important than you or more loved than you.  It may appear to you that I do more for her than I do for y'all because she needs me in a different way than y'all do. There are basic human needs that I have to do for her that y'all are now able to do for yourselves, but you need to know that if the situation were reversed I would do the same thing for any one of you.

Always know there will never be a shortage of Jesus or love or conversation or laughs or hugs or back scratches here.