Dragon Moms

Two friends recently sent me the link to an article in the New York Times opinion section. It's by a woman named Emily Rapp, and it's about being a "dragon mom." I was not too quick to read it at first--lots of people send me lots of links and even with the best of intentions I don't have the energy to read them all. But when it reappeared in my inbox this morning I decided to have a look. And I have been thinking about it ever since. (if you want to have a look, the link is obviously in the first sentence there.)

In this article Emily is talking about parents of terminally ill children. But I think it is fair, and totally makes sense, to include parents of profoundly disabled children in these reflections. At the moment I definitely have the latter. I may also have the former, but that is as yet undecided. So that makes me a Dragon Mom too.

I'm not going to say any more about it just now--it's all too raw and personal for this kind of forum. What she says actually just scratches the surface of all that is real and brutal and honest about our humanity, how we deal with the life we are given and the people we are given to love. If it were not for my faith I don't know how I would survive. As it is, the one thing my faith gives me, and most recently too, is the certainty that it's ok. It is good to struggle, it is good to admit defeat and despair because not only are these universal emotions: they are redeemable.