It finally happened. The moment I have been dreading since my legs were in stirrups and the doctor stood before me holding a squirming bundle of new born baby girl joy.

“Mom! I kissed a boy! And I liked it!” She grinned at me excitedly, oblivious to the silent sounds of the shrieking in my head.

She is only thirteen.

My baby.

Excuse me now. I have a shotgun to polish and a husband to calm down.

(He’s still hyperventilating over the fact she is sprouting boobs. This is going to cause his head to pop right off and roll clear down our driveway.)

Jumby was off yesterday. He didn’t seem sick. He was just not himself. There was no commando crawling through the kitchen to sneak up behind me and bite the heels of my feet. (Yes, he’s a carnivore and delights in feeding off the dead skin on the backs of my feet.)

There was no gleeful shouting of “Go!Go!Go!” followed by “Mumma! Mumma!” as he kicked back and forth on my lap.

There were no high fives, no peek-a-boo’s, no kissing (which is really more of ‘ I’m gonna open my mouth and see if I can bite mommy’s lips with my teeth’.)

There was, however, a whole lot of lethargy and falling asleep on my chest at the blink of the eye. It was like I was raising a wee little narcoleptic.

At first the husband and I weren’t worried. We chalked Jumby’s sleepiness to his late night partying the night before. The kid has a thing for strippers and disco balls in his bedroom. What can I say?

But as the day progressed so did the severity of Jumby’s lethargy and I found myself reliving the past.

“I think I should take him in. My mommy radar is going off.”

“Then you should take him in,” Boo agreed, looking worried as he held the zombie we called our son.

“But it’s late and we’ll likely just end up sitting in emerg all damn night and then they’ll send us home with slap on the ass and orders to call the pediatrician. I hate that.”

“Well, then don’t take him in. I trust you.”

“That’s the problem, I don’t trust me.” The last time it was late at night, and I found myself with a sick child who may or may not have required emergency care, I vascillated on taking him to the hospital. I did all the right things, I called the right people, I followed the right advice but instead of listening to my instincts, I ignored it because it was late at night, I was exhausted and I didn’t want to spend all night in an emergency room.

I’ve played the game of ‘What-if’ ever since. What if I took Bug in right away? What if I didn’t wait? What if the doctors had more time? What if, what if, what if. Two crueler words to a grieving parent, I can’t imagine.

Those ‘What-if’s’ swirled in my head last night as I stood in the exact same spot I had four years ago, looking at my husband holding yet another sick little boy.

Deja-vu stopped by to drop kick me in the stomach.

I knew when we adopted a special needs child there would be moments like this. Dark moments in which I’d face the past while wrestling the 35 pound ghost of a certain angel boy who hangs off my back.

I knew adopting a special needs child would mean late nights in an emergency room, hospital stays and getting to know every pediatric specialist a girl can imagine once again.

I knew a whole lot. Or so I thought.

But I forgot how much it hurts to be helpless when your child is ill and there isn’t anything you can do to make them feel better.

I forgot how exhausting it is to spend the night bedside to a child while wringing your hands with worry and hoping the doctors you entrusted your child’s well-being with, are up to the task.

I forgot how long and lonely the drive to the hospital can be in the dead of the night.

Last night, it all flooded back.

Jumby is better now, dropping his zombie impersonation and becoming more boyish with every hour that passes.

And as I sit beside him and watch him play quietly with a rubber ball, yawning from last night’s drama, I remembered something else.

The reason we signed up for this gig in the first place. No matter what happens, no matter how many late nights in the emergency room I have to endure, or even what the ultimate ending to Jumby’s story may be, it is all worth it.

I love this kid.

That’s the best lesson deja-vu can drop on my head any time.

***I’m a little late on the uptake, but I’d like to thank the Babble editors for naming me as one of their top 50 Mommy Bloggers. There are some fabulous writers on that list and if you are looking for some new reads, I suggest heading over there to check it out.***

***Can’t get enough of me? Head on over to my group page at Savvy Source. I’m spilling dark parenting secrets and fessing up to my parental crimes. Join the party so I don’t feel like such a schmuck.***

A long time ago, there was a stringy blonde haired little girl who had big dreams to conquer the world. The spelling world that is. You see, there was a school spelling bee and this little girl, who may or may not have grown up to be a redneck mommy, desperately wanted to win this contest. In her mind, winning this contest was all that stood between her and greatness.

