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Surgery bends rules on toys, soda, sweets

Surgery puts mom in the mood to indulge young daughter a bit

Date published: 4/25/2006

SO I WENT to Target and I splurged. I went for only a couple of things to help cheer my 3-year-old daughter, who had just had her tonsils and adenoids removed.

Stickers and coloring books, I told myself. I had written those two items down on my List: Stickers, coloring books. I didn't bother with a shopping cart.

Nope, wasn't going to need one of those because I was sticking to the List.

But I went to the toy section anyway.

I wandered down the aisles but didn't pick anything up. Then I saw several Angelina Ballerina items on clearance. Now for some reason my daughter loves that prissy little mouse with the dance obsession.

Bye-bye List. I filled up one shopping basket, then another. A dress-up outfit, a couple of playsets, two stuffed animals. Other little tchotchkes.

I'm not normally such a spendthrift. Really. But when I'd left the house, my recovering daughter looked so pale. She could barely talk.

I knew she would get better. She had a routine operation. Still, she was leaning on my husband and me as if she were a baby again.

Children are resilient. They bounce back quickly. My husband and I were already amazed by our daughter. On operation day, she went for her surgery without a fuss, my husband said. I wasn't there--I was with our infant son--but he showed me a short video.

She was wheeled back to the operating room on a little red wagon with her beloved frog stuffed animal, her blanket and a few other prized possessions. She looked nervous, a little shell-shocked, but also determined.

She rarely complained about the pain.

My husband and I told her repeatedly how proud we were of her. But we both felt a little helpless. We couldn't magically make her feel better.

She had been through an experience. She had grown a little.

It was a milestone. We celebrate these rites of passage with gifts. A new school year brings fresh new clothes. Grown-ups get showered with presents for weddings and new babies.

I wonder if sometimes the gifts are a way to take some of the fear out of new experiences.

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Date published: 4/25/2006