When You Were Born . . . A Mama Reflects

My son would be nearly 27 if he were alive. Since I can't share any birthday cake with him this August 25th, I will post this memory that I wrote here. 

Happy Birthday, Daniel!

The first time I saw Daniel, I understood why my sciatic nerve had been sending electric shocks up my back and down the backs of my legs. A ten-pound-seven-and-a-half-ounces newborn doesn’t just come out gracefully; he sprints. And cries, louder than small babies cry, because his lungs have already grown in proportion to the rest of him. 

      The first day of his life was a Wednesday. I woke at four in the morning to blessed contractions and nudged David. “Teo is coming!” Teo was our nickname for the baby in the womb. We’d called him Teo long before we came up with real name possibilities—ones I liked that David didn’t and vice versa. Naming a baby can be exhausting.  No wonder some cultures wait to name a child until he is seven days old. When we found out through the sonogram that our baby was male, I said, “How about Daniel Paul?” and even though David had nixed his middle name for Teo’s middle name, he said, “Okay.” Later I asked him why he gave in. “The way you said it was so cute.”

     “It’s finally happening,” David said as he sat on the edge of the bed in his summer pajamas. “You aren’t going to be pregnant forever.”

     Teo had been seated on my sciatic nerve for ten days and was four days late. When I’d been a day late, David, two-year-old Rachel, and I went to the State Fairgrounds’ flea market for the sole purpose of me walking the baby out.

     “When are you due?” a vendor selling furniture and knick-knacks asked. She smiled the way middle-aged strangers do at pregnant women—tender, kind, sympathetic.

     “Yesterday,” I said.

     “Walk,” she instructed.

      “I have.” I’d walked as much as one could when sciatica pinched at every step. I didn’t tell her about the sciatica, I just smiled and wobbled toward David and Rachel who were looking through a box of comic books for sale.

     On the morning of August 25^th, I loved every contraction. I got out of bed while David made his way to the bathroom. His mom had come from South Carolina to care for us, and when she woke, we’d eaten raisin toast and were packing for the hospital. As we hugged her good-bye and left for the hospital, I thought how excited Rachel would be when she woke to know that her sibling was about to arrive.

     On the way to Durham Regional Hospital, David and I stopped to get gas, and at the convenience store bought purple candy called Alexander the Grape, just because we liked the name. David picked up a word search book. This was our second time to have a baby; we knew it’d be a long day. I was not a quick deliverer.

     Once situated at the hospital, David asked for a memo pad and recorded the timing of the contractions and an account of the day. When the contractions set me into heavy breathing, he put his pen down, but knew not to rub my back or hold my hand. I wanted him with me, but I didn’t want any physical contact. A young, skinny intern entered and massaged my shoulder. She cooed, “You are doing great, Mrs. Wisler. So good, Mrs. Wisler.” I felt David bristle and knew he was afraid I might shove her onto the floor.

     When the doctor checked my uterus and told me it was time to push. I grunted and groaned and thought my body would explode. Three more hard pushes and out came the baby. Slippery, fleshy, bald.

     The nurse weighed him, and laughed.

     The doctor leaned over to look at the scale. “Ten pounds, seven and a half ounces,” he announced before she could. “He’ll be walking out of here!”

     Minutes later a nurse with red hair and a wide smile entered to see this big baby. She’d been in the delivery room five minutes, when another came in.

      The second nurse looked at Daniel, who was now warm against my chest. “Congratulations! How are you feeling?”

     “She delivered this baby with just a small tearing,” said the doctor.

     “And no epidural.” My husband smiled at me.

     We were asked if Daniel could be on TV, some program filmed at the hospital about smart moms and healthy babies. He’d be filmed in the hospital bassinet in the background while two hostesses discussed a segment of the show. I signed the papers in agreement and jokingly said that this could be the beginning of his film career. A friend in our neighborhood had also had a baby boy. She had a scheduled C-section, so while I was pushing, Mandy was done and drinking a cup of coffee in her room. Mandy’s son and Daniel were on the program together. The babies slept through their first-ever screen appearance.

