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Thanksgiving 2004
mignolan - 07:32am Jun 8, 2006 EST
Editor of Miracles e-newsletter
I was moved to write this in 2004, after the events described. Please forgive the length!
Michael F. Nolan, March of Dimes e-newsletter editor
----------------------------
Thanksgiving 2004
"Once upon a time there was a small small small boy, who was born early early early, before he was supposed to be born."
My son, sitting beside me, pats his chest and says, "Will."
"That's right," I say, and pull him in close beside me. I'm startled that he recognized himself as the child in my tale, and I'm stumped. The silly story I was sure to roll out lightly and confidently has gained weight. My heart thumps in my chest, and for breathing, all I seem to be able to do is exhale. I don't know how to continue.
It’s Thanksgiving evening, and for Will and his younger sister Ellie it has been an exhausting day filled with relatives and food and flashbulbs and playing outside and books and being told to sit still and Frosty the Snowman on TV. It was scheduled to be a Thanksgiving in Maine with the Jennifer’s family this year, but instead, the Lees came to us. The reason? Less than a month earlier, on the night the Red Sox won the World Series, the same night as a lunar eclipse, and the day our refrigerator died, Will and Ellie's brother Bailey had been born.
Having so many people at our home was a thrill for the older kids, so after a gauntlet of bye-bye's and night-night hugs and kisses, it is just 6:35 PM, but they're already in bed.
Will had for some time been able to climb into his crib, but discovered recently that he could climb out, too. That's the way we'd found him several times over preceding nights and mornings, often stripped down to his diaper, or completely "nakey," as he usually preferred. That evening he'd already dropped himself out of his crib once after I'd put him in, and with voices and excitement audible from downstairs, particular diligence was required for him to stay put.
After hearing from below a thud on his bedroom floor, I went up again, opening the door in time to catch him standing on a wobbly toy box, reaching for the pull chain on a lamp atop his dresser that was just beyond his extended reach. He got a long face as I told him to get down and back into his crib. To show him I meant business, I walked over to sit down, intending to wait until he was asleep before leaving. But I softened.
"Do you want to come and sit next to daddy for a while?"
He said, "Yes" with enthusiasm, and padded over in his jammies to climb up beside me on the small sofa at the other end of his room. The nightlight for a moment showed his smile, and cast a shadow across the dimple in his cheek. He reached for a book and handed it to me, but I couldn't read in the dim light, so I began to tell him a story. His story.
My wife Jennifer and I had from time to time shown him photographs of himself as a newborn. What the pictures showed were tubes and wires and a tiny burgundy-skinned baby born months before his due date. William had always insisted the pictures he saw were his younger sister Ellie.
He'd say he was a kid, and from his perspective she was the baby — with Bailey, I guess, having been born at 9 pounds, 9 ounces, being even to Will so gigantic that it obviously wasn't him. Jen and I figured Will didn't yet understand the concept of babies growing older and bigger (especially not himself) and we didn't think much more of it. But with just a few months until he was three years old, Will was in the midst of an extraordinary burst of learning and comprehension that had resulted in new abilities in understanding and expression.
He always looks for opportunities to help, and when he does, it's at top speed, whether it's fetching a tissue, or putting a used paper cup into "Big Oscar," his name (via Sesame Street, of course) for our kitchen garbage can. "Little Oscar" is our compost bucket. He usually remembers to say thank you, though please is still a project.
He adores Ellie and watches out for her, racing to get her baby doll if she's lost it. He'll get ice cubes — a peculiar favorite of them both — and give one to her, but moments later may grab it away, making her cry, as two year-old big brothers will do. But then he'll give it back to her, with a sincere sense of his own generosity. When we ask him why she's crying, he says, in his slightly hoarse voice (a consequence of the breathing tube in his throat during his NICU experience), "Will took Ellie's ice cube." He looks uncomfortable, hopping from one foot to the other, and seems to understand that we're peeved and that there may be repercussions, but he hasn't yet figured out to deny something he's done. It's not necessarily that he wouldn't lie if he knew how, but rather that so far he's incapable of it. And yes, we're enjoying it while it lasts.
He vacuums up new words and phrases, and uses them with enthusiasm. He recently mimicked me scolding Ellie, wagging his finger and talking sternly at her, so I said, "Will, don't chastise Ellie. Mommy and Daddy will take care of that." Moments later, he was on foot, bounding down the hall uttering, "Chastise ... chastise ... chastise ..."
His sense of time and place is improving noticeably, almost daily, with memories of events, names, and who-knows-what other bizarre details stretching back several months, even to a time when his abilities with language were more limited. As impressive as his gains have been, some concepts (literally every day concepts) remain to be surmounted. Will comes down each day after his midday nap and says, "I wake up in the mornin'!" For him, morning is apparently whenever someone wakes up, regardless of the time of day.
