June 2011 marked a new beginning for me as a father, at least in some ways. It was somewhere around then that I realized that things had changed, and it was so gradual, I hadn’t even realized it. I had gone from being terrified at times, wondering “Is he going to live?” to a more nagging worry of “what kind of quality of life will he have”. This is the year, spoiler alert (!), that I transitioned to more “I think he’ll figure it out”. I hadn’t quite reached that point, but this was the year when the transition happened for me as a dad.

Not that the previous worry was “wasted”, as some people like to claim with superficial comments. Worrying about your kids in these situations is not a waste, it ensures you are thinking about options, considerations, asking the right questions. It is no more a waste than having had fire insurance and not having had a fire.  » Read the rest

Back when I started writing these posts (Becoming Jacob’s Dad, Part 1: The early days), I was excited to tell the story. It was 2015, Jacob was just turning six, and I thought, “Okay, I’m ready to share.” Turns out that I wasn’t, not really. The stories of the NICU, surgeries, stress, coming home, failure to thrive, all of it…I thought at least I was ready, at best it would be cathartic. Nope, it was traumatic to write the stories, to relive the moments whose rawness ripped at my soul as I typed the words. Not a single post made it to the screen without tears running down my face. Sometimes good tears, tears of relief. Mostly tears from remembered trauma, the fear coming back to me. When I left off the previous post (Being Jacob’s Dad, Part 10: Months 4, 5 and 6), we had managed to do the eye surgery and learned to put Jacob’s lenses in, and I felt I could start to breathe again.  » Read the rest