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But she might…

8 May
As soon as my tires hit the gravel and I pull into R.O.C.K where Oli rides her horse, she gets THIS look on her face. She knows exactly where we are and what is about to happen. Then I say, "Oli we're HERE!!! It's time to ride your horse!" And she starts frantically clapping and yelling. She knows. No one can tell me that she doesn't understand. Just look at her face. I KNOW she knows.

As soon as my tires hit the gravel and I pull into R.O.C.K where Oli rides her horse, she gets THIS look on her face. She knows exactly where we are and what is about to happen. Then I say, “Oli we’re HERE!!! It’s time to ride your horse!” And she starts frantically clapping and yelling. She knows. No one can tell me that she doesn’t understand. Just look at her face. I KNOW she knows.

I posted this picture on my facebook page today. I posted it to show an example of what one of Oli’s expressions look like. This is an expression of “I know what is happening and I’m going to sit really quietly for a second and then I’m going to get really excited because I love what we’re about to do”. She has LOTS of these looks.

Some people have told me throughout her life that because she has an intellectual disability, is delayed and has autism, she doesn’t understand. That she couldn’t possibly understand because she doesn’t speak and because her cognitive development is delayed. We know that she is missing some of her genes off of her 14th chromosome. We know that this has affected her development and her learning. We know because she has done everything later than everyone else. We know that. I know that.

I know that despite being told that she may never walk independently, eat independently, have anticipation of events, be aware of her surroundings, have a sense of humor, the ability to laugh and to love, be funny, be brave, show strength and determination, cry, be sad, be mad, get frustrated… she has. I know that she has proved those people wrong every single time. And I know that she DOES understand. She does. I know because I KNOW her. Sometimes I feel like I know her better than I know myself. For whatever reason, she just can’t tell me what she understands with words.

I know that I may NOT know exactly what she is capable of in the future, but that I will ALWAYS give her a chance.

I know that I will ALWAYS believe in her.

ALWAYS.

That’s my job as her mother.

To believe in her despite all the odds, the challenges, the setbacks, the regression, the frustration and tears. Despite text books that tell me what she will or won’t do. Despite well educated doctor’s opinions and the opinions of the rest of the world. I will believe in her. I will never expect her to do less than her very best and I will never accept the words “She will never…”.

Because she might.

Because she probably will.

And even if she doesn’t do something or say something, I will go to my grave believing that it is still possible.

Some may call that naïve or say that I’m in denial. I’m not. I know that there is always the possibility that she will never move out, go to college, or get married.

But she might…

I will never ever be able to look into her sweet face and not see the sky as the limit. I will never take anyone else’s opinion on what she will or won’t do as fact. Oli will have to prove it to me. And even then, I will still push her. I will push her to have confidence and believe in herself. To set goals and achieve them. I will push her to develop her own sense of identity and to be kind. To love other people and to be respectful. To be understanding and to be grateful for what she has. To live and to laugh and to never look back. To view past mistakes as learning opportunities and chances to grow. To greet each day with optimism, and with a smile on her face, and to act better than she feels. To know that every day will not be perfect, but that’s okay. I want to push her to do her best with what she has and to be proud of who she is. I want her to be prideful instead of pitiful. I never want the world to take pity on her and I never want her to feel like she deserves it when they do.
Because they will.

She may never be able to do these things.

But she might…

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Leaving a child behind

1 May

After what seemed like an hour, but was more likely only a few minutes, I dared to sneak a glance at my husband. His face was a silhouette against the window of our car. With the sun setting orange behind him I could just make out the corners of his lips turning upwards in a smile.

“Move? You really think we need to move?” He asked, sparing a glance at me and momentarily taking his eyes off the road.

“I do. I think that we really should. Oli’s vision teacher is always telling us how great Austin, TX is. I think we should look into it.” I answer.

“Okay. I’m in. She just isn’t getting the amount of services that she needs. She needs occupational therapy and speech. She needs more physical therapy and orientation and mobility. I agree. Las Vegas, NV is definitely not the best place to raise a special needs daughter. Let me talk to my company and see what they can do. Maybe I could somehow transfer.”

And that was it.

The decision to move my family was made on a hot summer day in August 2009 on the drive back from California after a trip there for my birthday.

There were no arguments and no one resisted the change. We simply decided to move.

Bittersweet tears were shed by my husband. He was happy for Oli, but sad for who he was leaving behind. Moving to Texas meant leaving his two sisters, two nephews, one niece and his mother behind in Vegas. It also meant moving much, much farther away from his daughter, my step daughter Thalia, who lived with her mother in San Diego, CA. She was 11 years old at the time.

I didn’t appreciate then what an enormous amount of strength and courage that decision took for him. What it meant to leave a child and move somewhere where he would only see her once every 6-9 months instead of every month. He made the type of decision for Oli, which I’m not sure that I could have ever made. He made a choice to help one child, who may have needed it more, with the sacrifice of not seeing the other. Their relationship would remain tightly intact via computers and nightly phone calls. Many many phone calls.

