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.

Monday, July 5, 2010

4th of July

Hello everyone! Sorry it has been a few days since we posted last, but between finals week, going back to work, and Patrick prepping to leave it has been a little crazy.

The return to work went as smoothly as I could have hoped. Minus the tears on the first day, I can't help but love dropping Luke off at daycare because Miss Tiffany, the room lead, LOVES to snuggle with him. Don't worry though - he saves plenty of snuggles and smiles for me at home :)

After the chaos of returning to work, it was time to relax and celebrate the 4th of July (after I completed my summer school course!).  Luke is still a bit too little to spend much time out in the heat, so we had to skip the boat this year; however, we had a great time having some friends and neighbors over for a BBQ.


Our friends, Laura and Jason (from Minot), Lindsay (and Tiger), and Rick and Faith (with Luke's newest playmate on the way), and Lindsay's husband, Rob, all came over to shoot off fireworks. There is something about testosterone and fireworks that makes boys crazy, so the girls and I just sat back and watched the boys go crazy. Luke is still too little to run away from the fireworks, so he stayed up by us girls and laughed at his daddy acting silly. He sure did look cute, though, in his 4th of July attire!


After playing outside all night, it was time to get cleaned up......
....because it was time for Luke to go see his first movie in the theater! Daddy got to pick out what we saw since it's the last bit of free time he's going to have for a bit, so we went to see Grown Ups which was actually pretty funny. I, personally, voted for Eclipse, but I guess we'll have to save that for a date for me and Luke while Patrick is gone.

It's time for bed because we have to get Patrick to base bright and early so he can leave. For those of you who don't know - he starts Weapons School tomorrow.  The only way to explain it is that it's like getting his Master's in the B-52.  He'll be out in Vegas for two weeks of academics, but then it's 16+ hour work days/6 days a week until December. Wish him luck!!!!!!

2 comments:

  1. Stacy RomanJuly 6, 2010 at 4:27 PM

    Best of luck with Weapons School! You guys are strong and I know that you can make it through anything. Big hugs! Can't wait to see you soon!

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  2. maryn1978July 12, 2010 at 12:41 PM

    You mean 16+ hours a day SEVEN days a week...if there were 8 days in a week he would be there then too! Hey, if you need anything just give me a call! It is a stressful 6 months but you will get through it...and Luke is ADORABLE!!!!!

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