Happy Birthday, Miracle Baby

I’m sending birthday wishes to my older daughter, who celebrates her birthday today.   There’s a reason I call her a “miracle baby.”  I’ve written that my first husband, Rich, suffered heart failure when he was just 27.  He was sent to Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore to find out why such a young, otherwise healthy, man would have CHF.  We learned from his echocardiogram that his heart failure was brought on by a malfunctioning aortic valve.  He also had cardiomyopathy, an enlarged heart.

While we were there, a genetics specialist came up to examine Rich.  We were very surprised but cooperated.  Rich answered questions about his health and allowed his limbs to be measured.  We were puzzled when Rich was asked: do you have stretch marks in unusual places?  He did—all over his shoulders and upper arms.  Are you double-jointed?  Rich demonstrated he was.  Have you always been *that* near-sighted?  Yes, since childhood.  We were mystified.

The doctor had another surprise for us: he told us he believed Rich had Marfan Syndrome, which was a disorder of the connective tissue.  It could affect the eyes, lungs, heart, and skin.  People with Marfan were generally exceptionally tall (Rich was 6’6”), double-jointed, and had stretch marks in unusual places on their bodies.  We sat there with our jaws dropped open.  It turned out that Hopkins had a clinic for Marfan patient, seeing people from around the world.

Before doing anything about that, however, Rich’s malfunctioning aortic valve had to be addressed.  The surgeon felt that, because of Marfan, Rich should have it replaced with a mechanical valve.  A mechanical valve would stretch out the way a pig valve would.  The surgery was still in its beginning stages, just past the point of being “experimental.”  The surgeon warned it could be 50-50 either way.  If he didn’t have the surgery, Rich knew he would weaken and die.

The night before the surgery, we comforted each other the best way we knew how.

My parents, still active over-drinkers, grudgingly agreed to come and watch our sixth month old baby son.  My father actually asked me why I needed to be there for the surgery when Rich would be knocked out; besides, the nurses would be there to take care of him when he awakened.  I was already stressed and my mind was blown.  I reminded him how we all sat in the waiting room for hours during my mom’s hysterectomy because we were so worried about her.  What if she’d died?  I guess my father “got it”.  I don’t know: I walked out and drove Rich to the hospital.

Rich’s father and step-mother drove down from New York, arriving just after Rich was transferred from Recovery to the ICU.  I was only able to see him for the seconds it took for the orderlies to hurry his stretcher down the hall.  He looked scary but he was breathing.  He was on a ventilator and his wrists were tied to the stretcher railings.  Rich’s dad and stepmom arrived just a few minutes after I left the hospital.

Rich was in the ICU for a week.  From the moment he woke up, he fought the ventilator.  He tried fingerspelling (he learned signs to communicate with my parents) to the nurses but they were clueless.  One of them called me because he’d begun rocking and rolling and wouldn’t lie still.  The nurse wanted me to tell him to relax.  I tried but I just heard him trying to speak, a bark-like noise.  I figured out he was saying, “Off, off!” and told the nurse he wanted the ventilator removed.  They did and he calmed down.

Still, he became depressed over the next day or two.  I used the TTY to ask my parents to come back over so I could go and visit him; cheer him up.  Grudgingly, my dad dropped Mom off to stay overnight and I went to see Rich.  He perked up immensely when I arrived, so I spent several hours with him.  When I got home, Mom accused me of taking advantage of her by staying away so long.

I suggested we have my dad come NOW and get her; I would take the baby with me to the hospital the following day and ask for help.  I wasn’t going to abandon my husband just because my parents felt inconvenienced.  Mom saw how upset I was and backed down.  She agreed to stay one more day.  That, at least, gave me time to make other arrangements.

When Rich was released from the hospital, he was very weak.  The only steady income we’d have over the next 2 months would be from my part time market research job and any interpreting I could pick up.  I knew I couldn’t ask my parents for help so I reached out to Rich’s sister and his stepmother.  Each drove from Long Island to Maryland to care for our son and Rich so that I could continue to work.

