A Balm

When Abby gets in trouble it is heartbreaking. For the first few moments I'm usually pretty irritated, so you could say that my heart is hardened against the very sad tears that come with a time-out or a stern "talking to", but once I'm past that it is so very sad to hear her crying. I certainly have to leave the room when she is in her time-out spot lest her forlorn carriage breaks me.

Today she needed a good talking to, but not by me. I knew something was up when the bus pulled up and Ms. Cathy gave me a frown. It wasn't an angry frown, but a sad frown. Usually I don't board the bus, but today I did so I could get the full scoop while Ms. Cathy helped Abby out of her seat. Apparently, Abby was having a bit of trouble staying in her seat for the ride home. Even the seatbelt wasn't enough to hold her in. She is double-jointed see, and can quite easily maneuver out of restraints. Her shenanigans even caused Ms. Cathy to have to pull the bus over and get her situated again (a move I'm very familiar with). Abby was just not understanding that you cannot be moving around on the bus. Ms. Cathy had to bring out her "I-mean-it" voice, which in turn caused Abby to cry.

As I listened to the story, and Abby's head got lower and lower, I didn't know who felt worse about the whole thing, Abby or Ms. Cathy. At the end of the whole story Abby was letting out sad whimpers as she turned to give Ms. Cathy an apology hug. We then had to wait while Abby took the time to wipe her nose and each eye with the tissue that was provided, before she declared that she was "all better now".

As we were off I reassured Ms. Cathy that Abby was fine, and her response was, "Yes, but I'm not." I completely get that. There isn't anything much more heart-wrenching then when Abby turns to you and chokes out an "I'm sorry." Luckily Ms. Cathy understands that Abby's safety comes first.

I carried her into the house and drove home the point that we just want to make sure that she doesn't get hurt on the bus, all the while assuring her that she was loved and that tomorrow would be better.  Abby listened and agreed to do better, then moved on to happier things. I'm sure she didn't give her sadness another thought, but as I put her to bed tonight I couldn't help but see that little face from earlier before me, and it made me sad. She fell asleep quickly but as she cuddled next to me, with her head on my shoulder I found that I wasn't ready to sneak off to "my own thing" just yet. Where I had soothed her hours earlier, she was now soothing me. Soon enough the sadness was gone and only tenderness remained. Abby certainly is a balm for this soul.

This is an old picture (from 2009), but I thought it went well with tonight's
post. This is Abby sitting in her car-seat with her pants on her head. We'd stopped
for gas and I turned to see this. Mind you, those pants were on her bottom when
we left the house - and she'd been strapped in the whole time. Now you can
see that a measly little seatbelt isn't going to hold this girl down for long.