Our Babies

Our Babies
Luke and Claire

"Welcome to Holland"


By Emily Perl Kingsley, 1987. All rights reserved.


I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away...because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss. But...if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Luke 4, Parents 0

Hello dear readers! It's Patrick again, bringing all of the newest news about our family! I know I secretly have a fan club in our reader base, right?


Anyway, yesterday was.....let's just say it was a boon for the cleaning industry. I got a call from Melissa that said that Luke had decided that the wall behind his changing table, the changing table itself, and his Mother were all dirty. So he hosed them all down. For those of you keeping score at home, and I know that you are, that would be a #1 for one point. 1-0.


When I came home I figured that I would be a good father and hold the little baby dude while he ate so Melissa could pump/do some things around the house she had been trying to do. Well, Luke decided that I was too clean...so he leaked poopies (did I just use the word poopies?) out his diaper, over his blanket, and onto my last clean uniform! Sigh. That would be a #2 for two points. 3-0.
As I changed, Melissa was changing him out of his clothes so we could give "The Hose" a bath, and he figured that the lamp on the changing table was getting too hot.....so he hosed it down, and his Mother. What's funnier than that is Melissa's initial reaction was to try and "catch" the stream. She didn't do very well in Physics. Again, for those of you keeping score at home, that's a #1 for one point. 4-0.
We did get him washed, which he hates, so maybe we got a cheap shot in there at the end, but all for not. We had to wash all of his clothes and all of my uniforms. Such is the life of a new parent! You know, everyone warned us about the projectile peeing, but no one said a word about the projectile poopies! Mrs. Kilgore's class, please take note!!!!

3 comments:

  1. What, your phone couldn't figure out how to fix that?! hehe! Seriously must start using those peepee teepees...they are about the best invention after an epidural! As for the #2's...there ain't no fixing that! ;)

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  2. I guess Mellissa is not using the peepee teepee's to prevent a natural disaster ;) Hee hee

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  3. Next will he try to hose down the dogs? Hee Hee...

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