It was exhausting and we were struggling financially, but Rich was alive and recovering.  His mood was still low, though, because of our financial situation.  It didn’t help when we went to see the cardiac surgeon and learned that his heart was still very enlarged.  I got the doctor aside and asked what were Rich’s chances.  The surgeon asked, “Are you sure you want to know?”  I did.  No more than five years, he said.

It was a shock.  

I missed my period.  Was it stress?  Even in stressful days, I was regular to the day.  I was a week late and made an appointment with our doctor.  I went by myself, leaving my mother-in-law to care for Rich and Billy.  I told the doctor I needed a blood test; I was pregnant.  No, no, he said.  You are just stressed.  So much has been happening.

I insisted I was pregnant.  I was NEVER late.  Sighing, he drew my blood.  Days later, he called and sounded stunned.  “Yes, you are pregnant.”  Then he advised me not to tell Rich, who might find the news devastating and depress him further.

Great.  I’m not supposed to confide in my husband and best friend, left alone to worry about how we were going to survive all this.  And Rich wasn’t even supposed to live more than five years!  I didn’t want to tell my in-laws yet, either, and have them accidentally spill the news to Rich.

It ended up being me who spilled it.  One day I was in the dining room and, while Rich napped, I began wondering what would happen to us without Rich.  I began to cry.  And then Rich was there, wanting to know what was wrong.  I tried not to tell him the truth but gave up when he kept asking.  Maybe I’d end up killing him off sooner but I couldn’t help it.

To my complete surprise, he broke out in a big grin.  He was absolutely delighted.  The news pulled him right out of the dumps.  When I saw how happy he was, I was thrilled too.

Rich was scheduled to have another echocardiogram about 8 months after his surgery and I was definitely ready to have our baby, top heavy and waddling about.  When the surgeon came in after the test, he had an amazed look on his face.  “This is like a miracle,” he told us.  “The size of the heart has gone down in size by almost half.”  He looked at Rich and asked, “What have you been doing?”

Rich answered straight faced: “Making a miracle baby.”  He swore that he regained all his hope when he learned we were to have another child.

So, happy birthday, Miracle Baby.

Rich began to have atrial fibrillation in March of 2001, a good 13 years after his surgery.  The night before his appointment to see an electro-cardiologist, he passed away in the night.

 

Vounteering & Random Acts of Kindness Feels So Good

A few days ago, I happened on a piece in my Axios newsletter.  It has stuck with me and, because I am totally sick of US news lately, I thought I would focus my attention on it.  The idea was the benefits of paying it forward and acts of kindness.  We’ve all heard of little acts that actually make a big difference.  A prime example is a driver in the toll lane pays not only for him/herself but also for the driver behind.  It can have a ripple effect, with the other drivers in line inspired to do the same thing.

Or take the person in the Walmart line that is short of cash when the cashier is done ringing up purchases.  A person in line behind might be inspired to make up the difference.  It’s such a small thing but saved the first customer from embarrassment.  That customer might later do something nice for an elderly neighbor.

Kindness can spread just as well as a virus.

I have been in some tough situations in my lifetime.  One particular period of time was when my first husband, Rich, was recovering from heart surgery.  He was on medical leave and was receiving a very small portion of his salary.  I was working as a sign language interpreter for a school district but it was only part-time.  Rich needed a lot of help in those days and could only care for our baby a few hours at a time.  We were struggling to pay our rent, for food, and for expensive medications for Rich not covered by insurance.  We couldn’t bring ourselves to reach out for help.

Somehow, my cousin Mary figured it out.  She would come over to visit or to babysit Billy if I happened to pick up a freelancing gig.  Maybe it was what was in our fridge or what we wore.  One time when she dropped by to visit, she had a warm, full length winter coat for me.  I didn’t have any nice coats to wear when I went to work and this was an act of kindness that meant so much to me. 

When Rich was doing better and we were more financially secure, I felt a need to pay it forward, as it were.  We were going to church at that point and I learned that there were a lot of vets living under a bridge that was on our way to the church.  The church was providing cots to sleep on during the winter months and Rich became on of the volunteer drivers to pick the guys up and bring them to the church.  I joined a team of volunteers that rotated at Elizabeth House, where we served meals to those in need.  Many nights, we served families.

