A community...

So, I've made some friends this year.

These moms with kids like mine.

The wonderful supermoms that understand, without explaining, the life we all live.

We've had dinners together each month.

We send emails in the middle of the night.

We share in the joys of our little ones successes, and share in the heartaches when they are sick.

And today, for the first time, I visited one of them in the hospital. I have never been to the Children's Hospital to visit someone. I've always only even been there with Max. So it was strange going to that familiar place, and going up to see someone else's sick child.

When I walked in Heather greeted me with an "air hug", because she knew as well as I did, I didn't want to take home anything I didn't come in there with. Germs included.

And then we chatted. Shed a couple of tears. Told stories. Laughed and joked about the craziness of life on Mars...because really Holland is much too nice of a place for lives like ours.

And in the middle of it, I remembered a friend once saying how incredibly sad and life sucking hospitals are.

And I smiled. There I was, sitting with my friend, and we were anything but sad...or depressed...or having the life sucked out of us. In fact...if she didn't need to run down that doctor who needed to run some tests...and if I didn't need to get home to Max, we could have stayed up all night chatting.

So, another thank you to The Children's Hospital...you take care of our kids...you keep them alive. But you also give us supermoms a place to connect. To go, and know that we're not alone. Without trying, or helping, or endorsing or condoning, you've given us something we've all been missing. You've given us a community.