And many many tears.

Many tears of sadness and loneliness were, and still are, shed on behalf of Thalia.

Some days he gets lost without his oldest daughter.

Sometimes I wonder if he regrets leaving.

I wonder if he thinks it was worth it.

I’m sure most days he thinks that it was. And then. . .I’m sure there are others where the pain and the sadness are too much. Days where he longs to feel the touch of her sweet embrace and see the warmth of her beautiful smile.

I do know that every day he misses her. Every. Single. Day.

We both do.

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IN MY DREAMS, SHE FALLS OFF THE CLIFF

29 Apr

Have you ever had a dream that you wake from completely devastated, but so happy that you’ve awoken from your worst nightmare? A dream that sits way too close to reality for comfort?

I’ve had a few of them, but three of those dreams stand out profoundly. These are three that I will probably never forget. All of them involve my Oli.

The first one was the recurring dream that I told you about in the very first blog that I wrote for my story. The dream that I was going blind. You can read it HERE. I’ve never had that dream again since Oli was born.

The second dream/nightmare happened after Oli had her first big seizure and we almost lost her. I must have had some kind of post-traumatic stress. I dreamed that she died that afternoon.

A van pulled up to my childhood home with my daughter’s body lying inside it. I met the driver of the van at the end of the driveway. I already knew that she was gone. The driver dipped his head in the sun, casting a dark shadow across his sorrow filled eyes. Then he walked around to the back and opened the hatch. When he turned around again he had a little bundle wrapped in a brown blanket in his arms. I couldn’t see any part of her. Except for her feet. They were lying across his forearm. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her feet. She was holding them in a certain sweet way, so delicate and petite, crossed at the ankles. He handed her to me and I carried her wrapped in the blanket over to the shade of a tree and laid her quiet body beneath it. And then I just sat there. I sat there staring at her beautiful little feet. My heart broke into a million little pieces. How could she be gone?

I woke up from that dream gasping for breath, feeling the happiness and life being squeezed right out of me. I ran to the other room and sat on Oli’s bed. I sat there and stared at her chest, rising and falling with life. I rubbed her feet beneath the blankets until they wiggled and pulled away from my hand. I sat with her until that image of her lifeless form left my mind. But, it hasn’t left it completely. I still see those little feet lying motionless in the grass. I still vividly remember that dream.

It terrifies me.

The third dream I had last night.

I had a dream that I wasn’t her mother. I was her nanny and I was moving. I was moving very very far away from her and I wasn’t going to be able to see her again. It was so strange because in my dream I was looking at Oli through someone else’s eyes. Not my own. I saw her as other people must see her. She wasn’t my child, but I felt fiercely protective of her and completely torn apart at the thought of not watching her grow up.

She was sitting in a chair as I was saying good bye. Her curly hair was blowing in a breeze coming in through an open window. Her lips quivered in sadness. Her little eyes were filled with tears. She knew I was leaving.

I said, “Oh Oli. How am I ever going to live without you? I don’t want to go away. I want to stay with you forever. How am I going to survive?”

She wrapped her arms around my neck and nuzzled her face into the crook of my collarbone. Just like always. And then we said good bye. I cried and sobbed and screamed her name.

“Oli! Oli! No! Please! I can’t leave her! Don’t make me leave her!” The anguish washed a red tide over my heart and wiped all happiness away.

And then I woke up.

I woke up and my Oli was still sleeping safely in her bed. I hadn’t been taken from her. I was still her mother.

I don’t know what these dreams mean? I don’t know if other moms have these types of nightmares? Are other special needs moms terrified of losing their children? Do we all notice a visible line between life and death and are distinctly aware of keeping our children walking on this side? Do we all hover and protect, trying to keep them from falling off the edge only to have them flail beyond our control off of the cliff in our dreams?
I’ve never had dreams like these that involved my other children. They’ve never died or been taken away from me.

With Oli… I have. I still do.

I’m probably just terrified of losing her. Sometimes her life seems so fragile compared to everyone else’s. She seems so much more breakable. I imagine a lifetime of loving her and laughing with her, but I know that there is no guarantee. There is no guarantee with anyone, but with her it just seems so much more real.

Sometimes I just can’t seem to help being petrified that I’m going to lose her. I don’t want to lose her.

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Would Things Have Been Different?

24 Apr

Driving down to California that hot day in July, gave me a lot of time to reflect on what had happened during the previous 3 years. I started thinking about the year that I turned 27, 10 months before Oli was born.

Kekoa was only 7 months old. I have a picture of him and me on my birthday that year. He was sitting on my lap helping me to eat a piece of cake. What strikes me most in that photo is how young I look. How peaceful. The worry of doctor appointments, evaluation deadlines, and missed milestones had not yet been etched on my face. That deep penetrating sadness cannot yet be seen reflecting in my eyes. Grief cannot yet be seen shadowed over my shoulder. I had no idea what my life would look like just 3 short years later.

