We had been to the bouncing house several times before today, but Damon was usually more interested in playing in the water fountain than actually bouncing on any of the blow up gyms. He was always very happy when I held him and jumped or crawled up the stairs (while holding him) and go down the slide while holding his hand, but he never would stray too far from me otherwise.
There is one apparatus in particular that we both like. It has two slides with a tunnel of “stairs” going up the middle. I use the term stairs lightly because it’s actually just a pretty steep slope with tiny little handles and very skinny ledges going up on which you are supposed to stand. It is definitely designed for children’s feet! Usually when we go up, I hold Damon in one arm and use my other hand to hang on for dear life to those tiny handles so I don’t go careening backward onto the other children who are usually following right behind. When we were about half way up, I looked up and saw a fellow mom’s little girl sitting at the top all by herself. She was all alone so I knew she had climbed all by herself. The thing is, she’s only 3 days older than Damon, which makes her just over 2 years. And she’s a little girl, very petite. I was amazed that this tiny little thing could’ve climbed all the way up there by herself.
Damon and I finished the climb to the top and came whizzing down the slide laughing. When we got down, the little girl’s mom was standing at the bottom. “She’s such a good climber!” I said. “I can’t believe she can go all the way up there by herself.” She smiled and mentioned something about her always trying to keep up with her big brother. “Wow. If Damon tried to do that, he’d probably fall all the way down to the bottom.” I said as I shook my head. As we stood there talking, Damon told me he wanted to get back up so I set him on the bottom of the entrance to the slide so he could play. A few seconds went by where I wasn’t directly watching him and when I looked to the spot that he had been just before he wasn’t there. I knew he hadn’t gotten down so I climbed onto the bouncy slide and looked up the steps and he had already climbed halfway up! “Good job buddy!” I said proudly, as I climbed up behind him. All the while thinking that the further up he got, the harder it would be for him since the slope got steeper. But I decided to just see how far up he was willing to venture before rescuing him.
I stayed right behind him, with my hand poised to catch his little bottom if his feet slipped and watched as he slowly climbed up. His hand grabbed the handle, knee up on the step, then the other hand grabbed the step above and he would switch from his knee to his foot, then get the other foot up and so on it went until he was at the very top. And I hadn’t touched him once! We both made our way to the slide opening, grabbed hands, counted to three, then “WEEEEE” down we went. “Do gen mommy!” he shouted. “Oh Damon, mommy needs to take a break,” I said as I climbed down. “You go ahead.”
Off he went up the tunnel all by himself. I waited for what seemed like several minutes while he slowly made his way to the top. Once he got halfway up, I couldn’t see him anymore, but I resisted the urge to follow him. Finally, he made it. I couldn’t help but tear up when I saw his little head pop around the corner at the opening of the slide. He was all smiles as he said “Mama, I do it mysef!” “Alright buddy, come down the slide to mommy.” He sat there for a minute and even asked if I would come up with him, but I stayed where I was. “Ok Damon, one, two, three, GO!” And he pushed himself over the edge and down the slide he came.
I jumped onto the bottom of the slide and wrapped my arms around him, tears now streaming. “You did it Damon! Mommy is so proud of you!” I squeezed him so tight as I thanked God for this little triumph. For so long I wondered how much our little miracle boy would be able to do; questioned the amount of normalcy he would experience living his life with a heart defect. There was a time when he couldn’t even eat without medical help and now he was climbing the steps to a slide that I found difficult.
Damon played on that slide for several more minutes until he saw a blue ball that he wanted and ran to go get it. Every time he went up those steps and down that slide by himself, my heart just burst with happiness and pride. But as I sat there watching him, I began thinking to myself why I doubted so much that he could do it in the first place. He’s such a tough little boy; making it through two surgeries like a champ. God spoke to my heart right then. “Sarah, I have seen him through so much more than this, why would you not trust me to help him now?”
As we made our way back to the table where the rest of the moms were gathered, I found the one I had been talking to earlier. “I guess I’ve learned not to tell anyone that my son can’t do something. Because he (with God's help) will prove me wrong.”