"The next time you bring me from China..."

Yesterday was the first time I've ever heard Lucas express any form of "regret" about his surgery.
He has never said anything negative about the decision or about regret that he has "new feet", etc.  Even when kids ask on the playground he just says he used to have 2 toes and now he has 5.  Or he just says he had "surgery".  He has always been positive about it.

I know it was bound to happen at some point but it was hard to be on the recieving end of the comments he had.  It all came out of frustration.  He was mad because our neighborhood pool has opened for the summer and he wanted to wear flippers.  He cannot swim with his legs on because they will basically fill with water and he will sink.  I haven't done a ton of research on options at this point becasue it has never been an issue.

So as I write what he actually said, it comes with a slight chuckle under my breath (so sorry if that sounds insensitive) combined with "do you really mean that?--maybe I should be more sensitive"

He said -- in a huffy and mad tone...
"Ya know what?"
"The next time you bring me from China I want to keep my other feet.  I don't want you to cut my feet off"
"These feet are stupid"
it went on for a while with several more comments about how dumb they were, and he did cry a little about it too.
(does anyone else think that is funny in a way? "the next time you bring me from China..")

We did process through it. --I'm not that insensitive.
And I did finally relent and tell him
"ok"
"Let's try it"
 
I figured the reality was he needed to see what would happen.  I realized I didn't want to do it because it would make his legs wet and it would take a long time to dry.  I also know what will happen and he will sink.  It would be painfully hard to watch it happen and I also didn't want to be inconvenienced.  Check in my spirit about that one.

So, we headed off to the pool.
Fully intending to attempt swimming with legs on and flippers.

But, alas.
Once we got there he let it all lay to rest and was perfectly fine with just taking them off and swimming.
Whew.

It does make me want to do some research for him though.  There has to be a "swimming" prosthetic.  I mean they made a tail for a dolphin in the movie Dolphin Tale right?
And/or I need to take him to some swimming lessons so he can gain some confidence in the water even without his legs.  He really does quite great.  But, he knows he doesn't go as fast as other kids and struggles a little to keep up.  Some of that is because it is early in the swimming season.  I'm sure he will adapt and figure it out, but it would be fun to find something to make swimming even more fun.

I love this boy.
And the reality is.
He is pretty stinkin' amazing.