Helpless

There is a town in north Ontario
With dream comfort memory to spare
And in my mind I still need a place to go
All my changes were there - Neil Young, Helpless

I've talked a lot on the previous entries of this blog about how the whole process of being a Dad and everything around it has changed my life. One of the ways in which parenting changes us is that we are no longer completely in control. Before deciding to become parents, Jodi and I were in complete charge of what we wanted to do. We decided, practically on the spur of the moment, to move to England and live for two years as "working holidaymakers" in London. When we moved back to Canada and decided that we missed the buzz of the "big city" we packed up a truck and drove from Fredericton, NB to Toronto without jobs or an apartment or even much of an idea about what was waiting for us there. But that was ok, because we were in charge and we were able to go with the flow.
Almost as soon as you have that pee-on-a-stick moment (if you haven't been reading along, I'm referring to this previous blog entry), you lose a certain amount of control over your day-to-day comings and goings. Pregnant women have to start taking vitamins, and couples start going to pre-natal classes. You begin to rearrange your home. Every day and seemingly every action is focused on "the big day" when your totally-in-charge duo will become a trio. A trio that will be in a constant struggle to determine who is actually in charge.
I can tell you who isn't  in charge of the trio. The Dad.
I'm finally realizing that now, but I started to learn it while Jodi was pregnant with our first son, Eric.
We decided to use the services of midwives, rather than an obstetrician after doing some research and feeling that we would appreciate the more hands-on and family-centred approach. Wait? Did I say "we decided"? Maybe I'm still learning the who is in charge lesson. Jodi decided. And I thought it was a great idea, luckily.
I joined Jodi for a midwife appointment at Riverdale Midwives in Toronto and everything seemed to be going fine. It was January and the baby was due in March. Near the end of the meeting, Jodi mentioned, almost as an aside, that she was feeling a strange feeling in her belly, almost like a tightening.
She hadn't even mentioned it to me and wasn't at all concerned about it. It had been happening for a couple of days.
The midwives immediately seemed concerned and got her back onto the table to re-examine her. Based on what she said, they suggested we meet them at Toronto East General Hospital to have her checked out, simply because they would have access to better equipment there.
We still weren't all that concerned, and since they said they would be about an hour getting there as they would have to see one more client, we went for a nice dinner in Greektown. By the time we got there, the midwives were waiting for us and a bit stressed that we hadn't gotten there ahead of them.
Jodi was hooked up to the monitor, with a belt around her belly that had little sensors that would pick up changes in the tightness of her stomach so the midwives could determine what was going on. After monitoring her for a while, they determined that she was having contractions and after consulting with the O.B. on call, they decided they were probably more than typical Braxton Hicks contractions.
They explained that Jodi was having pre-term labour and they would have to take some steps to help. First, she was given a dose of steroids to help the baby's lungs develop, in case he was born early and needed the help. Then, they put a nitroglycerin patch on her arm to help slow the contractions.
Jodi spent the night in the hospital for monitoring and when she was sent home was put on bed-rest by the obstetrician on duty. She stayed on bed-rest until 36 weeks, which in Ontario is considered an acceptable full-term pregnancy.
That night in the hospital, with Jodi connected to the monitors, watching for signs of contractions, listening to the baby's heartbeat on the speakers, and trying not to eavesdrop when other expectant mothers were brought into a nearby bed, I felt more helpless and useless than I have ever felt in my life. Here are my wife and unborn baby being the centre of a flurry of activity from midwives, nurses and doctors, and all I can do is say "oh look at how that line on the monitor changed. i wonder if that means you're having a contraction? Do you feel like you're having a contraction? Do you want anything from the cafeteria? Do you find it chilly in here? Was I drooling while I slept? This chair is uncomfortable."
I think Neil Young must have been in a similar situation when he wrote Helpless.

Helpless, helpless, helpless, helpless,
Baby, can you hear me now?
- Neil Young, Helpless

I remember thinking how strange that feeling of helplessness was. I've been a Dad for five and a half years now, and that helpless feeling is still strange, even after all this time. I expect I'll be used to it by the time the kids are grown up.

