Friday, July 24, 2009

Friday, July 24, 2009

Quote of the day: "I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father's protection." ~ Sigmund Freud

Today, like all days, started the same. Mattie was up a few times at night and knocked off around 1am. I think he started to adjust to having me on point versus Vicki. I know Vicki is starting to adjust to not being on point either, but you can clearly tell that Mattie and Vicki miss their one on one time together. It's another validation to me that both Mattie and Vicki are intimately linked, not only as mother and child, but as "partners" against this fight for his life. Mattie has come to count on Vicki and I solely, but he has an extra special bond with Vicki. It is not one that I am jealous of, but one that I can clearly see is different. Mattie is a lucky boy to have a mom like Vicki, and I credit Vicki for her efforts as her actions, advocacy, love, sacrifices and convictions have maximized Mattie's chance of survival.

As some of you may remember/know, Vicki's birthday is tomorrow, the 25th, and yesterday's cancerversary and the events that occurred last year will forever cast a shadow on Vicki's birthday. Many of you have sent cards, emails, and gifts to Vicki, which she cherishes, and I think will help set the tone for the start of a better year ahead, God willing.

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To all my readers, I am now back on line! I missed writing to you the past couple of days. I thank Peter for keeping the blog going, but I think balancing work, Mattie, and everything else was a tall order for him. But Peter did it! Peter had to go to work today, so fortunately his parents were here to stay with Mattie. In addition, Mattie had a special visit from Bob Weiman, Mattie's Head of the Lower School of SSSAS. As many of you may recall, Bob has been teaching Mattie magic tricks this entire year. Bob learned these wonderful skills from his father, and I am very touched that he is passing along this passion to Mattie. Bob went above and beyond today. He spent over two and a half hours with Mattie. Mattie learned TWO new magic tricks. One of the tricks is a little more complicated and Bob apparently reserves this trick for children in 6th grade. But Mattie learned the trick immediately, and I think this made Mattie feel very unique and special. So much so, that when I walked in the door this evening, it was one of the first things he showed me with pride. We want to thank Bob for bringing lunch for everyone and for sharing some wonderful stories on CD with Mattie. Our family considers ourselves quite fortunate to have Bob in our lives and we appreciate his support as we try to rehabilitate Mattie to enable him to go back to school in the winter of 2010.

Left: Bob and Mattie. Mattie is learning a new magic trick and is engrossed with the process.


Mattie had an afternoon of play with his grandparents and Peter. Mattie also listened to one of the books on CD that Bob gave him, and then Mattie and the rest of the family took on the project of scraping paint on our deck. They are motivated to paint the deck for me, since they know how much I like sitting out there. The crazy part about all of this is our outside is far more organized and neat than inside our house. Some days I wish I had a magic wand. I would wave it over ALL the clutter, and instantaneously it would go away. I could never believe what one could accumulate in a year if I did not experience it first hand.

As for myself, I have been running back and forth to the conference since Tuesday night. After three and a half days of this, I can truly say I am wiped out. I am taking tired to a whole new level, in which I can bearly keep my eyes open, yet I am surviving. The ironic part is I can think clearly for the most part, concentrate on session content, and conversations. I am not getting 100% of the information, because fatigue has indeed impaired me, but to my amazement I am functioning. In fact, on Thursday, I even escorted some of our members to Capitol Hill and we paid a visit to six different Senator offices, and lobbied our Association's position on Medicare reimbursement for licensed mental health counselors. I played an active role, and sometimes I wonder how I put two words together. I haven't had the opportunity to visit the Hill in years, but in a way it is like riding a bicycle, once you learn the skills, you don't forget them. The conference gave me the time away from home, but I had back to back meetings, presentations, events, and networking. So there was NO down time.

