Wonderful Big Brother

I have so much to catch up on here...soccer season, preschool, Joshua getting closer to the age of two, more hospitals stays and medicine, and Jacob's first field trip. But, I just had to write about my morning with my two amazing little guys before I forget.

I joined a mother's group that meets twice a month, which is wonderful and I am thoroughly enjoying my time there and getting to know new mothers, as well as get to know women I knew previously even better. But, Joshua had a tough go of it at the beginning. I leave Joshua in the "walkers" room, which is essentially all toddlers up until they become potty trained/preschool age. Jacob is in a preschool room with some kids he actually does go to preschool with, and he loves it. But, Joshua is too young for me to explain that I will be right back, and that he is in a safe place where he can have fun with new toys and friends. He hates going. He cries and screams, but he has been doing SO much better, and does calm down each time now and play.

This past weekend, Joshua was in the hospital with an asthma attack, and is now on four different steroids. He is a jittery mess this week, unable to sleep soundly because of all of the medicine in his system. But, he is not sick. He has been seen by doctors all week, and had a clean bill of health every time (in terms of sickness you can pass to others - we had been working on his breathing issues, obviously!). But, he has a cough from his asthma attack, and sounds kind of gross because of it all breaking up in his chest and lungs.

The volunteers in his room thought he was sick and not feeling well, so pulled me from the meeting to take him home. Even though I knew he wasn't sick, I took him and went to Jacob's room to pick him up and take him home. The volunteer in Jacob's room was the sweetest woman, and offered to let Joshua join their room for the rest of the morning so Joshua could stay with his brother, and so I could hear the speaker we had coming. I gave her my phone number in case he was a distraction to the older kids, and went back to the meeting. I listened from the doorway for a minute to make sure he wasn't crying, and was shocked that she had Joshua done crying within 30 seconds. What an amazing woman!

I returned at the end of the meeting to hear the most wonderful report on both boys. Joshua had a fantastic time playing on the playground, being with his brother, and running with the big kids. He asked for "mama" every once in a while, but the volunteer was able to distract him and he didn't cry the rest of the time. What melted my heart was hearing how wonderful Jacob was for his brother. Jacob took care of him the whole time, included him, and took care of him on the playground. When Joshua dropped his pacifier on the playground, he went and found it, gave it back to his brother, and made sure he was okay. He let his brother sit with him, and helped him the entire morning. He is just the best big brother I could ever hope he would be. He knew I wasn't around to see any of this, and he very easily could have just ran around and left his brother to handle the morning on his own. But, he took his brother under his wing and made him included and comfortable. Jacob is the reason I was able to have an uplifting, positive morning with other mothers. He was so wonderful, and I made sure to remind him all day of what a wonderful boy he was and how much Joshua and I appreciate him and his kind heart. He was beaming.

But, Jacob was also a little upset when he got in the car. He has never once cared to be dropped off or to be away from me, but was crying when I picked him up. In the car, I heard a trembling voice in the backseat tell me, "They are going to tell the teacher and I'm going to get in trouble." He started crying and told me that he accidentally colored on the table when he crayon slipped off the paper, and a kid in the class told him that he was going to get in trouble, and that he was going to tell the teacher on Jacob. Jacob is such a rule-follower, that this stuck with him all morning and was causing him a lot of anxiety about being in trouble for something he didn't mean to do. He broke my heart! He is just so sweet! I assured him that accidents happen, and he most definitely would not be in trouble and that the crayon was surely already cleaned off of the table.

I was beyond proud of Jacob for telling me the truth, even though he thought he was going to get in trouble. In his mind, he was basically tattling on himself when he told me he colored on the table and thought I would tell the teacher what he did. I told him that I was so proud of him for telling me the truth, and he should always remember there is nothing he should hide from mommy. If he makes a mistake or does something he is not suppose to do, the best thing is to tell mommy and we can figure it out together. I want him to know that home is a safe place, and that mommy is here for him to help with problems and not to get him into trouble. He was so happy, and relieved. I am thankful that a big hug and a special lunch can fix his problems at this age!

A very successful morning with a lot of life lessons - much more than I thought I would get on this rainy Friday!