Here we live in one of the wealthiest countries in the world and yet we have vets and families homeless and hungry.  It’s appalling.  When I give, I donate to food pantries and No Kid Hungry or the Harry Chapin Foundation.  Ted and I can afford our food so it’s a small act of kindness to try and see that others get a meal.

Before the pandemic, I was a volunteer reader at an elementary school.  I read one-on-one with students K-2 and these were children who struggled with reading but not so much they qualified for special services.  I loved reading to the kids, most of whom had never had anyone read to them before.  I loved talking to them, learning about them and their interests.  Many of them grew more self-confident with the individual attention.  It wasn’t a small act of kindness because reading helps children to succeed later in life.  It was mostly an act of kindness to me because I love reading so and wanted the kids to feel the same way.

The point of all this is that volunteering or performing small acts of kindness ends up being a win-win situation.  The people we do a kindness for receive something that they need and it’s a feeling of relief or joy for them.  Feeling relief or joy starts the feel-good endorphins flowing and they’re likely to be kind to someone else.  As for the person who volunteers or helps out some way, the feel-good endorphins flow as well.  There is a feeling of doing something positive in a world of so many negatives.

When I volunteer, I feel I’m doing something useful and beneficial.  Working people are often too busy to volunteer a lot of their time but it only takes a few minutes to perform an act of kindness.  I wish we would all do this.  It could be healing for us all.

 

 

 

 

I Have Become UN-comfortably numb

Increasing, I feel numb about the news.

Senator Lindsay Graham introduced a bill to ban abortion nationwide, so women in the red states won’t have the option to travel to a blue state instead.  When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, I was outraged: roiling innards and breathing fire.  This? After everything that’s been revealed about tRump’s evil doings, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, mass shootings and the ongoing covid spread, I just shrugged when I read about Graham.  What else would anyone expect from Rethuglicans anyway?  Just one more thing.

I have news exhaustion. 

I was boiling during the four miserable years tRump was POTUS.  When President Joe Biden won the election and took office in January 2021, I hoped for relief of the agita I’d been experiencing since tRump took office.  I felt hope in spite of the fact that tRump and his cronies were spreading The Big Lie.  Blissfully unaware of the plotting going on, TB and I were celebrating his birthday.  After lunch we sat down to watch a program, which was quickly interrupted by coverage of the coup attempt.  I felt shock and anger.  TB and I agreed we never would have imagined such a traumatic thing.  Still, President Biden would bring hope of reconciliation and progress.

It didn’t happen that way.  Suddenly, crisis after crisis began piling on.  Putin invaded Ukraine and suddenly the oil industry prices rose and rose.  The excuse was the war.  The reality, I believe, is that Big Oil could bring in enormous prices during the crisis by jacking up the prices.  Food prices skyrocketed.  President Biden was making great strides in trying to get Democrats and Rethuglicans together to pass critical bills.

Voters only seemed to care that they were cash strapped and insecure about how they would afford gas, medicine and food.

To my surprise, major media began negative bashing of President Biden.  He’d gotten some bipartisan support to be able to pass an infrastructure bill desperately needed.  The mass media focused on any negative little thing.  President Biden’s approval rating tanked.

It was depressing and discouraging.

What else?

We withdrew rather abruptly from Afghanistan.  Thousands of Afghanis had to be evacuated to save their lives.  They found refuge in the US and other countries.  Age old racism reared its ugly head: while white Ukrainian refugees were approved of, many were very vocal about their anti-Afghani feelings. 

Covid continued to be an issue.  Most Americans were just plain sick of it.  These days, I rarely see anyone else wearing a mask.  I still do because I’m immunocompromised.  I just had a third booster along with a flu shot.  The fact that covid still lingers and I could get it from anyone anywhere is distressing.  I put it into a shelf in my brain’s dresser drawer but every now and then, that draw just opens itself on its own.