I had several touching moments at the conference. As you know I wrote an article about Mattie in my last president's column. Since I only heard from one or two members after the column was published, I figured perhaps this column wasn't of interest to others. As I began to see at the conference, this wasn't the case. I think people, even professional mental health folks, do not know how to address this topic with me. Their silence was that of uneasiness, and also not knowing what to say with such incomprehensible news. In fact, on Thursday afternoon, I was sitting at a table with a bunch of members I did not know. One member had the courage to thank me for my column and proceeded to tell me how much he got out of it. With that, others also spoke. I had a very meaningful conversation with this group about Mattie, and it seems to me, after that point, others also came up to me to acknowledge what I was going through. Many members told me they would be sending me resources and prayers. This all meant a lot.

I attended the conference's keynote presentation today, and found the discussion on the connection between the mind and the body fascinating. The premise was our emotional state influences our biological chemistry and cellular make up, and this emotional state is influenced by those around us. In the way, because we are social beings, when others around us experience a certain feeling such as sadness for example, then we as individuals can't help but absorb this sadness and be affected by this exposure. This exposure in turn can activate neurotransmitters, which ultimately not only cause neurons to fire, moving along messages in our cells, but on a more profound level these emotional messages can ultimately change the building blocks of our body, proteins. I found this whole discussion fascinating, because it makes perfect sense to me, but I never really focused on how our connections with others impact us not only on an emotional level, but also on a cellular level. The presenter also talked about individuals who deal with crises in their lives and how the emotional connections they make with others during this time can be very intense and crucial to survival. As he was talking, I completely related to what he was saying and have experienced this intense level of connections this year throughout Mattie's illness.

I even had the opportunity to connect with Charlie today as well. She was at the conference and surprised me with a birthday gift! I also had the wonderful opportunity to spend time with several of my counseling friends as well!

Before I left the conference, I text messaged Peter and told him it would be nice to go out to dinner tonight, so we could catch up with each other. When I arrived home this evening, Mattie did not want me to leave. However, Peter and his mom strategized a way to make this work. If I allowed Mattie to play a prank on me, then I could go out. So the prank I had to deal with involved rubber toy roaches. I was surrounded by them, and he hid them all over the kitchen. These rubber roaches look so real, they literally make me scream. The more screaming I did, the better he liked it! So needless to say, I earned my way to go out to dinner with Peter. In the picture you can see that Mattie covered Peter's foot with these roaches! Peter and I had dinner at our local restaurant in our complex, several of our neighbors were there and they came over to talk with us. In fact, some how the owner of the restaurant learned it was my birthday, and brought me out a piece a cake with a candle. It was very thoughtful! Peter and I never told her about my birthday, so I have no idea how she knew.

When I got home from dinner, Mattie worked with his grandparents on a birthday card for me. Mattie knows how much I love lighthouses. Even when he was a baby, we took him on lighthouse tours and climbed up many stairs to get to the top. So tonight, he decided to make me a 3-D lighthouse card. It was very touching. In fact, in the lighthouse keeper's house, the roof can be removed, and when lifted up, Mattie stuffed the house with beautiful cut out and hand colored hearts. Peter snapped a picture of our tender moment together as Mattie surprised me with my card.

Left: Vicki and Mattie with the lighthouse card!

Right: Grandad, Mattie, and Grandma!

We want to thank the Cooper family for a lovely dinner. Mattie and Peter's parents loved it, and we so appreciate your home cooked meal! Thank you for your thoughtfulness and continued support.

I end tonight's posting with a message from my friend, Charlie. Charlie wrote, "Peter, it sounds like you did a great job organizing the day on Thursday. Early physical therapy with the MTP later in the day was definitely the right way to go. I am sure Vicki was very relieved to hear how well things went even though she could not be there. Having Brandon and Jocelyn at the hospital to connect and play with Mattie was wonderful and definitely made the day go a lot more smoothly. I hope that Friday goes as well for you and Mattie as you manage without Vicki for the day. As always the blog is both positive and sad, I am thrilled that Mattie is recovering and working hard at PT and I am also praying that he beats the odds and the infusion of MTP is enough to kick-start his immune system into defeating any rogue cancer cells that maybe remaining as further chemotherapy is not currently an option. So both congratulations and condolences on this "anniversary," one that we hope eventually no child will ever have to face again."