In a Name

I was discussing names tonight with a friend on the Facebook chat thingy. As a stand-up comedian, I make fun of my name, in a chunk of jokes about how I am "The World's Youngest Lloyd." (here's an old video of me talking about it - with some potentially objectional words). But I don't really think too much about my name. Do you? Do you feel that your name is part of who you are? I think if I was Luke or Blake or whatever, the only thing that would be different about me is that I wouldn't be able to do the old man name jokes. A name isn't all that important, is it? Of course not.
Unless my wife and I happened to give you that name. Then it means a lot.
I wonder if my mother feels as attached to my name, or my siblings' names as I do to my kids' names?
If you've read my previous three blog entries on this Daddy blog thing, you read that as we were getting ready for our first son, we found out that my father was dying. At first, when he was diagnosed with leukemia in the summertime, they weren't sure he would live to his 75th birthday in September. After he survived to his birthday, he set a new goal of being around for he and my mother's 50th anniversary in October. Then he wanted to live for another Christmas. Then New Year's. Then the birth of his next grandchild, due in March.
I remember talking to him on the phone one evening (I tried to talk to him every day if I could in those months and felt horrible if I missed a day or two), and telling him the names we were considering for the baby, depending on whether it was a boy or a girl.
Since the baby ended up being a boy, I have to admit that I don't even remember what we had decided on for a girl, but I clearly remember Dad's reaction to hearing our choice of a boy name.
Dad had always told us that under no circumstances were we to name a child after him. Growing up in a small community in New Brunswick Canada (one-room schoolhouse kind of small community), named Gunnar Ravn, surrounded by kids with English, Irish and Scottish names wasn't easy for him. He talked about being teased about his name and getting into fights about it in the schoolyard.
I always thought Gunnar Ravn sounded like a strong name, but he thought it sounded like the kid who got teased at school.
As I understand it, his parents never gave him a middle name because, when they were expecting him, the youngest of 6 kids, and the only one not born in Denmark, they realized that the middle name they had picked out for him didn't work in English. They had planned to honour their family back home in Denmark by giving him his grandmother's maiden name as a middle name, which at one time was a fairly common practice. But luckily they decided that "Gunnar Bang" didn't quite sound right.
I think if they had gone with Gunnar Bang Ravn, I wouldn't be the first one in our family to have taken up stand-up comedy, because with a handle like that, he wouldn't have had a choice.
Anyhow, we decided to give our baby, if it was a boy, Dad's mother's maiden name.
I told Dad the girl name we had chosen first, then said, "or for a boy, Eric Larsen Ravn."
I remember as clearly as if it was yesterday, he kind of gasped as he realized I had found a loophole in the "no naming kids after Dad" rule.
I said "do you like them?"
He didn't answer right away, and when he did, his voice cracked. He said "they're both very nice, but I think I like the boy name a little more."
That is one of my all-time best moments.
I wonder what Eric will think of his name when he is older? Will he, like me, just think of his name as something he needs so he has something to write on the top of tests and on the inside cover of text books.
Or will he dislike his name, like my father disliked his own?
I hope he likes it. I hope he understands how important his name is.

