Paul's Heart

Life As A Dad, And A Survivor

06 Jun 2014
3 Comments

You Didn’t Just Say That


Back when I decided to adopt my daughters, part of the process involved being educated in how to deal with becoming an interracial family. My daughters were going to be Chinese, and with the exception of having my eyes, clearly they were going to look different than me.

That difference is almost certain to bring out comments from people who do not understand just how potentially hurtful their words can be. You can call it ignorance, perhaps even bigotry. I would just call the comments and questions unnecessary. After all, no one ever asks a family with biological children “so where is your child from?” or of the siblings, “are they siblings?”

But that is exactly what happens, and I cannot vouch for when the children are adopted by the same ethnic parents, but when the family is going to be mixed ethnicity, white/African American/Chinese/Latino, for some reason, people need to know.

So it is not unusual for me to hear at least a half a dozen times when I am in public with my daughters, I will hear, “Are they sisters?” to which I always reply “yes.” Because they are. That is all they need to know. My daughters know that they have different birth mothers and fathers, but have the same adoptive mother and father. Another question that I usually give a smartass response to is, “where are they from?” I can give only a smartass answer because when you see my daughters you can see that they are Asian. But I give the answer, “from Lansdale.” But then that gets followed up with, “no, I mean what country are they from?” which my reply the United States. No, I do not have to play this game, but I have grown tired of it after all these years. Their mother and I, while knowing that are daughters were adopted from China, simply look at our daughters as just that, our daughters. We recognize and celebrate their Chinese heritage regularly. But to us, our daughters are no different than if they were our birth children.

But the worst possible comment that I heard actually came from a co-worker, a comment that while I knew the person was capable of saying bigoted or self-righteous comments, all in the name of Christianity, I never saw this comment coming.

The conversation started in the breakroom during my lunch period. My co-worker said to me, “you know, I don’t really approve of what you are doing,” making reference to the adoption of my first daughter (I never gave him a chance to make another comment like you will see in a few moments). I looked at him, knowing his personality, that his opinion was going to be in the line of “being unable to have kids, maybe I was not meant to have kids as God had planned”, his God, not mine. I have heard this said be some before. And perhaps I could have accepted his comment without any reaction from me if that had been his comment. But for whatever reason, I allowed the conversation to continue like I was trying to educate the ignoramus.

“Why, what do you mean?” I asked like I needed his approval.

“Well, I just don’t think it’s right. We send all of work over to China. We sell nothing but Chinese made products here. And you are bringing the Chinese here making it worse.”

It is not often to make me speechless, but this asshole did it. I stood up, pushed my chair in and walked away. I never entertained any other personal conversation with him ever again. I never, ever thought I would hear that comment from him. I understand the rhetoric by uneducated people who feel the blame for all the ills on our economic relationship with China, but the children of China are not. My daughters are US citizens and when of age will pay taxes unlike many US corporations. But when I heard that comment come from him, I could recall that I never once heard him complain about that last fact, only that I was bringing the Chinese to the country, under the guise of creating a family for me, to take over the US economy.

There are many other stupid things that I have heard, and many families I know who have heard worse.

When you see me with my daughters, if you feel the need to offer a comment, and though I am biased, I do expect to hear how beautiful they are, but I do not want to be asked where they are from or if they are sisters. Trust me, I like to talk. And if I feel it is appropriate, I will bring up that fact.

Posted in Adoption, Education, Family and Friends
05 Jun 2014

Handicapped… Or Handicapable


Three months following my open heart surgery, caused by damage from radiation therapy for my Hodgkin’s Lymphoma decades ago, I took the family to the New Jersey shore for a weekend getaway as part of my recovery before returning back to work. We were going to take our children to the amusement pier for the evening. My daughters are fond of carousels. In fact, I have photos of my daughters on every carousel they have ever ridden. With both girls under the age of five, both their mother and I rode with them.

As we approached the entrance gate to the ride, there was the measuring stick for children who rode solo without their parents to make sure they were tall enough and next to that was a white placard. On the placard was a huge red circle with a heart shaped symbol and a big line drawn through it.

In my younger days, I operated rides in our local amusement park, so the “heart condition” sign should not have been a shock to me. I know the adrenaline rush that occurs with a ride, so I was not anticipating riding on any kind of thrill ride. I was prepared for that. But this was a carousel, the tamest of rides.

Now I know the likelihood of any cardiac event taking place on a carousel, but seeing the cardiac warning sign hit me like a slap to the face. My heart sank. Was it possible that I was never going to get to do one of the things that I truly enjoyed in life, riding amusement rides with my daughters?