We say, "Good boy Will. Keep it up!" Keep it up, indeed.
It some ways, the anguish of Will's early birth is more vivid to me now than it was as it was happening. When he was so new and so sudden, and as a baby so unlike what we had expected, he was in some way abstract, and the pain was, too. As a nearly-three-year-old, I now know him, and I have an understanding of what it is to be a father, and for him to be my son. If I had any sense at the time of how magnificent a little boy he might become I don't know that I could have kept myself together. He's beyond my dreams of who a boy of mine might be.
When Will finally accepted his fate — crib, and sleep — I went downstairs, where our friends and relatives were gathered, chatting and laughing, and rinsing, drying, and putting away plates and silverware. I began to tell Jennifer what had happened — that Will in some way understood, and recognized himself — and I began to weep, to let loose so much of what I'd kept knotted up for nearly three years. I don't know whether it was for love or happiness or profound sorrow that I wept, but tears poured.
A few days ago, while Will was in my lap, Jennifer came by and said, "Mommy's going to the grocery store. Will, what should mommy buy?"
"Carrots," Will said.
"Carrots?" Jennifer said. "Okay, mommy will get some carrots."
"Um ... and toast. And trucks."
One day recently, I heard Will muttering to himself, "Humpty-Dumpty sat on a wall, eating his curds and whey."
All of this makes sense — both his illogic and the surrealism of his perspective — because William is almost three. But as his parents, we feel profound gratitude that he's capable of the rascally lunacy that befits a boy his age. For too long it didn't seem likely.
Jennifer and I often look up from what we're doing to watch and listen to Ellie and Will, moved by what's typical. Some essential part of our love for Will is due to what he went through, and we along with him, in the distressing months following his early early early birth.
Our love for Ellie and Bailey is equally deep, and a share of that is for their compassion at letting us know what it is to have babies born so predictably, so large, and even, yes, so loud.
At bedtime each night, we read books together. But with so many visitors, and on such an active day, we didn't get to it. So while Ellie slept deeply on Thanksgiving evening, the regular story time may have been something her older brother missed.
I started, "Once upon a time there was a small small small boy, who was born early early early, before he was supposed to be born."
And he said, indicating himself, "Will."
Editor of Miracles e-newsletter
I was moved to write this in 2004, after the events described. Please forgive the length!
Michael F. Nolan, March of Dimes e-newsletter editor
----------------------------
Thanksgiving 2004
"Once upon a time there was a small small small boy, who was born early early early, before he was supposed to be born."
My son, sitting beside me, pats his chest and says, "Will."
"That's right," I say, and pull him in close beside me. I'm startled that he recognized himself as the child in my tale, and I'm stumped. The silly story I was sure to roll out lightly and confidently has gained weight. My heart thumps in my chest, and for breathing, all I seem to be able to do is exhale. I don't know how to continue.
It’s Thanksgiving evening, and for Will and his younger sister Ellie it has been an exhausting day filled with relatives and food and flashbulbs and playing outside and books and being told to sit still and Frosty the Snowman on TV. It was scheduled to be a Thanksgiving in Maine with the Jennifer’s family this year, but instead, the Lees came to us. The reason? Less than a month earlier, on the night the Red Sox won the World Series, the same night as a lunar eclipse, and the day our refrigerator died, Will and Ellie's brother Bailey had been born.
Having so many people at our home was a thrill for the older kids, so after a gauntlet of bye-bye's and night-night hugs and kisses, it is just 6:35 PM, but they're already in bed.
Will had for some time been able to climb into his crib, but discovered recently that he could climb out, too. That's the way we'd found him several times over preceding nights and mornings, often stripped down to his diaper, or completely "nakey," as he usually preferred. That evening he'd already dropped himself out of his crib once after I'd put him in, and with voices and excitement audible from downstairs, particular diligence was required for him to stay put.
After hearing from below a thud on his bedroom floor, I went up again, opening the door in time to catch him standing on a wobbly toy box, reaching for the pull chain on a lamp atop his dresser that was just beyond his extended reach. He got a long face as I told him to get down and back into his crib. To show him I meant business, I walked over to sit down, intending to wait until he was asleep before leaving. But I softened.
"Do you want to come and sit next to daddy for a while?"
He said, "Yes" with enthusiasm, and padded over in his jammies to climb up beside me on the small sofa at the other end of his room. The nightlight for a moment showed his smile, and cast a shadow across the dimple in his cheek. He reached for a book and handed it to me, but I couldn't read in the dim light, so I began to tell him a story. His story.
