I'm a little bit behind with my posts (about 4 months, actually). So, I pick up where I left you: beginning of February. This post is about one of the most emotional periods in our family life - don't worry, I won't make this an emo-blog.
Our daughter Mone was born and the day she came home from the hospital, our family was finally reunited. Saskia and I were really looking forward to our first "family feeling" - we kind of felt like a couple with a kid before, instead of a real family.
But after the first night at home, Elmo got ill (varicella). He called it "de stippeltjes" (the dots)
My dad picked him up from his kindergarden and kidnapped him for a whole week. We really missed the little fellow - it was the first time he was gone for more than 2 days. And with all the emotions due to the birth of Mone, we didn't know how to feel - somewhere between guilty and pleased because of the peace and quiet at home.
We talked on the phone every day with my parents, and the stories seemed just horrible. The first days he didn't really mind being sick, but then it got worse - I've never seen the varicella so bad. By coincidence we got a publicity in the mail about a vaccination against varicella that same day. Man, did we feel bad.
So I decided to go and visit him, which turned out to be a bad idea. I saw how my parents did their very best to take care of him, but the whole ritual of cleaning his wounds, covering them with cream and powder.. it was just as if you were forced to torture the little guy. He tried to be brave but it was just too painful. When I saw it, I was totally shaken. It was the first time (and the only, so far) that I felt like I was failing him because I wasn't there when he needed me.
I put him to bed and lay next to him. Because it was getting late, I had to sneak out of the room and leave like a thief in the night. He woke up when I was leaving, and yelled out for me. I could still hear him when I was driving of. I felt like a traitor, but decided to minimize it when talking about my visit to Saskia, so she wouldn't feel as guilty as me.
It really got me thinking about how important Elmo has become to us over the past two years. The next days we heard that he was getting better, but the empty feeling inside didn't go away. We decided not to visit him, since it looked like it did more harm then good. We made the best out of it and focussed on little Mone who was only about 10 days old at the time.
When I finally got to pick him up, he was all chearful. And driving home, I think I saw my mom getting a little emotional - Elmo is truely a heartbreaker.
What a homecoming it was ! Saskia and Elmo were so glad to reunite, that we could finally start that family-life we were all so hard longing for.
It took about a day before Elmo tried poking Mones eyes out or hitting her with her new toys: The daily routine had finally started. As always when Elmo is on "holiday", he makes incredible steps forward. In this case, he stopped his diapers overnight - we had been working on that for weeks, without success before.
He even tried emptying his little toilet himself, which was fun for him but not for his mother. I think our hygiene standards have just changed.
We moved on since then and I don't think Elmo has any bad memories of his "Stippeltjesweek".