     That evening, in the hospital room alone with Daniel, while the news on TV showed the catastrophe in Florida from Hurricane Andrew’s fury, I breathed in my newborn’s scent and smiled into his eyes. “Thank you for being a boy. Thank you, thank you. Now I can hang up those maternity clothes for good.”

Daniel wasn’t the content infant that his big sister Rachel had been. He fought naps and bed times, and yet each day, I thought, he’s growing up. He’ll grow out of this and once he grows out of this stage, that’s it. No more babies. When he pulled himself up onto the changing table at seven months, I grabbed the camera. At nine months he was taking steps and before he was two he had had it with diapers and peeled them off. I bought him big boy pants and showed him the plastic potty we’d used to train Rachel. He took to it immediately which busted that myth that boys are slower to be potty-trained than girls. Of course, having a reward for using the toilet was a huge incentive. That bubble gum dispenser positioned near the sink encouraged Daniel to pee as often as he could. Sometimes only a few squirts came out, but he felt he was still deserving of putting a penny into the gumball machine and getting a piece of gum. Sometimes he managed to get two out at the same time.

     I didn’t know how much fun having a boy could be and felt a bit ashamed that in previous years when I’d observed moms of male toddlers I’d been sorry they had to chase boundless energy through puddles and around swing sets.

Our family’s dynamics were a source of joy and pride. We made up jokes, we crafted our own songs; we went to Atlantic Beach in the summer and enjoyed the colors of Boone in the fall. Rachel was learning to read with the Hooked on Phonics series we’d invested in, Daniel was learning words he found important like ball, stick, and mud. Perhaps I was too proud of my children. Perhaps I loved them more than life. I knew that I loved them more than I loved God.

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One Tough Mama

"You are Wonder Woman. You know that, don't you?"  The nurse in the recovery room kept her eyes on a drowsy Daniel but I knew that she was addressing me.

Me, the mom with an eleven-month-old son in a stroller, a child of unknown gender in my belly, and four-year-old Daniel in the hospital bed, about to wake up from his third radiation treatment.

I only smiled.

"One tough mama," she said.  "You are amazing."

My daughter would have smiled at me had she been in the room, but she was in first grade learning to write about her brother Daniel.  He and I like to red funny books. He has a boo-boo in his neck.

Daniel opened his eyes and looked around the room.  "I had a nice nap," he said.

The nurse and I laughed.

This scene is only a memory now, a memory I have recalled over the eighteen years.

Eighteen years ago I did not think that I was a wonder woman.  I was merely doing what any mom with a kid with cancer would do----one foot in front of the other, moving forward.  It was a season of getting my three kids to where they needed to be when they needed to be there.  For Daniel that meant getting him to radiation treatments every day at 6 AM for three weeks, and to the hospital once a month for week-long cancer treatments.

Tears?  No.  Sentiment?  Who had time for that?  I was one tough mama.

Eighteen years ago I was thirty-six, and believed that if you prayed hard enough and dreamed big enough, you would never have to live a life of heartache.

When Daniel died at age four, people told me that they didn't know how I did it.  They used words like brave and strong and inspiring.

But now I wonder if they would understand that eighteen years since my little boy's body could no longer fight the battle, I'm a crumbling mess.  I cry because at The Home Depot a tool set has been reduced to 1992, the year Daniel was born. There's a car in the parking lot with Dan on the license plate.

Days before my Daniel's birthday (he would be 23 August 25th), I am reduced to an ache so large that I wonder if the years have stitched up my wound at all. I recall his death and his birth and the four tiny years between the two events as I prepare dinner for the living.

I stir the spaghetti sauce with blurry eyes. Tears splatter onto the counter.  My other children are 25, 19, and 18.  They have grown used to me, they know me.  I'm the mom who collects watermelon and tells the story of how Daniel stored left-over watermelon in his hospital bathtub after the Fourth of July. I'm the one who searches for rainbows after every thunder storm, keeps Curious George books in a dusty book shelf and uses Daniel's phrases----like, "A spider for a pet! I have a spider for my pet!" and Daniel wisdom----"I know why they call it a parking lot, because there are LOTS of places to park."