Father's Day

I mentioned in my last post that the day I found out I was going to be a father is the day that my life began. That was only about 6 years ago. before that, in over 30 years of my pre-parenting life, or my pre-life, I can only name a few "defining moments" that stand out as playing a huge role in who I am. I know there are tons of little moments that all add up to shape who I became. But I think it's interesting that in the 6 or so years since then, I can name several major moments that are clearly defining moments. Maybe that's why I feel so strongly that life began with fatherhood, because event after event since then has changed my life. Frankly, I could stand a few years of stability now. Enough major change, thanks. But I guess I don't have a lot to say about some of the kinds of changes that happen.
After the pee-on-a-stick life changing moment, Jodi and I decided to keep our news to ourselves for a while. Because that's what "they" say you should do. Wait until it looks like the pregnancy is going well. Maybe wait until the end of the first trimester. That's a long time!
By Father's Day, 2004, Jodi was barely pregnant. The stick was barely dry. We weren't telling anyone yet. Jodi called home to Sussex, New Brunswick from Toronto to wish her Dad a happy day, then I did the same. Then we said, "let's call back and tell them!!!!" (there really were that many exclamation marks).
It was great, on Father's Day, to tell my Dad that I was going to be a Dad, finally. This would be my parents' 13th grandchild, but they seemed as excited for that news as they did for each of the others. Now I was really pumped about being a father!
Later that summer, we were visiting our families on the east coast. Dad was short of breath a lot, and after a lot of prompting from his family, he finally booked an appointment to have it looked into. Probably needed some antibiotics. Maybe a puffer.
Meanwhile, I had to get back to Toronto for my last few exams at Ryerson. Jodi's schedule allowed her to stay around for a little longer, so she and her parents headed off to their cottage in Cavendish, Prince Edward Island while I stuck around Sussex for a couple more days before my return flight. My parents and I took a day and visited my sister Lorrie and her family at their lakeside camp near Harvey. Dad insisted on driving the whole way, even though he didn't feel well. I remember how sick Dad looked when we got there. But he came around and we had a great visit and he even let me drive home.
The next day, he went for his doctor's appointment first thing in the morning. The doctor ordered some bloodwork and sent him home to wait for the results.
Around noon, my mother had an appointment with her doctor, who shared an office area with Dad's right in the local hospital. I'll never forget the look on her face as she came back into the house from her trip downtown. She looked terrified, but like she was trying her best to not let me see. It wasn't working at all.
Dad was outside mowing the lawn, and Mum sent me to get him right away. As she was leaving the doctors' office, Dad's doctor came out and told her that she needed to get Dad to come back and see him right away because his bloodwork was back and it showed a very low hemoglobin count.
I ran out, and told Dad and he cursed at being interrupted from his lawn mowing, and headed in to clean up. They called a while later to say he was being admitted for an immediate blood transfusion. I tried to avoid panicking and even did a Google search that convinced me it was just something wrong with his medications that was causing the drop in hemoglobin.
The transfusion seemed to make Dad feel better overall and he waited for more tests and more info from the doctors. Jodi was going to come back to Sussex, but everything seemed to have calmed down, so I told her to stay put and I headed back to Toronto to write a couple of marketing exams. I knew Dad had an appointment to find out more from the doctor on the day that I wrote one of my exams, so when I finished, rather than wait until I got home to call, I went straight to a pay phone in the hallway at the school.
When Dad told me that he had leukemia and the doctors didn't expect him to live more than a few more weeks, the buzz of students around me suddenly disappeared. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion as I tried to process what he was saying. I don't remember much of the rest of the conversation, and I don't remember going home. I may have cried the whole way on the streetcar for all I know. The next thing I really remember is being on the phone with Jodi and she could tell something was terribly wrong. She went into another room away from the crowd that was gathered at the cottage and I told her the news. I remember hearing her mother in the background, when she came to find Jodi after hearing her crying. She just said "is it Gunnar?" and I could barely hear Jodi's answer, but I knew her mother was hugging her, and I could feel that hug through the phone, as corny as that sounds.
The two phone conversations from that evening are some of the clearest memories I have. Right now, I'm in the cottage where Jodi was when we spoke and often when I go into the room where she was, the conversation floods back into my mind and the emotion I feel is almost crippling.
As a sidenote, this cottage has been host to some of the most fun times for our family in addition to that horrible memory. Later I'll tell about another life-changing moment that involves the cottage in Cavendish. I was wondering today why, even though two of the worst moments (the one I just told you about, and the one I'll tell about another time) in my life involve this cottage, I still find it to be one of the most comforting places to be. Maybe it's the location, right on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, that makes it so comforting. But more likely, it's simply because this is where our family gathers. And that puts a stamp on a place that makes it part of you in a way.
This all sounds very Hallmark. Sorry.That's not my intention.
Anyhow, speaking of family, there was one other call that I'll always remember. I don't remember exactly when it was, whether it was that same night, or the next, but I'll always remember how good it made me feel. Jodi's sister Meghan called me to say that she had heard about my Dad and she just wanted me to know she loved me. That call felt so good, so I am glad to have it in my memory to balance out the other two.
So, this is a long post (get used to that, I'm no editor), but my point, finally, is: I was wrong. Life didn't begin when I became a father.
For my father's illness to have had such an impact on us all, and for our families to be so strong and tight, my life must have started long before parenthood and there must have been a lot more serious defining moments than I remember. I guess becoming a parent takes up so much of your brain that your pre-parenting life seems for a moment to be less significant. But clearly it isn't.
So, put me back into the "undecided" camp in the debate about when life begins. Ask me again after I turn 40.