Six years later, unless you happen to catch me with my shirt off, which does not happen often in public, to look at me, you will never notice anything wrong with me just by looking at me. I do a very good job at hiding the late side effects that I deal with, so good, that even my doctors get fooled that I have actually been diagnosed with cardiac disease, pulmonary disease, muscular-skeletal issues, immunity issues. But they will all confirm, those diagnosis do exist. So seeing over a dozen specialist at one of the top hospitals in the country, Memorial Sloan Kettering, I have a label that is buried deep inside my conscience. I am disabled, handicapped, like it or not.

My doctors agree that I do not appear the typical Hodgkin’s survivor. From the day of my cancer diagnosis to today, I have never thought of myself anything less than a fully functional human being. True, I may not have the strength, ability, agility, flexibility, that I once had, that the average healthy person may have, but I am still fully functional. I do not consider myself handicapped, I will not even use the word. But I am learning to accept the word “handicapable.” With restrictions, dictated by my doctors, I am a fully functional human being.

I do have a handicap parking placard for my car, but it rarely is used except in situation of extreme heat and humidity (difficult for breathing) or if I happen to be carrying something heavy. Other than that, you will never see me use it. As an employee, I put in an eight hour day taking the same breaks as others who have nothing wrong with them. The truth is, I do not know if anyone else is dealing with any health issue, just as with my appearance, most have no idea about me.

I remain a good employee, committed to my efforts in any task that I take on. Unfortunately, to the dismay of my doctors and loved ones, I am too hard on myself to allow anyone to help me with physical challenges. As a cancer survivor, especially one dealing with late effects like me, we carry enough on our consciences without having the burden placed on us, that we feel we have to rely on others for assistance. At least that is how I feel.

Unfortunately, my body does not show that mercy to me. If I do happen to push too hard, it has a very rude way of letting me know that I have done too much, like when I had to have my open heart surgery, or two battles with septic and double pneumonia. I have learned more to listen to my body. Sure, sometimes my coworkers do not like that, some may even feel that I do not do my share. But I would challenge anyone to wear my size 9 1/2 shoes for just one day.

I do not look for pity. I have given up looking for understanding. But I do know the difference. I am not handicapped. I am handicapable.

Posted in Cancer, Education, Inspired By..., Side Effects, The Heart | Leave a comment
02 Jun 2014

An “Iron Knight” Or An “Iron Maiden”


This past weekend, my oldest daughter participated in her second elementary school triathlon. It is a school district wide event, so the triathlon has been called the Iron Knight Triathlon (the high school mascot is called the Knight, or for the females, the Maiden).

The event was in its third year and involved over 1000 students from grades Kindergarten through sixth grades, separated into three divisions of grades and then genders. Each grade division is then established with a different duration to allow for the disparity and difficulty. For my daughter, who is finishing fourth grade, she had to swim three lengths of the high school pool, then ride her bicycle a mile and half, and then jog 3/4 of a mile. She had done this course last year for the first time, and trained a lot harder this year, knowing what to expect during the transitions between legs. No surprise, she improved her time from last year, and as I viewed an overhead view provided by the school district of the event, it was amazing to see how elaborate and huge this event has become in only its third year.

But there are two things of importance to take out of this post. First, the emphasis on physical fitness, even for our children at all ages. And this took place, not during school but on a Saturday – morning and afternoon, though training meetings for the triathlon took place on school days, after hours, and of course practices were on the student athlete’s time. Every day the children were expected to train, eat well, and get plenty of rest. This was a good thing.

The second point I want to make, as a huge supporter of public school teachers, I mentioned this event took place on a Saturday, morning and afternoon. Swim practices for the event were also held on Saturdays. Guess what, there were numerous teachers and other staff members involved who volunteered to make this event as great as it was. And while I am only writing about the triathlon, there are many other events that take place by teachers who volunteer their time. I bring this up because it is contract time again for many schools including my daughters’ school district. And there are always morons who want to spew out the garbage about teachers being part time workers, and they clearly are not. Any parent who is involved with their child’s education, and that means more than just sitting at the kitchen table making sure the child does their homework, but participating in the various other functions held within the school, would see plenty of dedicated teachers, who many are parents themselves, and you would see the extra hours that these family members put in, away from their families. I will write more on this in a different post. But for now…

GREAT JOB!! elementary students of the North Penn School District. And to my daughter, I am so proud of you. As I trained with you, I could not keep up with your efforts (at least as far as the running) so I have an appreciation for the time, effort, and practice you put in. I hope you participate again next year, of course in the higher division, which means a lot more practice and a lot more distance. But if there is one thing I know about you and your sister, you can do anything when you put your mind to it.

Posted in Education, Family and Friends, Inspired By... | Leave a comment

Post Navigation

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →