The game of Life and powerful wishes

So Emma got the boardgame Life, for Christmas and we decided to play it this afternoon. I always liked that game as a kid...I thought it was cool to spin the wheel and choose your career card or land on the space declaring you had twins so you got to put the two little pink pegs in your car. So, it makes me laugh to hear Emma say that she likes it for the same reasons too. Anyway as we were playing, it got me thinking. Life in general really is such a "spin the wheel and see what you get" kind of thing honestly. My "game" of Life had the usual things like college (never finished though!), get married, have a home, and have a kid. Unfortunately though instead of the fun and exciting spaces on the board game like 'Win the Nobel Prize...collect $100,000'...I spun the wheel and landed on things like 'meet the love of your life who just so happens to live in another country...lose a turn and spend the holidays missing your family'. Or 'find out your child is diabetic...spend the rest of your life worrying about her and never sleep again'. Don't get me wrong...I have landed on quite a few cool spaces on my board as well. I've lived in many places, gotten to visit France, snowboarded on amazing mountain tops in Oregon, and met some of the most amazing people along the way. However, I would trade all of those good spaces and good turns of the wheel for Emma not to be diabetic.
Like every Christmas...every birthday...every coin toss into a fountain...every time I look at the clock and it reads 11:11...every time I see a shooting star...I wished this year for a cure for diabetes. I'm sure all of you who have a diabetic in your lives would make the same wish too. I know wishing it to happen won't make it happen...but I still do it...I can't help it. Well, since Emma was sick with a stomach virus a few days before Christmas, I have been struggling to keep her blood sugars from being too low. Even now that she is no longer sick I am still having trouble. I have lowered her lantus dose in the morning, adjusted insulin to carb ratios at meals, increased snacks...and still I am having trouble. I was thinking about that today and had a little chuckle at the thought of what if that was all it took...what if all we had to do was WISH so hard for something that it would happen? Imagine what the world would be like then. I know a lot of people in the world would be wishing for things like money and power...or fame and material things. I wonder how many people out there would be like me and wish for a cure...how many would trade everything they had in this world...or even give their own lives to just ensure that their child or other family member would no longer have to live with this disease? There would be no hesistation on my part...no thought...no second guessing my choice...I would give it all for her.
My Grandpa passed away quite a few years ago and I talk to him all the time still. When I am missing him or when I am struggling. I ask him to help me be strong enough to handle all the messed up things that are on my plate. I ask him to help me with Emma's diabetes. I ask him to help keep her safe. I asked him to please help her get better so she wouldn't be sick and have to spend Christmas morning in the hospital. On my way up the stairs to Emma's room at night, I have asked him to please help make her blood sugar be 10.0 so I can go to sleep knowing that she won't drop too low overnight and die. Every single time he helps me. Every single time I know that he is watching us and helping her and I get through our struggles. I know when my time comes and I get to see him again, I will have a hard time expressing how greatful I am for his help. There won't be enough words or hugs or kisses to show him how much I appreciated it. I will try my hardest though.
In any case, even though I spun the wheel of Life and wound up landing on the damned diabetes space...I know that I still have many more turns to spin that wheel. I have many more chances to see what spaces I will land on next. Hopefully one day I will spin lucky 7 and land on 'A cure for diabetes is found! Collect your freedom back from the banker and share the fantastic news with your daughter! Tell her she will live a long and healthy life with no complications and she can go ahead and break all the needles up and smash her blood sugar meter now and then go eat whatever she wants and run around like a loon and maybe eat supper 3 hours late cause she doesn't want to stop playing and maybe even sleep in the next morning!' Ok...I know that all probably wouldn't fit on one space on the game board...so I'm ok with just putting 'A cure for diabetes is found!' and the rest will just be implied. Here's to hoping...and we shall have to wait and see where my game piece lands on the board.