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Last night was a tough one for us in the Smyth house. Our little Hudson has been fighting a cold for the past ten days or so {as is Daddy} and out of nowhere, yesterday evening, he spiked a fever of 103 degrees and became completely inconsolable. Within minutes, we were cancelling our plans for the night, dressing our baby up and heading off the emergency room at the Children’s Hospital. Thankfully, we were in and out within just a couple of hours {a rarity for any ER} with a suspected upper respiratory virus but an otherwise clean bill of health. It’s a good thing that I was standing there and watching the words come out of the doctor’s mouth because our son proceeded to cry for the rest of the night. Had we not just been sitting in that very waiting room for two hours, we would have been headed there in the middle of the night patiently waiting to find out what was eating away at the insides of our little boy. All of this to say that we just went to bed about forty-five minutes ago.

So most of last night’s hours were spent rocking Hudson back and forth…sometimes he slept, sometimes he cried…but the entire time he clearly needed Mommy or Daddy like we were the last life boat on a sinking ship. At around 3:30 this morning, I was remembering my Lenten commitment regarding gratitude and surprisingly, I felt overwhelmed by it. Yes, I felt like I could have slept for about a week…yes, it breaks my heart that my son felt so unsettled…and yes, both the novelty of our all-nighter and our level of patience began to dwindle significantly after the second hour of this hysteria but, I still couldn’t help but feel immensely grateful that, at the very least, we were at home. A home that I absolutely love to pieces. We were curled up together in a big rocking chair, covered in a quilt blanket and quietly listening to Mozart. Our house isn’t big or extravagant but we were safe, we were warm and we were in a place that always made everything easier. It’s filled with wonderful books, cute teddy bears and adorable bath toys. “Things could be worse” I thought to myself. And from there, I began to remember a time when – as far as homes go – it was worse.