It's been about 3 years since I left a note here and surely many have moved along since. A lot happened. My son Kevin will turn four coming January, but he's a big brother now. Susannah was born on the 26th of Jan this year, a day before Kevin's birthday. We're keeping up with his family tradition where siblings are born that close. ;)
That is not it, 2007 and 2008 were tough years, my best friend and father struggled with his health. In December 2007 he visited Aruba with mom, and on the day they arrived there, his third grandchild and first granddaughter was born. He just couldn't shake off a persistent cold which seemingly developed in a pheunomia in January.
He was just recovered from that shortly before Kevin's 2nd birthday and very proudly gifted my son his very first bike. We spent hours talking about the research I was doing for my historical novel and his support was just immensely. Added to that we heard that his direct family was larger than we ever expected and I had written down his life history for a new found nephew. Little I knew what happened the months after that. Dad still felt that he hadn't kicked the pheunomia, so on a dreary February day I pressed on and with mom present, I set up an app. with his GP. Scans and further tests happened, and the devasting blow came early March in 2008 that he had lung cancer. It was treatable and even though he warred with many fears, I went to physiotherapy with him to help him getting that confidence that after he woke up from surgery he could breathe easily. We all stood by him, mom, my brothers and I, close family members. Chemo started after surgery and in June he got the news that chemo had kicked it: the lungs were clear. In May I discovered that I was expecting a baby and after that news I told him that we were expecting a child and his fourth grandchild.
What more could we possibly want? Dad was in remission, I was expecting our gift of a baby and we had to go house hunting quickly because we needed an extra room. We had luck with finding a great house and we bought it. our ver first house after years of renting. Packing started and Kevin and I spent a few days during summer at my parent's house. This way I could catch a break. Hindsight... those days were such a tremendous gift. Dad and I called on a daily basis for so long and shortly after that, his shoulder started to hurt, then his neck. He met his oncologist and his lungs were still clear. Yet, something was off and ct scans were made in a different hospital, revealing that the cancer had struck throughout his body... with the exception of his lungs. He was told that he could make Christmas, maybe the birth of my baby.
We got our heads together and asked dad to make a wishlist. We fulfilled every wish he still had: we took him to the sea, a huge paper factory, visiting a specialised orchid farm... what more. We kept on creating precious moments for him.
In September, a sonogram revealed that we were expecting a girl. Dad, mom and my brother would come by later that day, so I rushed to the store to buy pink anise seeds, sprinkled them over dried biscuit (Dutch tradition). Amidst all the moving boxes, we carefully lifted him on our couch and I revealed to him that his own little girl was expecting her own little girl. We cried, because we both knew that at this rate, he would not make it. I had this wish, but I also knew that he was in a lot of pain. Radiation helped a bit and chemo on top of that... He drank in the sights of our old home where we had shared so many wonderful memories. In that same month we got the keys to our new home and in between readying the home, packing the old home, Kevin's speech therapy & pre-school... it was a lot to go through.
On the day we moved in our new home, dad got a chemo. However his white blood cell count barely allowed for it. Three days after we moved in, dad passed away on the 22nd of October. I recall a few things of those days, me being called in the middle of the night, my (now) sister-in-law picking me up, and the unreal feeling that he was gone. His cremation was beautiful, yet it felt so unreal and yet real. I vividly explaining dad's passing to Kevin, who snuggled up close in bed the next morning after I returned home and how I tried to tell him that mommy would be very sad and that granddaddy was in heaven now. My kid took it so well.
In dad's coffin I placed a miffy on behalf of Kevin and a butterfly on behalf of his unborn granddaughter. I read somewhere in between, while researching my novel, that butterflies carry your wishes and whispers to god into heaven. Dad was there, and well, it just felt right. I don't remember much of the weeks after that, besides probably a lot of unpacking. I mean those boxes ended up unpacked somehow.
The birth of Susannah was a bittersweet experience, the weeks after I cried a lot, especially since I was gifted such a beautiful daughter besides an awesome son, and he wasn't there to see it. Mom visited often and still does, for some reason the close bond I had with dad has shifted to me and mom, and I don't mind. A few weeks before Susannah was born with her eyes wide open, by close brother and his girflriend told me that they were expecting. Maarten, our brand new nephew, was born this September, making my mother a very proud grandmamma once more. Maarten is also named after dad, which of course made us all wibbly.
We spread his ashes exactly a year after we passed at a very peaceful place, and we feel ready and brave enough to move on.
Within my own small family, I worked with a speech therapist since July 2008 to see if we could help Kevin mastering his speech and we worked hard on his speech and language development. We entered programmes to see what we can do to help Kevin and making sure that when he goes to elementary, he doesn't fall behind because of it. Only a week ago, we heard that a children's psychologist thought he had PDD-nos, so that's ungoing still. Kevin can talk now up to five to six word sentences, although grammatically not that perfect, but he has discovered the joy of talking to and with us. Sometimes I have to tell him to just be silent for a bit, but he is such a sweet and cheerful kid.
Edit: I have issues with uploading photo's, those will follow.