And what’s going on with Mother Earth?  We’ve been abusing her and now she’s majorly pissed off.  There have been stories of flash floods in Louisiana, Missouri and Kentucky.  The western states all seem to be on fire.  Around the world, there have also been major disasters because of climate change.  Yes, Congress finally managed to get a major piece of legislation passed to start addressing climate change and trying to reverse the near irreversible.  The credit should go to President Biden, who’s been all about trying to work with Repubs on the most recent bills.  He has been successful at that.  Mass media has pretty much ignored his achievements.

That is so frustrating.  Does mass media want a dictatorship or theocracy?  They sure seem to want it, even though it means muzzling.  In Florida, Gov. Death Santis wants copies of everything journalists take down in notes from whatever it is he’s doing.  All the notes and recordings have to be “reviewed”.  Chilling.

Queen Elizabeth died.  I did feel something at the news.  I’d liked and respected her from afar so I felt sad she was no longer in the world, but I told myself how much she’d accomplished in her life.  Besides, now she was reunited with her beloved husband, Prince Phillip.

Every day, there is another awful update having to do with TFG and his evil doings.  The FBI search of his house, more investigations into his fund-raising shenanigans, more details of a very major coup plot amongst 45, legislators in Congress, violent white supremacy groups, and the wife of a Supreme Court justice.  The House Special Committee on 1/6/21 is about to reconvene.  Some of the hearings revealed some pretty horrifying information. 

And the questions floating around all the time is this:  will TFG ever face justice for any of this?  If yes, WHEN?  If no, what are the consequences of these treasonous people getting off scott-free?

Urban Dictionary defines news fatigue this way:

“Becoming tired of the constant negativity or political propaganda in the news. …”  Oh yeah to the hell! “People with news fatigue might decide to stop all news consumption for the purpose of being more at peace and improving their mental health and mood and may then find themselves happier and with more energy to do the things they enjoy.” 

I used to read and keep up with more news sources than I do now.  I used to read “Daily Sound and Fury” religiously.  It became too overwhelming, especially the shouting.  I mean, portions of an article would be in all caps with ginormous fonts.  It gave me a headache.  I began to just skim the titles of the articles and now find I don’t click on any for more information.  I’m at the point I don’t want to open the newsletter email at all.  The same is true with CNN and NBC bulletins.

I’d been following Huff-Post and Crooked Media but am beginning to feel very fatigued looking at those stories too. 

This isn’t like me.  Was I burning out?

I happened on this article from the New York Times.  Yep, I have a couple of the symptoms of news fatigue/worry burn-out: I’m avoiding most of the news and when I do read one of the newsletters I still look at, I feel numb at the headlines.  I think to myself: welp, here we go again.  Nothing’s going to change.  My thoughts are leading me down the road to another symptom: feeling powerless.

Another: some stories provoke an angrier reaction than I normally would feel.  That anger is rooted in fear.  I am powerless; no one is going to do anything about the issue.  It’s all supposed to become the “new normal” and that really pisses me off.  Retreating into numbness helps still the boiling internal waters but it’s also dysfunctional.  I learned from 12 step meetings that numbing myself or dissociating would keep me in a state of powerlessness.  It served me well enough growing up in a dysfunctional household but was totally unhelpful when I became an adult.

So what to do?

At this point, the best thing I could do for myself is unplug for a while.  It would be so hard to do that.  I stay in touch with friends and family online, usually on Facebook.  If I could avoid bringing the news there and blocking news sources from reaching me there, I could have a much more positive interaction there.  It would mean stopping Twitter too.  Can I do that?  I don’t know.

Another thing I need to do is stop checking the news before I go to bed.  I read before I go to sleep and I would get a lot more of that done if I turned my phone and laptop off in the evening.

I should find other happier activities: go for a walk, color, do more reading, watch classic TV shows.  Phone banking has been a very positive activity for me.  I don’t feel powerless when I phone bank.  I’m doing my part to help save democracy.

Here is one more I’ve already put into practice: subscribe to good news only media.  It is so true that reading about small town heroes, animal antics, and bits of trivia are uplifting and can make me smile or laugh.

I’m going to give these suggestions a try because I don’t want to burn out completely, especially not before a crucial election.

Giving Pink Floyd a shout out because my title comes from their song, “Comfortably Numb.”