I can’t help but think about what my life would have looked like if I hadn’t had Oli.

Would I still be ignorant to things such as early intervention services, occupational and speech therapists, VI teachers and O & M specialists? Would I miss the looks that strangers give to those who are different than them? Those looks that say, “What is wrong with her? Oh! What is wrong with her?!” Those looks that break my heart. Would I be oblivious to the passing remarks containing the word “retard” or the jokes made about blind people? Would I miss spotting the looks of exhaustion and overwhelming sadness that I see painted all over the faces of other special needs moms? Would I appreciate every single day with my children as much as I do now because I fear that I don’t know what the future will hold? Would I cherish their kisses as sweetly or hold on as tightly when they wrap their arms around me? Would I have learned to walk through the grief and come out on the other side stronger and more secure than ever before?

These are all things that I thought about, but did not have the answers to yet, in July of 2009. That year my sole focus was still on changing it. I wanted to change my life however I could so that I would begin to feel better. I needed to feel like I was DOING something for Oli. Being her mother just wasn’t enough.

As I was lying on the beach or trying to sleep in a strange bed that weekend, I became consumed with what I could do for her.

What I was doing wasn’t enough.
It wasn’t enough.
I should be doing more.
Other mothers were doing more for their kids.
I needed more.
I needed to do more.
I have to get out.
I have to get out of Nevada.
They can’t help her.
They can’t give her the help that she needs.
There has to be more.
There has to be a place that can do more.

My mind was trapped on a hamster wheel, spinning, spinning, and spinning. Chasing an unseen assailant that was ruining my life. Chasing a dream that I would be able to change it all. A dream where I was able to fix this somehow.

Still…a dream that I would wake up to a daughter who was “normal”. A daughter who was not blind and developmentally delayed. That dream that I secretly lived in while the world moved on without me. The world moved on and left me alone with my self-doubt, self-pity, and self-hatred.

Because I didn’t want to feel this way.

I wanted to just love her and believe in her.

I DID love her and I DID believe in her.

I didn’t JUST do it though.

I thought that all of those feeling were abnormal. I thought that they were wrong. And I thought that they made me a bad person. A bad mother. Even though those thoughts were my truth. They were my reality and no matter how much I tried to ignore them, forget them, and deny them…they were always there.

They were there taunting me, shaming me, and making it difficult for me to breath.

They told me lies like, you are alone. You are a failure. No other mother in the world feels like you do. You don’t deserve to have these beautiful children. You are not good enough. You will never be able to do enough. You can’t help her. You will ALWAYS feel this way. You will always be terrified, sad, and miserable.

And I was. For a very long time I was.

I didn’t know what was making me feel that way though.

All I knew? I was unhappy and I needed more support. I needed more support for my daughter.

I waited until we began our drive back to Pahrump to broach the subject with my husband.

As the sun dipped silently beneath soft orange clouds I built up the courage to say, “I was thinking…maybe we need to look into moving to another state. Somewhere that has more vision services and can help us better.”

A million butterflies danced and turned somersaults in my stomach as I looked at my husband, waiting for his response. You could have cut the tension in the air with a knife, once those words were out of my mouth.

A few minutes past and then my husband spoke…

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I drive my husband nuts.

23 Apr

(Back to my Oli story…)

I woke up one morning at the end of July 2009, to a request to pack my suitcase.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“I can’t tell you, just pack some clothes. Oh, and can you pack for the kids too?” My husband looks at me sheepishly.

“How am I supposed to pack for everyone if I don’t know where we are going? I will only pack if you tell me what I am packing for.” I reply in my true party pooper nature.

“We are going somewhere for your 30th birthday. If you want that surprise that you say that I never treat you to, you will close your mouth and just pack. Please. Be a nice girl and just pack and don’t make me ruin it for you.” My husband begs me.

But, alas, I am never one to make things easy on him. I start guessing.

“Camping? We’re going camping aren’t we? I don’t want to go camping. I love it, but I didn’t imagine my birthday so full of mud and dirt and so NOT full of bathrooms and showers and fully cooked meals.”

“No. We’re not going camping.” Seth responds. “Go pack.”

“The mountains. We’re going to the mountains aren’t we? I don’t know about that? It might be cold at night and then Oli won’t sleep and then I’ll be grouchy and you’ll be grouchy and then it will just suck and I’ll want to come home because the children will make me crazy.” I’m imagining snow covered mountains at 3 am and watching a beautiful sunrise amongst other patients in the looney bin. All of us wrapped cozily in straight jackets being sent there by our lovely children and our husbands wayward attempts at disastrous surprise birthday trips.

“No. We’re not going to the mountains. Now just go pack! Why do you have to make this so difficult?”

“Because that’s just me and that’s why you love me.” I reply with a sweet smile and a voice dripping with sarcasm.

“Are we going to Hawaii? I LOVE Hawaii! That would be the best birthday present ever! I could totally handle mud, dirt, non sleeping children and the looney bin in Hawaii! Let’s go there!”

“You’re not going to play nice are you? You’re going to make me tell you.” He smiles despite his annoyance because he knows me so well and had been planning on telling me the whole time.

“No and yes. No I won’t play nice and yes I will make you tell me.”

He shrugs and lets out an over embellished sigh. “Okay. If that’s what you want my darling, annoying, party pooper wife. We’re going to California. I rented a house for 3 days on the beach. Happy?”

“Yay! Yes! Yes I’m happy! I love California! Now I’ll go pack. What should I bring? What if it’s too hot? What if the kids get sunburned? I need lots of sunscreen. Did you pack the beach umbrella? Do we need to pack food for the house before or after we get there? Should I wear my blue bikini or my red one? Good thing I’m not showing with this baby yet. What about clothes for at night? It gets cool at night. Should I pack coats for the kids? What are you bringing?”

“Aaaaaggghhh! Shannon! YOU are making ME crazy! I’M the one who will end up in the looney bin at the end of all this! Just GO PACK!”

I smile sweetly at him again. He loves me.

Maybe this whole turning 30 thing won’t be as bad as I thought. There is one thing that we do have to discuss while we’re gone. Something that has been running through my mind and keeping me up at night.

We need to move. We need to get out of Pahrump, NV.

We need to go some place that isn’t so isolated and has better services for Oli. I can’t stand the hour long drive to doctor appointments and the minimal therapy services she is receiving. We have to do better for her. We have to go someplace that can help her to learn and to thrive in this world as a blind child. We need to go where doctors understand her and therapists know how to teach someone who can’t see. Some place where she will not be an unusual case with an unknown condition.

I have to get out of this town. I feel like I’m drowning in a sea of uncertainty and suffocating on loneliness. I feel like if we could just get out and go someplace where people could help us, that it would all change. I wouldn’t feel like I was so weighed down by Oli’s disability and maybe I could learn to cope better. Maybe I would stop pretending that I was fine and I could start being honest. Maybe I would be able to tell someone that I hated this. I hated the fact that Oli wasn’t what I had imagined. Maybe I could tell someone that I was terrified of this baby that I was going to give birth to in 9 months. Maybe things would be different in a different place. Maybe I could let go of the hatred that I held for the way I felt. Maybe…Maybe I could just accept it and move on.

I’m thinking Texas. I’m thinking Austin, TX sounds like it would be a good place for my family. I hope my husband agrees… He’s going to get a surprise of his own this weekend.

Surprise honey! I want to move!

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Something That I Don’t Talk About

28 Mar

Aggghhh….Okay. This is the post that I didn’t really want to write. I didn’t want to write it because it makes me really sad. Which actually says a lot.

People have asked me to talk about what I felt like once I became pregnant again. What happened to make me decide to have another baby once I knew all that I knew about Oli.

I’ll start by telling you that it wasn’t an easy decision. Especially after we learned that Oli had a genetic deletion. It was something that could affect subsequent babies, although the likelihood was only 5%. 5% feels pretty huge once you already have an affected child. Any percentage above 0 feels like an enormously stupid roll of the genetic dice.

You want to know how I felt when I looked down at that little white stick and saw 2 pink lines appear?

I felt terrified. I felt scared and selfish and happy and overwhelmed.

I felt like I had probably just sentenced this tiny little miracle to a life of blindness. A life of doctors, therapies, and disabilities.

I didn’t have a whole lot of time to process learning that Oli’s condition was genetic. I found out about her OTX2 deletion and then found out I was pregnant just a few weeks later.

Many scenarios ran through my head once I knew that I was going to have another baby. One thought, which I really really HATE to talk about, was maybe I shouldn’t have her. Maybe I shouldn’t go through with this pregnancy.

I don’t like to talk about that thought because the idea of my Ginger not being a part of my life literally brings me to my knees with pain. It sends a stabbing knife of sorrow straight through my heart and makes it hard to breathe.

My baby girl. My little Ginger. I had seriously thought about not having her.

See no one really talks about this.

I was raised Catholic and abortion is something that you are never allowed to even mention let alone talk about. I never thought it would be something that I would ever consider. Because I never thought that I could do it. I always thought that if I got pregnant then I got pregnant and it was my responsibility to take care of that baby. Abortion was never an option.

Well…right at that moment…it became an option.

My views on abortion have always been more pro choice. Mostly because I don’t believe that I ever have a right to tell YOU how to live your life. That goes for my beliefs on everything. Religion, marriage, abortion… You name it. I don’t feel like I have a right to tell you what’s right for you. I’ve never lived your life, had your experiences, dealt with what you have. I never would feel comfortable telling you what to do. I don’t believe that anyone really should. Just because something may or may not be right for me does not mean that it may or may not be right for you.

