My Sweet Man

Jeremy doesn't put on pretenses. Wherever he is, he is the same. There is some sense of comfort in that. I know some moms attend conferences only to hear that their child takes on a different persona in the classroom. Brian and I spent most of our latest conference nodding and laughing.

Within the past month, Brian and I noticed our toilet paper consumption increased by quite a bit. Figuring out what happens in a house with small people is always a chore. Imagine the "Who's on First?" sketch. It goes something like this:

Me: "Jeremy, where is the toilet paper?"
Jeremy: "I used it to go potty."
Me: "why did you need to use so much?"
Jeremy: "Because that's why I used it."

It would be comical if it weren't so real, trust me. I noticed the uptick in toilet paper usage but my powers of observation were lacking. It wasn't until a couple weeks later that I realized that the cardboard cores were missing, too. Even armed with that information, I still thought Jeremy was just using too much paper.

He's always liked to eat paper. His first pediatrician trained us to look for what was different. He's always had a weird proclivity for it. Recently, I found him chomping on Bekah' artwork; I assumed it was a jealousy thing.

The other night, though, was the last straw. After the kids had gone to bed, Brian found him in our room. Specifically, he was in our linen closet, looking for toilet paper. In his words, he "wanted to take the toilet paper to his room so he could eat it."

A visit to his pediatrician today confirmed a diagnosis of anemia (pica often accompanies anemia). There are things we can do to treat it, but my heart was breaking because he kept asking for his sister and brother. He asked for them when Dr. Gronberg examined him, when the nurse pricked his finger and as the visit stretched out.

The rest of the story is that Dr. Gronberg asked me if Jeremy has been anxious lately. I got choked up again. He has been hating school. He has told me at various times that he's not a school guy, that there's no way he's going to school, etc. He is very popular at school and at church, has a lot of compassion and is incredibly empathic.

But he's very high-strung. He's always been very rigid in the way he sees the world. My dad bought him a Playskool Ball Popper several years ago. No one else is allowed to play with it because they don't play with it correctly. He obsessively closes all doors in our house, wears a baseball cap at all times of the day (except in the tub and at school), won't let anything extraneous sit on his placemat.

So Dr. Gronberg suggested that he see a counselor. I cried again, not (as my father suggested) because my son is not "normal"; rather, I cried because my 5-year-old has already almost died twice, been hospitalized four times, undergone numerous medical procedures and tests. In short, he doesn't deserve this.

I don't understand why God wouldn't help him out. I don't understand why God wouldn't shield him from this. It makes no sense to me and it pisses me off. I have a sense that he is destined for greatness but at this rate, greatness will have to happen soon.