My wife Jennifer and I had from time to time shown him photographs of himself as a newborn. What the pictures showed were tubes and wires and a tiny burgundy-skinned baby born months before his due date. William had always insisted the pictures he saw were his younger sister Ellie.
He'd say he was a kid, and from his perspective she was the baby — with Bailey, I guess, having been born at 9 pounds, 9 ounces, being even to Will so gigantic that it obviously wasn't him. Jen and I figured Will didn't yet understand the concept of babies growing older and bigger (especially not himself) and we didn't think much more of it. But with just a few months until he was three years old, Will was in the midst of an extraordinary burst of learning and comprehension that had resulted in new abilities in understanding and expression.
He always looks for opportunities to help, and when he does, it's at top speed, whether it's fetching a tissue, or putting a used paper cup into "Big Oscar," his name (via Sesame Street, of course) for our kitchen garbage can. "Little Oscar" is our compost bucket. He usually remembers to say thank you, though please is still a project.
He adores Ellie and watches out for her, racing to get her baby doll if she's lost it. He'll get ice cubes — a peculiar favorite of them both — and give one to her, but moments later may grab it away, making her cry, as two year-old big brothers will do. But then he'll give it back to her, with a sincere sense of his own generosity. When we ask him why she's crying, he says, in his slightly hoarse voice (a consequence of the breathing tube in his throat during his NICU experience), "Will took Ellie's ice cube." He looks uncomfortable, hopping from one foot to the other, and seems to understand that we're peeved and that there may be repercussions, but he hasn't yet figured out to deny something he's done. It's not necessarily that he wouldn't lie if he knew how, but rather that so far he's incapable of it. And yes, we're enjoying it while it lasts.
He vacuums up new words and phrases, and uses them with enthusiasm. He recently mimicked me scolding Ellie, wagging his finger and talking sternly at her, so I said, "Will, don't chastise Ellie. Mommy and Daddy will take care of that." Moments later, he was on foot, bounding down the hall uttering, "Chastise ... chastise ... chastise ..."
His sense of time and place is improving noticeably, almost daily, with memories of events, names, and who-knows-what other bizarre details stretching back several months, even to a time when his abilities with language were more limited. As impressive as his gains have been, some concepts (literally every day concepts) remain to be surmounted. Will comes down each day after his midday nap and says, "I wake up in the mornin'!" For him, morning is apparently whenever someone wakes up, regardless of the time of day.
We say, "Good boy Will. Keep it up!" Keep it up, indeed.
It some ways, the anguish of Will's early birth is more vivid to me now than it was as it was happening. When he was so new and so sudden, and as a baby so unlike what we had expected, he was in some way abstract, and the pain was, too. As a nearly-three-year-old, I now know him, and I have an understanding of what it is to be a father, and for him to be my son. If I had any sense at the time of how magnificent a little boy he might become I don't know that I could have kept myself together. He's beyond my dreams of who a boy of mine might be.
When Will finally accepted his fate — crib, and sleep — I went downstairs, where our friends and relatives were gathered, chatting and laughing, and rinsing, drying, and putting away plates and silverware. I began to tell Jennifer what had happened — that Will in some way understood, and recognized himself — and I began to weep, to let loose so much of what I'd kept knotted up for nearly three years. I don't know whether it was for love or happiness or profound sorrow that I wept, but tears poured.
A few days ago, while Will was in my lap, Jennifer came by and said, "Mommy's going to the grocery store. Will, what should mommy buy?"
"Carrots," Will said.
"Carrots?" Jennifer said. "Okay, mommy will get some carrots."
"Um ... and toast. And trucks."
One day recently, I heard Will muttering to himself, "Humpty-Dumpty sat on a wall, eating his curds and whey."
All of this makes sense — both his illogic and the surrealism of his perspective — because William is almost three. But as his parents, we feel profound gratitude that he's capable of the rascally lunacy that befits a boy his age. For too long it didn't seem likely.
Jennifer and I often look up from what we're doing to watch and listen to Ellie and Will, moved by what's typical. Some essential part of our love for Will is due to what he went through, and we along with him, in the distressing months following his early early early birth.
Our love for Ellie and Bailey is equally deep, and a share of that is for their compassion at letting us know what it is to have babies born so predictably, so large, and even, yes, so loud.
At bedtime each night, we read books together. But with so many visitors, and on such an active day, we didn't get to it. So while Ellie slept deeply on Thanksgiving evening, the regular story time may have been something her older brother missed.
I started, "Once upon a time there was a small small small boy, who was born early early early, before he was supposed to be born."
And he said, indicating himself, "Will."
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