So anyway…I struggled with what the right thing to do for me, my family, and my unborn baby might be. I did a lot of crying and a lot of praying and pleading that nothing was wrong with this baby. Eventually one night I was lying on the couch late at night. I remember lying there thinking, I have to make a decision before it’s too late. I tried to picture myself going into a doctor’s office and having the procedure. I tried to feel what it would be like to not know that anything was wrong, but choose to play it safe and not have the baby. How did it make me feel? Could I live with myself terminating a baby if I didn’t know that she was blind? What if she was blind? Was it really that bad? Even if she had other disabilities or something else happened, was it really better to never have been?

The answer I came up with that night was…no. No. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t end a life based on the fact that it might be hard for her. I couldn’t not have her because it might be hard on me. It was going to be scary, but I just couldn’t terminate the pregnancy. I decided that it would be way worse to NOT give this child a chance at life, then to just have the baby born blind. I chose blindness as a possibility for this child over death.

I’ve never made a more significant decision in my life.

I went to the doctor and then called the Albert Einstein Medical Center to see if they could do genetic testing on the baby before she was born to find out if she was missing her OTX2 gene.

It was scary. I was scared the entire 9 months that I was pregnant. Even after the amniocentesis came back and said that she was fine…I was scared. Because what if something else was wrong? What if they missed something? They missed noticing that Oli’s eyes were small before she was born, what if they missed noticing something with this baby?

It was scary because I continued to wonder if I had made the right decision.

Another baby was going to take time away from Oli. She needed so much more time because of therapy and doctor appointments and she just needed more help with everything. It was going to take time away from Kekoa. He had already had so much of his time stolen away by Oli’s disability. Another baby was going to take more. And the baby. What about the baby? Would I have enough time and energy or even enough emotion left for this baby? Would this baby get enough of what she needed?

Was this the right thing to do?

Could I do it?

I had all of those questions throughout my pregnancy.

And then Ginger was born.

I laid my eyes on the most beautiful baby girl. This little baby looked at me with eyes that said “Just love me. I don’t need anything else. It doesn’t have to be perfect. Just love me.”

And I knew that I had made the right decision.

It was the right decision for me. I look back and think about what if things had been different? What if something had been wrong? Now I know that it wouldn’t have mattered.

It would have been a different road, but it wouldn’t have mattered. She would have been perfect anyway.

Because Oli is too.

Oli has taught me that life doesn’t always lead me down the nice, friendly, easy path. It’s not always sunny and clear. And that in my life I have received gifts that I never would have looked at as gifts. But that’s exactly what they are. If my last child had been born with a disability then she would have had a disability. She would have been different. And that’s okay. Different is just different. No more, no less.

I would have gotten through it.

Just like we all do when life hands us something that we are not expecting. We hate it, are angry with it and scream at it. We deny it and argue with it. And then we get through it.

And we move on.

Because really?

What else can you do?

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One Mother’s Expectations

14 Mar

“I thought that one day I would just wake up and have all of the answers. What I have found is that the answers I get, rarely have anything to do with the questions I ask.”

It was a warm day in June 2009 and I was sitting on our cream colored leather couch in the living room. I’m sure there was a cartoon on the TV that I had forgotten to turn off when my kids laid down for a nap. I was alone, which for some reason, I usually am when I get bad news. My husband was at work.

The phone rang and I glanced down at the caller ID.

Unknown.

I normally don’t answer calls labeled unknown and let them go to voicemail, but on that particular afternoon I answered it.

Unknown.

That is where I was sitting in the moments before I took that call. I didn’t know what Oli “had”. I didn’t know why. I didn’t have any answers. Why had her eyes not developed in utero? What was wrong with her? Why was she so different from other children her age? Why was she 2 years old and not walking or talking yet?

At that point in her life, I needed to know why.

I thought that if I knew why, I could help her better. I thought that if I knew why, then I wouldn’t be so angry with the world. If I finally got an explanation as to what had happened, then I could come to terms with the whole mess that had become my emotional prison.

I found out why, on a warm day in June when my phone rang and I answered a call from the Albert Einstein Medical Center. They were calling to tell me the results of Oli’s genetic testing.

I found out why it happened, but I did not find out why it happened to her. Which is really what I wanted to know all along.

Why did it happen to my family? Why us? Why did fate choose my sweet, innocent, beautiful little girl to bestow such a big obstacle on. A big difference. A hardship.

Why?

You see, for a long time I thought that this was some kind of punishment. I couldn’t understand why this happened to me. To my baby. I was a good person. I never hurt anyone intentionally. I had a good life. A happy life. I grew up with a great family. I had friends, went to college, had a job. I was grateful for my life and was just going along trying to be the best person that I could be.

And then…the ground fell out from beneath my feet.

I thought it was all happening to me and my family. It was my son and my husband who were affected by this.


I took on ALL of the responsibility of the health and happiness of my little family because I was the wife. I was the mother. I was supposed to protect them, keep them safe and ensure their happiness.

And then Oli was born.

She was born and I wasn’t sure that I could do any of it anymore.

If I could not stop, prevent, change, or fix what had happened to this little person that I had brought into the world, then I could not stop, prevent, change, or fix what happened to any of them. That realization hit me like a 2 ton steel truck, right smack dab in the middle of my forehead.

When I realized that…I began to react and operate by my fear.

Fear of this big, scary world that had walked into my hospital room on another warm day in May, 2 years previously. That unknown world walked right in, handed me a big pile of crap called unmet expectations and promptly walked right back out of that room.

Oli wasn’t what I had expected. She didn’t fit into my box. The box that was supposed to hold my perfect little life. No matter how hard I tried to cram that square peg into that round hole, she would. not. fit.

When I answered that unknown phone call, I still had expectations. I expected to hear that she had SOX2. Something that lots of other kids had. This particular gene deletion is responsible for the majority of microphthalmia and anophthalmia.

You know what I heard instead?

I heard that she did NOT have SOX2. I heard that she had something else. Something that was not very well known or very common.

She had OTX2.

A gene called OTX2 was deleted from her 14th chromosome and caused her eyes not to develop.

They didn’t know a whole lot about OTX2. When they diagnosed Oli she was one of only 15 kids in the world known to have this deletion.

I expected to finally have an answer, a plan. I expected to find out her diagnosis and then hear, “She will do this at this time. Talk at this age. Walk at this age. Have this ailment, but never suffer from this one. She will go to college. She will get married. She will wear a pink dress to the prom.”

These are the things I wanted to hear when I got that phone call. I thought that I would finally have answers. Real answers. A plan. When I got the diagnosis, I expected a map for the rest of her life to be laid out during that phone call.

What I got instead was….we don’t know?

We don’t know what her future will look like. We don’t know when she will walk or talk. Or if she will at all. We don’t know if she will go to college, ever have a boyfriend or get married. We don’t know if she will ever even be able to live on her own. We just don’t know.

My expectations, the ones that I had been relying on this whole time, were shattered like a mirror when I got that diagnosis. Her future, reflected in that piece of glass that I had been focusing on for 2 years, came crashing down around my feet.

Now I had a diagnosis, but I was no closer to any answers. No one could tell me how to fix it for her or what I needed to do as her mother, to make her fit into this life. Because no one knew what this life would look like for Oli.

I hung up the phone and gazed out of the window towards the mountains in the distance. Tears freely rolled down my cheeks and I made no attempt to wipe them away.

Now I knew what had happened, but I realized right at that moment, that I would never know why.

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Oli’s Genetic Library

12 Mar

In the summer of 2009 I got another phone call that I won’t forget. I remember exactly where I was sitting, what I was thinking and what I did after I hung up the phone. It’s just like when people remember where they were when a certain big event happened. JFK’s death…I’m not that old. How about…Kurt Cobain’s death and when I heard that they declared OJ Simpson innocent of murder. I remember exactly where I was when I got the call telling me of Oli’s genetic diagnosis.

We had some genetic testing done for Oli a few months earlier to see if she had a particular gene deletion. There are a couple of different genes responsible for eye development in a fetus. So it would make sense that one of these genes might be missing and caused her lack of eye development. She also had other things going on so it was more likely that it was a gene problem and not just a random occurance. Which, sometimes, it is.

These tests can be extremely expensive and if you don’t know what you’re looking for, you end up wasting thousands and thousands of dollars testing a multitude of different genes. You can’t just go into a lab and say “My baby was born without eyes, draw her blood and figure out the problem.” Number one, they will look at you like you have lost your mind. Number two, regular labs don’t run these kinds of tests. It has to be a specific lab and usually they are doing these tests to further their research.

We got lucky that the Albert Einstein Medical Center had some money and was willing to test Oli for 3 different gene deletions. (I think it was 3, but I only remember the names of 2.) SOX2 is the most common deletion in microphthalmic and anophthalmic children. This is the one they tested first. OTX2 is another one that is less common, but also causes micro and ano. Oli is missing OTX2.

(Kekoa is watching me type this and wants me to add “Oli is wonderful”. OLI IS WONDERFUL!! Kekoa you are just too sweet.)

Before I tell you about that phone conversation I want to explain one quick little thing so it makes sense. Oli has all 46 of her chromosomes. They are all present and accounted for. Imagine that the chromosomes are bookshelves. The GENES are the BOOKS on those chromosomal bookshelves. Oli has all of her bookshelves. Oli is missing some of the books off of her bookshelves. Notice I put “some books”? Yes. Multiple books. Not just the one titled OTX2. She is actually missing around 20 books off of her shelves. Bookshelf number 14 to be exact. Some book thief came during the peak of her fetal development and stole 20 books off of her bookshelf number 14. Bastard!!