In the Beginning there was Pee

When does life begin? This is the question at the centre of some pretty heated political-religious debates. For me though, I think of the question in a much more self-centred way. I sometimes have a hard time remembering that my life didn't begin when I became a Dad. I know I'm not the only parent who feels that way.
It's not that my pre-parenting life was forgettable. I think my wife and I did some pretty great things before we decided to become parents. We were in our early 30s by the time Jodi was pregnant with our first son, Eric. We had been married for 7 years and had dated for a few years before that. We've traveled around Canada. Had our honeymoon in Quebec City. Spent time together in Banff and Lake Louise and Calgary when Jodi came to visit me while I spent a summer at the Banff Springs Hotel during my "on the job training" portion of my Culinary Arts studies. Hung out on the beach during the amazing low tide in the Bay of Fundy.
We lived for two years in London, England, where Jodi worked as a teacher in a school in a very poor area of East London (Mile End) and loved it. I cooked at some amazing restaurants in London, and would be lying if I said I loved them, but it's a cool experience to look back on. We backpacked around Europe. Just listing them off the top of my head, I can say we visited 14 countries during our 2 years living overseas (The UK, Ireland, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, Italy, Greece, Turkey) and I may be forgetting some. Does Litchtenstein count as another?
Then we came home to New Brunswick, Canada. We lived in Fredericton for a while, then packed up our gear and shipped off to Toronto because we missed the big city life. Moving halfway across the second largest country in the world to no jobs, no place to live (thankfully we did have some very generous family in Toronto who let us crash in their apartment!) was pretty exciting. In Toronto we took advantage of city life by taking in NHL hockey games, Major League baseball games, theatre, film festivals, and more and more and more.
Overall, our life before kids was lots of fun and very memorable. So why is it that I can pinpoint the moment when it feels like life began? Everything before that moment seems in a way to have happened to someone else. That moment? When Jodi peed on a stick. Actually, I guess it would technically be a few minutes after that, when she came to me to tell me that the line turned blue, or pink, or whatever it was that it did to say "your pee is full of pregnancy." That technology amazes me, by the way.
That is the moment when life began. I knew I felt different after that moment because my attitude towards my classmates changed. I was just finishing a Bachelor of Commerce degree from Ryerson University in Toronto at the time. I had accelerated my studies (four year degree program in two-and-a-half years) so we could move on to the next thing in our lives sooner. The next thing being babies, of course. As a "mature student" (the only time I've ever been called mature, which felt strange), I already felt like I was from a different planet than most of my classmates. I remember trying to decipher what they would say to me and they would in turn look at me like I was ready for a retirement home (Classmate: "yo, guy, I'm gonna represent on this test, yo!" Me: " pardon me?" Classmate: "Oh yeah. Old dude. I think I'll do well on this test." Me: "That's 'oldER' dude.")
After I found out I was going to be a Dad, I felt even more removed from these kids who thought they were all grown up. They couldn't wait to prove to the world that they were the smartest young business graduates ever. I couldn't wait to change my first diaper. A bit of a disconnect I guess.
Some say life begins at conception. Some say it begins at birth. Some say life begins at 40. I say life begins when your wife pees on a stick and then squeals a couple of minutes later. If that never happened to you, then you ain't never lived.

