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all grown up

A week ago tonight, Madeleine got her right arm stuck between a rubber ball and the moving belt on our treadmill.  It was horrible.  The belt took off skin around the wrist and on the inside of her forearm.  A doctor friend told us it was pretty much a 2nd degree burn and to treat it as such.  The hardest part was keeping bandages from sticking to it because for several days it oozed.  No blood but just a clear oozing.  Once we started putting wax paper down as the first layer of dressing (Phil's brilliant idea) things got much easier.  Tonight it looked so much better.  New skin is growing and we are just trusting for no major scars or no scaring at all.

Madeleine has been a real trooper.  I came to a new conclusion throught this ordeal.  People who intentially harm children should be put to death.  I have always struggled with the death penalty because our system seems so easily flawed by corrupt judges, jurys, lawyers, cops, witnesses and too may innocent people have been sentenced to death.  But when we were ever so carefully picking out gauze stuck to Maddie's little 3 year old arm and she was crying and pleading with us to stop, I thought, "A person that could abuse a child is so sick.  Sick enough to deserve death."  

Having children always seems to change us adults.  I remember how Jana (my sister) always hated watching movies where a child got hurt in someway.  I always thought it was so weird until I had a kid of my own.  

If Madeleine has been a trooper through this I have been the wus.  I never let her see it but I was emotionally wrecked each time I had to force her to sit and let us clean her wounds. 

I remember when I was falling in love with Phil that I began to think about how much it would hurt when death seperated us.  The hurt I felt just thinking about it almost made me want to stop loving him. Children are the same way.  I sometimes hold Lilian and want to just beg and plead with God to never allow harm to fall on her.  To convience him that taking her from us would be the worst thing he could do to us.  But, as with Phil, I remind myself that it's all a gift. Gifts are given and because God is perfect, he sometimes takes them away.  It doesn't stop me from begging and pleading with God to let me keep these gifts through a long and rich life. 

This hasn't been one of my more uplifting blogs, to say the least.  So, I'll share something sweet. The first time we took off the bandages and they didn't stick to her wounds, I felt a wave of relief sweep over my body and I said, "Oh, thank you God."  Maddie got a huge smile on her face and said, "Jesus helped me!"

Imagine the smile she'll have when she understands just how much Jesus has helped her. 

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