i'm having a little bit of melt down. it goes something like this: i want Beach to not have a disability any more. i want to raise my hand and say 'oh excuse me we have had the disability for more than our share could some else take a turn please?' like you would with the schoolroom hamster. it is either that or i want her to stop moving out into the world. picture this: me holding her back from success because i'm scared she is going to get hurt- that is an honest picture of what is going on in my heart. i know i don't want others to treat her different but i want to. i know how capable she is but honest mom thoughts i want her to stop before something really bad happens- something worse than the momentary panic & embarrassment of her glasses getting tangled in her hair. 
maybe you're thinking hold on there, slow down, so you couldn't get the contacts in this morning. so they tore last week, got lost in her eye, and it got infected. so they haven't really helped her vision like promised. so she told her coach she vaults mostly blind. so, you're right this stinks continue venting tissue? whiskey?
more and more she complains about her vision or lack there of and it is because the further out she creeps the more the world has its say. yes, i know a little blind left eye and not even totally blind at that is nothing compared with the possible challenges handed out, our hamster is nothing compared to the howler monkeys of another.... but this is my kid and what she is doing is amazing she is a gymnast and if i am honest with the way i am feeling right now the thing i want most is her eye fixed and if not that then i want her to stop being a gymnast. i don't want her to be alone out there and i don't want her to be judged- really think about it from a mom's point of view- from a soccer mom's point of view. from the point of view of a mom who doesn't want her child to hurt any more than she already does. would you choose this for your child? i can't believe i am saying this but i miss the referees. i don't want Beach to put herself out there and gymnastics is so far out there the only thing further would be tightrope walking.
nobody panic. nothing is going to change. her eye will still stink and her gymnastics will still rock and i will continue to be a gymnastics mom but what i want to say is it is really scary to see your child fight so hard for something and to know you can't help where it really matters. i can drive her to the gym and i can pay the money and i can watch her win medal after medal until there aren't any more to win but i can't help her to see.
so what set me off? the 45 minutes of trying to get contacts in coupled with the look on her faces as she tried to get her glasses untangled from her hair. and all the little statements lobbed from the backseat about wishing she could see. the patching and the tears. the years of looking at her through the other side of her coke bottle google eye glasses.
and this: little Rae competed her first meet today, first time on the podium she tied for third with another little girl based on the all around scores they broke the tie awarding Rae 4th and the other girl 3th. the gym maids accidental gave Rae the medal then as the whole gym watched in horror they took it back. reasonable parents hissed there may have been booing. it was unfair & it was mean. that is what i am afraid of the judges of life taking things away, no not things taking my child away, chipping away who she is because of what she isn't. And then there was this: i want my child to not pause while planning the games for her birthday party and ask "with my eye will i be able to play these?"
this is where Alexis and Conner's mom has to step in, the young mom who 15 years ago made a decision watching another mom justify letting her daughter live her life even though living her life cost her and her father their lives. (Jessica Dubroff) i made a decision that i too would be willing to let my children live no matter how painful it is to watch. i didn't say i had to like it. sometimes you just have to let go- of yourself.
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