setting the record straight

When the doctors authorized Ish's casts to be split to relieve pressure, they had the casts wrapped with bandages to be held together and then told us that we would need to replace the bandages a few times in the course of the six weeks.  A few popsicle stains and snags later, we knew it was time.  But I also knew that I wasn't feeling comfortable about doing it.  All I could imagine was seeing the cast pieces shift in mid-wrap, and I knew that I was a fainting risk.

So last night some of our friends, including a mom of athletes and a friend whose job includes changing others' bandages, gathered round to see this thing through.  And as I was avoiding making direct eye contact with Ish's legs, I was thinking about all that I had been "privy" to in Baltimore and was amazed to think that I had never passed out that entire time.  Because I want to set the record straight: I am not a strong person.  I am wimpy, really, and I am so thankful for the power of Jesus strong in my weakness.

And to prove that we are not a well-oiled machine around here, that there is plenty of weakness:

• When my in-laws left that first week of us all being home, I cried, certain that we wouldn't even survive to bedtime.
• When we were introducing some regular strength Tylenol into Ish's medications, I took the boys out, bought the Tylenol, and added it to our temporary medicine cabinet on the kitchen counter.  The next day when I went to use some, I noticed that the seal had already been removed, but I could not remember whether or not I had actually been the one to open it.  So we had to throw it away, make another trip to the pharmacy, and have Mark make an intentional memory of being the one to break the seal.
• I have been late to pick up my kindergartner as often as I have been on time in the past two weeks.  That is five days too many to young Elijah-son.
• I got quite woozy upon discovering a blister under Ish's casts.
• I have made two appointments where I either asked for the wrong day or remembered the wrong time. And these are just two that others caught for me - there are probably more to be discovered.
• I have had long moments where I thought that this present situation was the most important thing going on in the world. 
• It wasn't until Saturday that I even thought about what beverages I would be serving approximately 75 people at this Friday's piano recital. 
• I have snuck pajamas out of the hamper, folded them, and reshelved them so that the boys would have something to wear.
• I have had three different containers of flowers that Eli carefully planted from seed expire on my watch.
• I have forgotten to put the brakes on the wheelchair enough times that the boys all have been heard to say, "Ish is rolling away!"

For those reasons and more, I am so thankful for this:

But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.  II Corinthians 12:9-10