3:30 am and another night when I can't sleep. What am I thinking about? The same thing that's kept me up on other nights - softball.
It's hard to write about this. Lots of mixed emotions.
I am incredibly grateful that Meg has a team that has stuck with her, and that she has an opportunity to play at all. Her coach - the one who has been her coach for many years, has been there in so many ways. Not every coach out there would have kept her on the team.
But it has been a source of pain and hurt and heartbreak for her.
She feels superfluous. Written off. And it hurts like hell.
She's spent the season on the bench.
I get it, that she isn't "up to speed." I get it that she isn't a great player, and that the coaches need to look at the team as a whole, and of course, they need to put the needs of their own kids first. That makes sense. I can't fault them that.
But it hurts her. In her heart and in her head, she's an athlete. She wants to get better, and she wants to feel valuable and needed. She won't get better sitting on the bench. She won't ever get stronger, get back to catching, as long as she sits on the bench. The message was made loud and clear on day one of the season - you aren't a catcher, you're a benchwarmer. You aren't here because we want you here, and value you as a player - you're here because you had cancer, and we feel sorry for you, and we feel like we can't just drop you. Of course it is more than that - of course it is a sign of the uncertainty that surrounds her, and a sign of caring that she is, no matter what, a part of the team.
Every time she goes to practice, and gets treated like an incapable sick kid, it drives her nuts. It's insulting, and hurtful. And well-meaning. And caring. It is both a source of love and of hurt. It is one more way that disease messes with you.
And so when I lie awake at 3:30 and think about softball, it really isn't about softball at all. As always, it's about the damn cancer, about what it has done, about what it continues to do, and about how I protect my little girl. I can focus on the "little" things, like softball because they at least feel like I should be able to do SOMETHING. As for the cancer, and the future, I'm powerless.
