Today she is 24. Twenty four hours in a day twenty four years in a lifetime. In as much as there is NO SECRET how much my kids mean to me, and how much Kaitlyn has meant in where I am today, I want to take this opportunity to relay something to any parent out there who has young kids dealing with diabetes.
Last night we were leaving the Nassau Coliseum where we attended a home show. Nice to look at ‘stuff’ and talk to people in the ‘business’ of caring for homes. As we left, people were attending a ‘Disney on Ice Show’. This has a huge bad reminder in my memory; as when Kaitlyn was very young she had one of the most severe glycemic reactions right in the back seat of our car in the parking lot as we pulled into see a show. I was quickly reminded how many wonderful memories of Disney Shows existed as well, but the bad one still haunts me.
We have dealt with diabetes since Kaitlyn was two. As you look at your child battling this disease; I want you to know that the only thing that can hold them back is their own imagination. I don’t tell you that as a wish but as a life-long observation. As I continued to pray nightly by her crib, her tween bed, and her teen bed that she would not be taken from us; I could not help at marvel at the child she was, the woman she was becoming and now is.
I am sorry she inherited my ‘will’ because when we go at it…..we go at it good. 🙂
That said, she was a wonder in high school and she got every bit of mileage in friendship and activities. She came home once and said, ‘I don’t have my High School Letter, and I should…..in something.” She tried-out for something and made the team. “Me and my partner are absolutely horrible”, she would say; but a smile would quickly go across her face, “but I’m getting my letter.”
That’s Kaitlyn. See it. Want it. Go for it. Get it. Even if takes a step to the left and /or a step to the right; at the end of the day she gets what she sets her mind to achieve. She amazes me daily.
To my weakness, being my only daughter, she pretty much gets what she wants from me as well; and Jill surely works to counter my actions that I don’t go overboard —-winning—-sometimes.
Kaitlyn works 1000% on whatever she does and yet, (and I have said this before) she is the type of person that genuinely gets excited at opening gifts; even the small ones in her stocking at Christmas time. She just loves life and she enjoys it, truly, more than anyone I know.
There is nothing that she has wanted that diabetes stopped her. Nothing. And whatever she wanted to try, even cross country; we let her. We found a way to make it work. When she stopped something, it was her choice and her choice alone.
So I wish Kaitlyn Happy Birthday today. And to you I say, look at your child and know that life has wonderful things in store for them and let them try whatever it is they want to try. Our job is to find a way to make that happen for them.
Life is not for the ‘what I can’t do’; real living is to take on the challenge, and watch your child look back and say, “Yeah, I did that!!!!!!”
Nothing better than that, especially on their birthday.
I love you baby. KKNN
I am a diabetes dad.
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One reply on “On Her Birthday, Even at 24………Her Daddy’s Eyes Only See This!!!!!!!”
I will let her know.