My kids don't mind tears in the sauce.  But they also know that I won't become sad when they head off to college or leave home for a dingy house with a group of boys before completing high school. They know I value the "normal" things kids get to do as they grow older and find their paths.  I cherish them and that they get to grow up, fall down, get up, and try again. (And am grateful that the middle child did graduate eventually.)

This is who I am, this is the life of one tough mama.

Because we remember always

One of the reasons we are Carved By Heart is because we treasure memories. Memories----happy, silly, fun, tender and sometimes tearful---live in our hearts. We have lost a great love, but we have not lost love. Our loved for those no longer here on earth with us is forever present. I know that my memories of my son Daniel are always ready for me to recall and sometimes, even after nearly 18 years, I can still feel his four-year-old fingers in my hand.

Candles are a great symbol of remembrance. Candles offer a wonderful glow, a light to let us know that our loved one's light lives on.

Taking an unscented white pillar candle, we have embellished it with strips of white and purple ribbon. To personalize, we've added a label with a loved one's name. We've carved the name into a wooden stand with a carved dark brown border. There's an indentation for the candle. And then, we've included a silver photo frame. As a final touch, we've added a wooden heart, painted it in silver and glitter. Under the name, we've added a tiny silver charm.

Our remembrance candles burn bright in memory of our loved ones.

See more photos of our candles here at this link. We are happy to personalize a candle and stand/holder for you.

Advice for a Dead Child’s Birthday? Do What YOU Need

A living child asks for a birthday party. Or you, as the parent, ask him what he wants for his birthday. There’s dialogue. There’s a cake and candles and presents. The camera captures the smiles as he tears open his gifts. It’s easy. It’s tradition. Parents fall into bed at night, exhausted, but grateful. Their son or daughter seemed happy with her birthday. Moms and Dads rest-—they did it!

But what exactly is a parent supposed to do on the birthday of her child when he is gone? Not gone, as in out of town or at the beach, or out of the country. Gone as in-—no longer alive.

A dead child doesn’t want. A dead son asks for nothing.

What does a mom or dad do? Where’s the rule book for celebrating birthdays for a dead child?

Every year I hope to come up with something creative. Every year something comes forth-—a poem, an article, an idea, some gift to a charity in Daniel's memory. Each year I recall a little boy who told me that he wasn’t supposed to say "customer words" (cuss words). A little boy who celebrated his last birthday, his fourth, with the help of friends, family, and a big red fire truck that stopped by to give him and his guests plastic firemen hats. (Daniel didn’t seem too impressed, but he wore the hat over his bald head anyway.)

Today, Monday, is Daniel’s 22nd birthday. I want to go to Daniel’s Place, i.e., the cemetery. My three kids are busy with work and the first day of school.

How many years since Daniel’s death has the first day of school come on his birthday? Another reminder that he never got to go to real school, just Mother’s Morning Out at a church and a few sessions with the teacher at the hospital school.

My kids are remembering their brother. Liz, the youngest, who was born three months after he died, tells me she remembered at school today. But she isn't eager about going to Daniel's Place. What she wants is a nap after the first day of her senior year, a nap before she has to go to work.

I decide. I make a decision, those things that were so hard to do right after Daniel died. I’d made so many when he was alive undergoing treatments for his malignant tumor. When he died, I wanted to not have to decide anything.

But today I will go alone to Daniel’s Place. Because I am going to do what I need to do. This is my son’s birthday and he’s not here and I decide that it’s perfectly acceptable to be a bit selfish. Even though I’m a mom and moms are always doing for others and neglecting their own needs, I’m allowed. I will go alone to sit by his grave and not wait for others to find time to join me.

Carl says he’ll go with me. He never met Daniel either.

We stop at the Dollar Store and buy a Happy Birthday balloon with a butterfly. We indulge in a few snacks. Carl gets pork rinds even though the sound of them crunching annoys me. I pick out a bag called Party Mix because it has a birthday hat on the packaging.

“Really?” says Carl. “Party mix?”

