Making Friends in Unexpected Places

Three of the four kids had school on Monday, and that left me at home with my baby. It was nice. Very nice. So I thought I should go somewhere and do something to celebrate the fact that I got a day of one-on-one with my boy. I decided to take him to see Monsters vs. Aliens.

After the film, we stopped at the potty on the way out. I learned that Mr. Flushes a Lot should not be trusted to stand behind you while you're sitting on the loo. Bidets are not pleasant when they're unexpected.

And then I changed Micah's diaper. Getting him changed on one of those fold-down wall-mounted thingies is a struggle. They are not designed for 6 year olds is all I'm saying. And when the diaper is the messy variety things get even more tricky because you can't just lay the boy's bottom down while you find somewhere to put the used diaper or grab an extra wipe. (Besides the fact that poop will get everywhere, his bottom tends to hang off the end of the table. He's just too big for the thing.) It's obvious to everyone around that the boy is too big to be wearing diapers. Painfully obvious. And inevitably, someone always feels the need to ask how old he is.

I always feel there is some explanation needed when I reveal the fact that he should have been potty trained years ago. I struggle with this because it sounds like I'm apologizing for the hand that life dealt me. But recently I realized that if someone has a problem with my 6 year old not being potty trained they can do one of several things.

1. Lump it.

2. Potty train Micah for me.

3. Assume there is a good reason for his current lack of toileting skills, and perhaps even ask.

4. Realize that the boy has Down syndrome and understand that sometimes things like potty training take longer. Like 6 years of longer and counting.

I decided that Monday would be the perfect day to test my newfound backbone and see how straight it helped me to stand. When asked the inevitable question, I simply said, "he's 6." And I smiled. Because he's my boy and I'm very proud of him, and I won't make excuses for who he is any longer.

It was the sweetest 5 minutes of my day. While I stood there trying to balance my boy's bottom above a too-short board suspended several feet in the air, I made a friend. As I wiped poo that smeared into cracks and crevices heretofore unknown to man, I heard about my friend's grown son with Down syndrome. As I struggled to find a place to put a messy diaper and get another wipe to finish the job at hand, I was reassured that our kids are the best blessings that we'll ever have in this lifetime. And we both knew that she meant our kids with Down syndrome. We each had 3 other kids besides, but agreed that there was something special about our kids with special needs. Something magical. Something angelic. And we wouldn't ever change our boys even if we could.

We knew that of all the parents in the world, we were the lucky ones. We got the kids with disabilities.