This little girl with stringy hair and knobby knees studied hard to prepare for her future victory. To others it may have seemed she was prancing around singing into her hair brush while listening to Micheal Jackson’s Billy Jean when she should have been reading a dictionary, but that was only to the untrained eye. The reality was the soft dulcet tones of the Pop King’s songs helped soothe the spelling savage beast raging inside of the little girl, roaring to be released from within.

Finally, the day of competition arrived. Children were gathered from all corners of the school to stand on the stage in the gym and spell their way to victory. The little girl, wearing a striped orange and brown corduroy jumper (thanks Mom. Wouldn’t it have been easier to paste a ‘kick me’ sign on my back?) was confident in her ability to conquer the competition and secretly crowed a little inside everytime a child fell victim to a misspelled word.

Round after round, the number of children grew smaller until there was only five small children standing on that stage, each desperate to win, each pinning their self-worth on correctly speaking a series of letters to spell a word they barely knew the meaning of. Then it was the little girl’s turn at the microphone. She walked up confident in her future status as the school’s best speller. She heard the word and beamed widely when she realized it was a word she easily knew.

Taking a deep breath she slowly and surely said the letters which would bring her one step closer to victory. Moments stretched for what seemed an eternity as she waited for the signal from the judges to resume her place back on stage. Instead, she heard the buzzer. The dreaded sound of defeat, identifying losers for all the school to mock. What? How could it be, she thought to herself. She knew that word. She knew she spelled it correctly. There had to be a mistake, she thought.

“I’m sorry Tanis, the correct spelling is Capital I-n-d-i-a-n. You forgot to capitalize the first letter. Please get off the stage and join the rest of the losers who can’t spell worth beans over in the far corner of the gym we like to call ‘loserdom’. And please remember to tie your dunce cap on tightly for the picture we want to take so we can mock you forever in the future.”

(Oh, ok, I’m sure the teacher didn’t use those exact words but you’ll never prove they didn’t either.)

With one small mistake the little girl’s dream of ruling the world with her spelling prowess died a flaming public death. Never again did she participate in another spelling bee, but never again did she ever misspell the word Indian.

I had pushed this particularly painful episode of childhood failure far from my mind. It was eventually buried under bigger and more spectacular failures that inevitably followed.

Then I had a daughter. One who is strikingly similar to her momma in all aspects, including her blood-thirsty need to spell correctly.  One who has for the past three years, dredged up this painful memory in her own quest to dominate her school and rub her momma’s the world’s nose in her spelling supremacy. A daughter who has forced me to acknowledge time and time again, that not only can I NOT spell correctly, but I am indeed a raging dumbass.

No longer do words like schottische, muishond, Beetewk or canaille strike terror in my heart. Mostly because I have accepted the fact I am, indeed, a spelling dumbass. Who needs to spell when one mostly communicates in 140 characters via text or twitter?

The little girl who couldn’t spell Indian correctly is all grown up and no longer dreaming of winning a spelling bee. Now she dreams of watching her child win the big bee. Because those that can’t, procreate, yo.

This year, after years of studying (or rather, having her kids cram words down my throat whether I like it or not) is the year it all comes together. Fric is on her way to making her momma’s dreams come true with her triumphant victory at the school’s spelling bee last week.

That’s right Internet, my daughter, the one who sprung from my loins, crafted from my DNA, took the title as her school’s best speller. Cue the harps and stand back because rainbows are about to shoot out from my back end.

It was a dream come true for the little girl with stringy hair and knobby knees, who once stood on a stage in a striped orange and brown corduroy jumper with letters of victory flashing in her eyes.

Suddenly, I understand how Walter Gretzky must feel.

His Stanley Cup is my Scripps Spelling bee. Look out world. I’m, er, Fric is one step closer to total spelling domination. Next up, regionals, then CanWest and then the Big Bee.

Good luck baby girl. No matter how far you go, you already shot past the moon in my eyes.  I promise to help you however I can.

Just don’t ask me to spell.