Actually…that’s not how it happened. Those genes were already missing off of the ONE egg or that ONE sperm when she was conceived. What are the odds? About 5% according to her geneticist. We don’t know who it came from. The sperm or the egg? I’ll blame the sperm. The female egg is the epitome of perfection. Those sperm have been the cause of a whole host of problems throughout the history of evolution. War, famine, and STD’s. How about the invention of golf, ESPN or the Harlem Shake. Can I blame those on the male species?

Most of these books that she is missing have unknown functions. Like book number 63 might be responsible for something, but we just don’t know what? Maybe it did something thousands of years ago during the evolution of humans and we just don’t need it anymore. But… there is sits on the shelf, acquiring dust with a random title like “Fins” or “Hairy backs”. (Some people are still reading this particular book.) Or maybe book number 13 does something like provide the normal pace for hair growth. Which would explain Oli’s VERY slow growing hair. I have only barely trimmed it. Once. 4 months ago. I’m not sure if this is why her hair grows slowly, but I’m guessing it has something to do with it.

Sooooooo…that’s the deal with Oli’s library. Pretty interesting, huh?

Next I’ll tell you the story about the phone call.

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A Phone Call I Won’t Forget

8 Mar

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On Saturday May 9, 2009 I got one of the few phone calls that I will never forget. How do I remember the specific date? Because we were celebrating Oli’s 2nd birthday.

We were having some family and friends over to the house to celebrate Oli’s special day. We were just getting ready for everyone to arrive when my cell phone rang.

“Hello?” I didn’t recognize the number on the display.

“Hi. My name is Bridget. I got your number from Tanya from the Albert Einstein Medical Center. I’m 22 weeks pregnant with my first child and I was recently told that they suspect that she has microphthalmia. I know you have a daughter with micro and I just had some questions and wanted to talk.”

It seemed like all of the breath was expelled from my lungs in one quick whoosh. My heart dropped to my stomach and the moment became imprinted in my memory. This woman was going to have a baby girl just like my Oli. I was one of the first people she reached out to. I knew how terrifying those first few weeks were when Oli was born. I remember searching for just one person who knew what I was going through. I found that one person and I still remember my phone call with her. Now I got to be that person. I got to offer another mother the same compassion and understanding that was offered to me.

I wished I could reach right through the phone and wrap my arms around this stranger.

“Where are you?” I asked.

“We’re just outside Austin, TX.” She answered.

Now, I was stilling living in Pahrump, NV at this time. Seth and I hadn’t even discussed moving yet. Well…we had discussed it, but we didn’t know where we were moving to yet.

Fate, strange coincidence? I don’t know. I find it eerie that we ended up moving about an hour away from Bridget just a little over 5 months later. We’re still friends, although she has since moved away to be closer to her family in St. Louis, MO.

“I’m so glad that you called me! I would love to talk with you about Oli and help you in any way I can.”

I remember carrying the phone into my bedroom, mouthing “another A/M (anophthalmia/microphthalmia) mom to my husband, and closing the door. I sat on my bed and asked Bridget to tell me her story. How she found out, what she knew about micro, and most importantly, how she was feeling. I remember she sounded scared, lost, and overwhelmed. But, she had something in her voice that I had been missing. Something that I pretended to have, but always fell short of achieving.

She had faith in her voice.

A lot of babies born with microphthalmia have some sort of vision. If the eyes are not too underdeveloped they may have some usable vision or light perception. Sometimes only one eye is affected and the other eye is normal. If the micro is severe enough, then the kids don’t usually have any sight and sometimes even when the micro eyes are not severe, there is no vision because other structures are involved. Like underdeveloped optic nerves. Basically….one just never knows until the babies show us that they can see or not. Anophthalmia means the eye is missing completely. This also can affect only one eye, the other being normal, or it can happen in both eyes. You would think that the kids with bilateral anophthalmia would not have any vision at all. You would think that they would be 100% blind because, well…because they are missing their eyes. Not true. I have heard of some kids with anophthalmia in both eyes and these children display signs of having light perception. You just never, ever know. You cannot say with any certainty that a baby is blind until they absolutely prove to you that they are.

When Bridget went in for a routine ultrasound the tech noticed that her baby’s eyes seemed small. Upon further testing/measuring the eye sockets they realized that they were really small. Although, no one knew the extent of the underdeveloped eye sockets. They wouldn’t know for sure until her baby was born.

For a long time after Oli was born I would think about what it would have been like if I had known about Oli’s eyes before she was born. Most people don’t know until birth because eye measurement just isn’t something they do with a routine ultrasound. They only do it if the tech notices that the baby’s eyes look small. I can make arguments about which would have been better for me, knowing or not knowing.

On one hand, I’m glad that I didn’t know because I got to enjoy my pregnancy. As much as I can enjoy being pregnant, which is not very much. I didn’t dread her delivery or have to worry about what would happen afterwards. For people like me, this was a very good thing. My mind has a hard time staying in today as well as suffering from constant abuse from my nemesis, Gertrude. That little old lady would have made my life a living hell in the months before her birth. If I would have known I would have been plagued by a constant rush of bad scenarios and terrible outcomes running through my head.