I suppose he thinks a party is not what we parents of dead children have. Actually, I think, as I eat from the bag while the two of us are seated across from Daniel’s marker, I’m not feeling in the party mode. Last year the kids, Carl and I celebrated Daniel’s 21st year with a picnic. This year, I feel undone by a life that is relentlessly tough. My maternal inventory: I have an adult child with Borderline Personality Disorder who came back to live with us last summer and another who left home and did not graduate high school. The youngest is not allowed to screw up because mama is tired of dealing with disappointment and the law. And yes, I have a dead child I have not seen since he was four.

But today on this birthday without him. I want to remember a little boy who loved Toy Story, stickers, laughter, and watermelon. I want to recall when he said, “You’re pretty, mommy, can I kiss you?” and then when I said, “Yes,” he smiled and shouted, “Hot dog!”

The tears come; this year Daniel’s birthday hits me terribly hard.

I write out a message on a sheet of paper to attach to the butterfly balloon. In the distance a hawk soars over the tree tops. From a tote bag, I remove a Fisher Price airplane and a heart-shaped box Daniel painted and place them both on the grave. I take pictures.

I take pictures of the sky, hoping to get the hawk in one of them. Standing with Carl, we lift the balloon into the sky. It sails to the left. Never before in all the 18 birthdays since Daniel’s death has a balloon headed in this direction. Perhaps this is a reflection of why this day seems super hard to live. If it sailed right, maybe things would be going better.

Carl and I watch until the balloon makes its way safely over the electrical wires, over the tree tops, and over the Interstate. We watch until the balloon is no more.

When it comes to celebrating the birthday of a child no longer here, my advice to parents is do what you need to do. Take the day off if that's what you need. Who cares if no one else understands? Sit at the grave, take pictures of the sky. View the clouds, look for dragonflies. Write long messages and attach them to helium balloons. Drink a Corona or glass of chardonnay to your child’s life and try not to think of how unjustly short his time on earth was.

Take care of you. You, the one who lives with a hole in your heart. Be kind to you; you need to stay healthy. Surround yourself with those who get it, who encourage you, not belittle you, who let you tell the stories, who don't judge your tears. Hold on and drink deep from that well called hope.

Remember that your love for your child expands beyond the sky. Always.

On your child's birthday, give yourself that gift of remembering love.

~ Alice J. Wisler

He was just a little boy . . .

It's that time of year again. That time when the yellow raincoat hanging in my closet feels as heavy as my heart. Everyone else is older now and with each passing year, this raincoat looks smaller than it did when he wore it. How could he have once been so small?

I look into the face of my son, that cute photo I took when I was just taking another picture of a child. Back before I realized that it would one day help to heal my heart.

There is so much I don't know. I don't know why Daniel spoke of Heaven so fondly. We never told him that he was going to die. I suppose it was because I never believed he would. Not until the very end after the staph infection shut his body down and the EEG confirmed what I did not want to hear. My son was brain dead.

Prior to that he looked into the sky one day and shouted, "I wanna go to Heaven!" His father and I looked at each other, speechless. No, no, our expressions conveyed. Not yet. Get well first and live and then die an old man.

I don't know why he wasn't able to die an old man. I don't know why he didn't even get to learn how to read.

He memorized. He memorized a complete book of jokes. And Maurice Sendak's Nutshell Library collection. "I told you once, I told you twice, all seasons of the year are nice for eating chicken soup with rice." He laughed at Pierre who got eaten by the lion and said, "I don't care." He loved for people to read to him. Curious George Rides a Bike. Are You My Mother? Where the Wild Things Are.

He spat watermelon seeds, built towers with Legos, loved Cocoa Puffs, and gave stickers to the doctors and nurses. "Because," he said, "you give presents to your friends."

After the doctors said there was no more that they could do, I kissed his cheek and whispered to him that he could die. "People tell me to let you go. To let you go. To say good-bye. You can go." The words sounded too harsh; no mother should have to tell her child that he is allowed to die. Quickly, I added, "But not yet. Not yet."

A bald-headed boy in a comatose condition, bloating on a sterile bed was better than no boy.

