I often look backward in time and think about the path my life has followed. What if I had made a different decision along the way? How would the course of my life have changed? Kind of like the “Choose Your Own Adventure” books I used to read as a kid. There are certain forks in the road where you have to make a choice and that choice has great weight and a different outcome.
There have been times in my life where major decisions needed to be made and I could sense that they were turning points. One of them was when we decided to buy our first house. This was before we had any children. We looked at and talked about two different options. Should we buy the nice forever house in the quiet suburbs with the wrap around porch and the white picket fence where we’d raise our perfect children in an award winning school district? Or should we buy the fixer-upper in the city, gut and rebuild it, and experience a life of unknowns to be able to say later we’d done something we’d always wanted to do? I got the feeling when we chose the city we were choosing a life of great highs and lows and it would cause us to grow into deeper individuals. A life that might be hard work but it would be worth it. A life well lived. If we had chosen the suburbs we would’ve been choosing the hum-drum, middle of the road, dare I say – a life with maybe not as much meaning? When we saw our house we knew it was the one. The seller changed his mind on selling it. Doug persuaded him. It all eventually fell into place. No matter the obstacles put in our path, the house was ours. Later we would surmise that part of the reason we were led to that house was Aden. The special ed services he needed were available at our city house, not at the house in the suburbs. What would’ve happened if we’d picked the suburbs?
Another instance was when Aden was five years old and it was determined he was not getting enough benefit from his cochlear implants to listen and speak. We had a choice to make – send him to the center-based county-wide cognitive impaired school or the local regular ed school with the cognitive impaired classroom. My first instinct was send him to the regular ed school. We visited the center-based school and I went home and cried. The center-based school was for moderate, severe and multiply severely impaired children. It was hard to see all the kids there that needed so much help. Even though I knew he had significant cognitive impairment it was a whole different thing to acknowledge it by sending him there. The staff at his current school did some digging around and advised us to take the center-based placement. They had heard nothing but good things about the teacher he would be placed with there. Though I didn’t think that was the path to take, we took that leap of faith and sent him. Looking back now we know that was just what Aden needed. It provided the stepping stone to place him in our current school district. What would’ve happened if we’d picked the local school?
Two years ago we were told Aden needed a school program that could challenge him more. We were going to have to move. We looked high and low for a house with our specifications in our price range. We wanted to be moved in before the new school year started. It took months and it was getting down to the wire, but we finally found a house we thought would work. We saw it several times. We even went in and took measurements and tons of pictures to determine where all our stuff would go. We picked bedrooms for the kids. We talked about all the changes we wanted to do to it. The seller seemed desperate. Their realtor even called us to see where we were on making a decision. We put in our offer and it was rejected outright with no counter offer. They did not want to hear from us again. We were hysterical. It was April and school started in just over four months. We needed residency in order for the school district to accept Aden and put all his services in place. I was pregnant with Ethan, due in August. We wanted to be moved in as soon as possible. There were no other options.
About a week later I happened to be looking through the listings and saw a listing I had seen many times before – a brand new house in a subdivision. The specs were exactly what we were looking for but I had not considered it because a) we loved houses with character – we lived in a 1920s house b) it was right next to the highway and we were trying to avoid highways, airports and train tracks and c) none of that mattered anyway – there was no time to build. I finally showed it to Doug on a whim and said “see, it even has the second floor laundry we love in our current house.” I had no idea he would immediately jump on seeing it. Turned out when he went to see it the house was almost finished but someone had bought it that very morning. The only available lot in the subdivision was in a location we were less than thrilled with. But during the time we were looking at it, the financing fell through on another empty lot across the street. One we liked. We immediately put down a deposit to hold the land for 48hrs so we could think about it and the rest is history. It’s just what we wanted and needed – in a good location, close to the school, has the layout we needed, located on a private drive so no worries about traffic for escape artist Aden, big backyard, friendly neighbors, tons of kids around. Because we had it built we could also put in other things to accommodate our needs like expanding the garage and putting in hearing-impaired smoke detectors. So much better than the house we put an offer on. What if that other house hadn’t fallen through?
When Ethan was seven months old I remember driving onto our street and thinking, this is it. It just can’t get any better than this. Doug has a good job, we have a nice, new house, three great kids, great school. Then we found out we were unexpectedly pregnant with Alex. At first I was scared. Ethan wasn’t even sleeping through the night so I was still a bit crazy from the sleep deprivation. Then I had an overwhelming sense that this was the way the path was supposed to go. We wanted four kids just not that soon. Someone at the time said “If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans.” So I was going to go with His plan knowing it must be better than mine.
I feel like some things in life are course corrections. That house we were going to buy was a sure thing. The only other offer was a land contract and the realtor said the seller wasn’t interested. It was like God stepped in and said “No, that’s not where your life is supposed to go. Here’s the path I’ve chosen for you.” I thought I knew exactly where our lives were going. I could picture it. There was a sense of relief in knowing. Then Alex’s life and death changed the course of our lives. We are on a different path than we were just eight months ago. It wasn’t my plan. It wasn’t what I wanted. It wasn’t what I thought would happen. Now I feel like I’ve lost my way, like I’m on a map where the road just disappears and there’s no way to know where it goes. I wish He would just tell me where to go and what to do. I’m waiting for the course correction that puts me back where I thought I was supposed to be. Will it ever come? What if His path and the one I wanted aren’t the same? How do I accept that?