On the other hand, if I would have known, maybe I would have been better prepared. Maybe I could have talked to another A/M mom before she was born. Maybe it would have helped. Maybe not? Maybe I would have been paralyzed with fear and raging pregnancy hormones. Maybe….

Now it doesn’t really matter. Not knowing is just part of my story.

I talked with Bridget for a long time that warm day in May. I tried not to let my sadness or my fear for her creep into my voice that day. I tried to just listen and offer her whatever I had that might give her some peace. The truth is…Bridget already had it. Although I’m sure that she was scared, she already had a sense of peace about her because Bridget had faith in something bigger. Faith that her baby would be born exactly as God had intended and she knew that her baby would be well taken care of.

Her baby girl was born in September 2009. She has bilateral anophthalmia. She is totally blind.

And she perfectly named her baby….Faith.

If you want to read more about Bridget and her sweet Faith go to www.superbabyfaith.com

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Don’t Put Me In The Room With The Big Comfy Couch!

5 Mar

When I approached the information desk and made eye contact with the woman behind it I must have looked a little “frazzled”. When I asked her if Oli was out of surgery yet she must have sensed my panic, noticed my tightly clenched fists, or saw me on the verge of crying because she immediately went to check for me. She even bypassed pretending to know how to work the phone or computer.

She came back a very long 5 minutes later and said “No. She is still back there, but they will be done soon. She’s doing just fine.”

“Oh okay. Thank you. I knew everything was fine, but you know…..well, I had to check because you see, she’s blind and autistic and has this rare gene deletion, so we don’t really know a whole lot about it and this gene caused her eyes not to develop so she wears prosthetic ones and she started having seizures in 2011 and…..”

Crap. I lost her.

She’s “working on the computer” now and trying to politely get me to go sit down.

What?

You don’t want to hear Oli’s life story?

Are you sure?

I can tell it 2.5 minutes if I talk really fast and run all my sentences together.

No?

Whatever. You’re missing out on a really good moment of mommy-gone-mad. Especially since I didn’t sleep last night. It’s an even better show when I don’t sleep. I’m much more likely to cry and then burst into fits of uncontrolled laughter.

Oh well. Your loss. That’s some quality entertainment your missing out on.

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You better believe that I sat my butt down in the nearest chair and did not move until that pager lit up and vibrated.

I finished my much needed cup of coffee, checked my Facebook (thanks for the prayers guys!) and waited.

6 hours later…..no, it wasn’t really that long. It just felt like it. They called my name and walked me back to another little waiting room.

This one was WAY better. It had a nice big squishy couch, a table and chairs, a little TV….

Wait!

No!

I don’t want to be in this nice room!

This looks like a “bad news room”!

You never give parents bad news in uncomfortable chairs. That’s just plain mean. You give them bad news in rooms with big comfy couches and little TV’s. Rooms with a circular table and chairs for having “discussions”.

I want to go back to that other room! I want to go sit in those crappy vinyl covered chairs with the fish again! NEMO! HELP!
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“Make yourself comfortable. The audiologist will be with you soon.” The volunteer tells me.

Make myself comfortable? I am going to get the worse news of my life, well….the second worse, behind “Your baby is blind, do you have any questions?” It will be the same. “Your daughter is deaf, do you have any questions?” I should call the School for the Deaf right now and just get this ball rolling. No need to waste time…Good thing I have my Tab, I’ll just Google it.

I mean…the news cannot possibly be good. This couch is just way too comfortable.

Maybe I’ll hold off just a minute. Google will be there in 5 minutes. Maybe I’ll take a nap.

I’m feeling a little over-tired and the craziness has begun to set in quite rapidly.

Luckily I did not have to wait long enough to be able take a nap. (Well I guess it wasn’t so lucky for everyone else that had to deal with me the rest or the day.) The audiologist walked in and sat down.

Uh-oh. She’s sitting. Number one rule of doctors and nurses: always sit and be at eye level when delivering bad news to parents.

Stand up lady! Stand up!

“The results of Oli’s hearing screen were 100% normal. She has perfect, beautiful hearing. No problem.” She doesn’t give me the chance to spin out of control with panic.

“Really?” I exhale for the first time all morning.

“She’s fine. But her eardrum on the right is still not moving well. I think that it’s probably just scarred and thickened from having so many infections in it and then rupturing. It DOES NOT affect her hearing. She can hear you just fine.” She explains.

SHE CAN HEAR! OLI CAN HEAR!

To say that I was ecstatically, fantastically, wonderfully, overjoyed…would be an understatement.

I now knew, 100% without a doubt, that my sweet girl can hear me.

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(I know how to carry on. I just do not know how to keep calm while doing it.)

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