Each morning when I woke from the bed by his, I was relieved that he was still with us. Today was not the day I would have to deal with death. Not today. Not yet. I talked to him, I told him that I loved him. I told him he could die and I told him not to.

My mother was reading to him from a children's book about a boy who took a star from the sky and tried to keep it in his bed. But the star didn't belong in his bed and began to lose its light. At last, realizing that the star needed to be in the sky once again, the boy let the star sail back up to the heavens. "You can go, too," my mother whispered to Daniel.

Minutes later, our Daniel star left us. After only four years, his body had served its purpose. It was no longer needed. His spirit freely flew, sailing up to Heaven.

No more cancer, no more tears! "There are no tears in Heaven," he'd told me one day. Then he turned and asked me why.

"Jesus is there and there is no sadness when you are face to face with Him," I said.

There are no tears in Heaven, but there are plenty on earth. Especially when I hear Elton John sing Daniel or when somebody mentions Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story. Or when it's just an ordinary Sunday and the choir sings Amazing Grace.

I never thought he'd die. I always clung to healing, to health, to growing up with him, not without him. To more walks in the rain with him in his raincoat. To more times of him running out to greet the ice cream truck with all the change he could gather from the kitchen drawer.

I expected more birthdays, more kisses, more laughter. I wanted to send him off to kindergarten; instead I send kisses to Heaven. I take pictures of sunsets and sunrises, oceans and flowers, plant memorial gardens, and search for butterflies and rainbows. And I see the gap he has left between his older sister Rachel and his younger brother Ben and his sister Liz----the one he never met.

But after Daniel died, I remembered that I'd had a dream about six months into his treatment. He was climbing a ladder and the top of it was shaded by clouds. He was smiling, happy, no tears, no pain. He waved at me and continued to eagerly climb with a surge of energy. The next morning I shared the dream with my mom and my friend; their faces were sullen. What was wrong with them? My dream was a clear indication that Daniel was going to go from being ill to being free. His smile was a sure sign that he was going to be healed from the disease. We would have more of life here together.

Now I know that the dream was showing me that Daniel was climbing up to those clouds and beyond---beyond what I have ever experienced----where those who aren't around us anymore to share jokes live. I had wanted to keep him, hold onto him, I wasn't ready to let my precious star go back to where he came from.

I still want him here. With us. But I imagine Heaven is too wonderful to leave and once you are there, you are the happiest----your most perfect and content self----the way you were meant to be.

I love you, Daniel. I miss your bright blue eyes.

But your star shines bright. Especially tonight on your 21st birthday.

In memory of Daniel Paul Wisler: August 25, 1992 ~ February 2, 1997

Memories of a smile

There's a pull on my heart today---the kind that won't let go even though I'm enjoying a day that's all about spoiling me---my birthday. The wrapped presents on the kitchen table embrace mystery, and a magnificent chocolate cake made by my son Ben awaits. My two daughters whisper in the next room, and once my husband comes home, the five of us will go out to eat dinner at an Italian restaurant.

Yet, through moments of this day, the bittersweet mixture of pain and joy is evident. There's no denying that this ache stems from years ago when I sat in a hospital room with a little boy. He was the patient, but it was my birthday. The nurses brought in a cake with candles for me. The boy smiled, and wiggled with excitement as the nurses sang. Later he ate two pieces of cake.

Much later, he threw up. Seems chemo and birthday cake do not go well together.

Less than a month after my birthday, I cradled his breathless, bloated body in my arms and wondered how I'd ever live to see tomorrow.

I was not planning to have to live his August birthday without him. Nor mine.

Now, thirteen years later, I'm wrinkled. I might even have gray hair; I don't really know because I color it at least once a month. But the little boy is still four.

Each year on my birthday, his smile warms my heart as I recall the way he sat on his hospital bed, happy because his mommy was being treated to a cake with candles.

Each year I wish I could see that smile for real, and not just in my bin of recycled memories. When my birthday cake is sliced, I want to offer him at least two pieces.

Sweet Daniel, perhaps there's cake in Heaven. Perhaps the angels sing. Once I've wiped the tears from my eyes, I'll listen for your voice among them.