I'm Just a Dad

When my wife and I were waiting for our first child, 6 years ago, I remember thinking "I'm going to work so hard to be the best Dad ever." Now, as the parent of a 5 year old and a 2 1/2 year old, I think "I just hope when the boys are grown up they remember me as not the worst Dad ever." I'm not the best Dad ever. I'm just a Dad.
Our oldest son, Eric, has had a number of medical issues and disabilities, so Jodi and I have experienced parenting in a way in which most parents never have. Other parents see the challenges we have faced and say things like "wow, you guys are such amazing parents," or "you and Jodi are so strong."
But we don't always feel so strong. We have moments when we feel like we can barely put one foot in front of the other. I have moments when I feel like not only am I not doing all that I need to be doing for Eric, but that I'm not strong enough to do what he needs me to do. In the end, I do my best and if I think about it, I suppose I do a pretty good job for my kids. But so do most parents. I just do what almost anyone would do if their child was in the same situation as Eric. I just do my best. Sometimes it is enough, sometimes not. But this is what parents do for their kids. You would do whatever your kids needed too. I'm in a different situation, but I'm not necessarily a different parent than you or anyone else. I'm not an amazing parent. I'm just a Dad.
Sometimes Eric's medical situation gives me other reasons to think about what being "just a Dad" means. In Eric's life, we have met and he has been followed by literally dozens of Physiotherapists, Occupational Therapists, Speech and Language Pathologists, Music Therapists and we stopped counting doctors at around 300, including General Practioners, Paediatricians, Developmental Paediatricians, Emergency Room Doctors, Intensivists, Neurologists, Rheumatologists, Dermatologists, Oncologists, Radiologists, Neuro-Radiologists, Opthamologists, Neuro-Opthamologists, Geneticists, metabolic Geneticists, etc, during Eric's various visits and his inpatient admissions to at least six hospitals. It's sometimes overwhelming to think of the huge brains that are putting so much time into figuring out what's happening with Eric.
To most of these professionals, me being a full-time stay-at-home Dad is fine and they don't think twice about it. Sometiemes, someone will find it puzzling and hard to wrap their heads around. I have to laugh when I hear things like "remember to tell Eric's Mommy about this so she can get the prescription from the drugstore," or "here's an exercise Eric's Mommy can do with him."
I also love when people (usually elderly people) see me with my sons without my wife being there and they say "oh, are you babysitting today?" as though a father being alone with his kids is a novelty. This makes me sad and makes me laugh at the same time. On my other, less serious blog, I wrote a post about these kinds of comments. If you want to read it, click here, but please come back, I'm not finished yet..
To the medical professionals and people in general who see my time with my kids as a rare thing that I'm not all that committed to, I guess I'm not a caregiver, I'm just a Dad.
So being just a Dad can be frustrating, whether it's living up to people's expectations or experiencing people's expectations being way too low. But at the same time, it's my favourite job ever. I love being just a Dad.
I'm going to write a bit on this blog thing about my experiences being just a Dad. I'll probably go back to the start, when Jodi and I were expecting our first baby, and tell you some of the highlights and lowlights of my parenting experience over the years.
Why? First, as the parent of a kid with special needs, I have enjoyed reading other parents' stories. They make me realize that there are others going through similar situations, similar trials, similar pains, and similar joys. That knowledge is comforting in some way, I guess. Secondly, it feels like writing out some of these experiences, and reliving them in my mind while I do so, will be a bit therapeutic. So think of yourself as my therapist. By reading this blog, you are awarded a degree in "Just-a-Dad-ology".
Stay tuned, Dr. Reader. More to come soon.
Llove, Lloyd