How's Dad?

Our parents met in a St. Louis hospital about 35 years ago. How they met is one of those stories I’ve had Mom tell a thousand times. She was a nurse, he was a medical student. Dad asked her out on a date, and she turned him down. She was dating someone else. His response, “When you get rid of him, let me know.” He says after that, he went and lit a candle in the hospital chapel and didn’t ask again. She came around not long after, invited him to dinner at her apartment. She dropped the other guy, and she and Dad were engaged six weeks later.

I was watching a couple of little girls play with their Barbie dolls the other day. They had Barbie and Ken in their full wedding garb at the altar reciting their vows. I remember doing that myself as a kid. But I can’t figure out for the life of me where little girls learn those vows. We all know them somehow, “For richer or poorer, in sickness and in health…” But I don’t remember ever saying those words, dolls in hand, and thinking of sickness beyond a cold or maybe a bout with the flu. I just wonder how many people realize the possibilities ahead when they make that commitment.

“How’s Dad?” It’s the question we all hear only second most often to, “How is she?” And it’s the one for which we have no respectable answer. “He’s holding up well.” “He’s in doctor mode.” Those tend to be the best we have to offer. Truth be told, I think he’s holding up well and in doctor mode because of his kids. We may be in our twenties and thirties, but we may as well be two, four, six, and eight again. He’s still our Dad. We’re still his kids. She’s still his wife.

To call the last two weeks – the last 48 hours – a roller coaster, would not only be cliché, but an understatement. The lows are lower than I could ever articulate, and every glimmer of hope lurches us back upward. That goes for every last one of us. I’ve said to a few people over the course of this, I can only imagine two things more difficult than being the child of someone who is going through this right now: being the individual in the hospital bed, and being the spouse of the person in that hospital bed.

Today Mom got through her second round of radiation. And while the markers aren’t huge, we can see moments where she’s starting to rebound from the challenges she’s faced – particularly since Sunday. As they wheeled her out of radiation this afternoon, she held up two fingers. Two down, 28 to go. Tomorrow doctors think she’ll be strong enough to start chemo, too. We have no doubt. She’s never settled for anything less than perfect before, she’ll approach this the same way.

When we were sitting with Mom in her room in the Neuro ICU at Barnes today, I looked at Dad and I wondered if he thinks back to meeting her in a St. Louis hospital all those years ago. Could they have ever even considered that they’d be back in this capacity? I don’t think anyone ever does. But as with so many moments in the last three plus decades, we are where we are. They’re adjusting. We’re all adjusting. But they have an added responsibility as parents – one from which they’ve never shied. They continue to teach by example. Ask any one of us. We understand those vows now. Over the last two weeks our parents have truly taught us what marriage means.

So how’s Dad? I think he’s every bit as scared as the rest of us, but as hopeful as any of us. Two down, 28 to go. One day at a time. Hour by hour. We couldn’t be any prouder of Mom. We couldn’t be any more grateful for both of our parents.