This Fragile, Mortal Coil

Dear Claire,

How do I explain to you who my father was? It all feels so fraught. I don't know where or how to begin.

He died when I was 11. He had cancer.

See, saying that word was hard. I don't want to teach you that word. People can't bring themselves to say "cancer". They say the "dreaded C word", instead. I don't want to sugarcoat it, though. The horror of the disease needs to be honored by name.

So, there. I have begun. Yet...

How do I explain who I am? How do I explain being so formed by his absence?

One hot, August night, I was baptized in the waters of loss. When I came up for air, dizzy and disoriented, I found my identity unwillingly transformed.

I was not myself when he died -- in an instant, a fatherless child navigating in the murky depths of grief. In a sense, I am not myself now. Or, rather, I'm more than I appear to be. A part of me remains hidden. I guard this place like an animal protecting a wound, daring anyone to try and come near. Your papa does not know what I have shared with no one.

But I worry you sense that a part of me is unreachable. I wonder how this history that I keep silent separates me from you, as well as the ones I love.

Telling you is its own thorny road, though. I don't want to share childhood memories of my dad, and have you detect pain in my voice. I worry that this story of loss will change your own sense of self. How will you grapple with who "Grampy" is? My stepdad is the only Grampy you have ever known. Yet, he is not your Grandpa by blood.

It's all so confusing. Will it be too much for you? Will you fear your own papa dying?

These thoughts are too dark for a young mind. I struggle to imagine you contemplating them. I want to shield you from their dizzying and disorienting effects. Right now, you believe that the sun rose for the first time on the day you were born. Someday, I will have to tell you that the moon and the stars existed before you.

Talking about my own childhood loss makes this fragile, mortal coil feel even more present. It signifies my powerlessness to protect you, just as my parents could not protect me.

I know for sure that you will never know how I lie in bed at night, and pray to God that you never have to go through what I went through. You will never know that I wake up in the middle of the night to make sure you are breathing. I fear I am cursed, and that you and your papa are too good to be true.

But silence can cause more damage than revelation, I've found. These words have not come easily for me today. Perhaps, I have written them more for me than for you. I feel no closer to knowing what to say to you when you are older. Maybe, a poet's words will help you understand one day:

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead

To mourn full-throated like W. H. Auden is to honor his memory. This past is your birthright. Someday, you may take part in the grieving too. You may desire to know your grandpa, to understand me, to commune in our family history -- maybe, even to know and understand yourself.

This story of loss ends in triumph anyhow. After all, you are my father's and your grandfather's legacy, Claire...unique and beautiful, Claire.

Love,
Mama

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Joining Finish the Sentence Friday with Janine, Kristi, Stephanie, Kate.

Doctor's Orders: Take a Chill Pill

George was positive Claire was cross-eyed for a while. A trip to a specialist assured us she was the picture of health. Surely, our pediatrician referred us to the eye doctor more to allay parental fears than out of concern for Claire’s sight. Dr. Gillespie’s been in medicine long enough to know that a parent’s anxiety is best assuaged by keeping him or her busy.

At each well visit to the doctor’s office, we hear a non-stop string of: “She looks fine”, “I don’t see a problem there”, “Why don’t we check to be on the safe side”. Our doc remains upbeat, despite our endless paranoia about our daughter’s health.

I imagine that someday Dr. Gillespie will reach a breaking point and respond, “What are you crazy?” instead. That’s because, even as I’m relaying my question, I know I sound like a crazy person. I just can’t seem to help myself.

George and I can divide the quality of our obsessions into two distinct categories. George is preoccupied with Claire’s physical health. Why is the skin on her feet peeling? (Try a little olive oil). What are the bumps on the back of her neck? (It’s prickly heat). Are you sure she isn’t wheezing? (Her breathing sounds fine).

I have a desperate need for Claire to meet all of the appropriate milestones exactly, to the minute, on time. When Claire’s weight dips from the 85 percentile to the 50^th, I’m certain I’m starving her and bombard the good doctor with questions about diet and nutrition. She does her best to pull me down from the ledge.

The problem is I’m never completely satisfied with the answers or that everything’s really ok.

I don’t think we are the only parents who can’t stand the idea that our child might have vulnerabilities. Nor are we alone in our fear that our child’s vulnerabilities might just be out of our control. Worrying and the subsequent overcompensation brought on by said worrying are conditions of the human race. These states become compounded when you become a parent.

If I were to ask Dr. Gillespie about my own heart palpitations, I’m sure she would tell me that everything’s just fine…

Mom's Sick: Walking Pneumonia/Running Child

Consider me of the walking wounded with walking pneumonia. 

Close-up of Pneumonia. Isn't it pretty?

If I had logged all of the hours I’ve cared for Claire and was compensated with sick days, I surely would be kicking back with a few reruns of LA Law right about now. But everyone knows that motherhood doesn’t stop when you do.

Instead of long stretches of horizontal recovery, life has gone on as usual -- with added challenges, such as: how to pick up a 20 plus pound baby without fainting, how to convince a toddler that dirty Kleenex is not a delicacy, how to read Goodnight Moon for the fifth time in a row without punctuating every two words with a cough. Then, there’s dealing with a generalized lack of resources when Claire: cries, screams loud enough to rattle my aching brain, or reaches for the outlet for the thousandth time. 

However, much of being sick with a child came as no surprise to me. What was a surprise to me were the many upsides of balancing care of a one year old with care of oneself. I found Claire to be helpful in many ways:

1)    She doesn’t care that I am beginning to smell, because I haven’t showered in three days.

2)    Or that she is beginning to resemble an orphan with long, dirty fingernails and ratty, tangled hair, now that her bath time routine has been reduced by 50% or so.

3)    She’s fine with staying in her pajamas all day or roaming around solely in a diaper.

4)    Likewise with her mother’s daily attire and toilette, or lack there of.

5)    She is happy to eat the same frozen vegetable for five meals in a row.

6)    She doesn’t know that I skip most of the words in Goodnight Moon anyway to save a few tubercular breaths.

7)    She’s oblivious to time, so she doesn’t realize we haven’t been out of the apartment for three days.

8)    She finds all kinds of things to entertain herself around the apartment anyway, since everything inside is still new and fascinating too.

9)    She actually enjoys that the apartment is a mess, because there are more things on the floor for her to explore.

10) Most importantly, when she takes a nap twice a day and goes to sleep at 7:30, mama goes nighty-night right alongside her.

But the best part is that Claire clearly still loves me, even though I’m not doing my best job caring for her. I can’t say that of any of the many other bosses I’ve had in my life (yes, Claire is my new boss). The next best thing is that dads like George can be great at picking up the slack.

Of course, not contracting pneumonia in the first place would be most advisable. But for the inevitable times when I am sick, I’ve decided that I’ll take my family over paid sick days any day.

Photo Source: Yale Rosen, Flickr

Because It's Good for You!

Claire woke up a wreck at 3AM last night gagging on post-nasal drip. The sound coming out of her nose alternated between a whistle and a death rattle. George and I got to work on it with baby saline solution and that weird bulb designed to extract baby snot. Lloyd the cat supervised, as Claire looked at us like “Et tu, Brute?” and started howling.

In a couple of minutes, she settled down and rivers of evidence made it clear that our work was fruitful. However, it was also clear that Claire didn’t feel a bit of gratitude for our efforts.

We have enjoyed many awesome firsts in the recent months – smiling, laughing and babbling. My personal favorite is watching Claire crawl commando style across the living room floor to ambush a sleeping Lloyd.

But last night’s adventure with sinuses, was one of the first firsts that we did not greet with relish. Her first cold was also part of a bigger recent trend; one I will call the “It’s for your own good” phase, also known as “She doesn’t know any better”.

This nascent period finds us at odds with Claire, vainly attempting to explain to her that we have the moral high ground. The encounters like last night seem tailor-made for the phrase “This is going to hurt me more than it will hurt you”. Of course, like with all children, this truism makes little difference to Claire.

There are other situations where I imagine people like the Godfather or Dr. Phil superseding. I see Claire on Brando’s lap…“Work with me here. You know your parents have to change your diaper”. The Don would be no match for her, however.

Her lack of cooperation in some endeavors is just plain mind-boggling to me…“Why can’t I wipe your nose? Doesn’t it feel better not to have snot running down your face?” She looks at me like “First of all, I don’t need to explain a thing to you and second, why are you assaulting me?”

Try telling her that the computer wires aren’t edible or that no good has ever come from pulling a cat’s tail. No matter, though, because she wants what she wants, and her parents are the ones thwarting her best laid plans.

Right now, distraction works wonders, so there’s no lasting line in the sand. I can usually give her a Kleenex to tear up and she’s right as rain.

I know we are a short trip to “eat your peas” and have a ways to go before “it’s past your curfew”. Those challenges will surely be more complicated. I don’t know which is harder: the battles themselves or the fact that she just doesn’t understand. Of course, there will come a day when she will be 100% sure that, without a doubt, we don’t understand either.


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Photo Source: Nasal Spray, Wikipedia