Sandra R. Wolkoff

Our babies push us to be stronger

2010-10-01T12:38:00.000-07:00

Our Babies Push us to be Stronger
September 12, 2001

I still remember and this, too, is about Steven and everyone else's Steven.

Sandra Radzanower Wolkoff

A former client, Janet, was on the phone, speaking quickly through the bad connection on her cell phone. She said we had helped her family so much in the past, she wondered could we help her now. The call had come in about 9:15 on Wednesday morning, September 12 and I was having a hard time remembering who she was and an even harder time paying attention to her. The staff had just shown up at work and was already glued to the radio. We are all worrying about our own friends and families, stories tumbling out of our mouths, tears following close by.
I was preoccupied with my own thoughts, worrying about my older son who came back to our house the previous night, too scared to stay in his apartment in the city. He had witnessed the planes crashing into the towers, transfixed by the unobstructed view from the rooftop basketball court provided by a once flush internet company; had gasped and moaned with his colleagues, still kids really, fearing more attacks, reflexively ducking when the first F-16’s flew directly overhead. He spent hours telling us what it was like in the city, the smell and the smoke, the panic in the street, the fear about bridges and tunnels closing, or worse.

It was my son’s voice that I was still hearing in my head when I again asked Janet what the problem was. She answered that her family was worried about her sister- in- law, Laura, and her children; a four year old, a two year old and a three week old. Laura’s husband was missing and presumed dead --the second plane, the one that hit the south tower of the World Trade Center, had crashed directly into his office. She hoped we would be able to help the family as they coped with the tragedy and be available to work with the children. I told her that we would do whatever we could and she said she would call back.

The day continued to bring more painful stories, sometimes with horror and miracles in equal measure. We learned that our office was in a community that was so struck with loss that it was hard to find a family not frightened over a missing loved one, neighbor, or friend. Press releases were written and packets on trauma and children were hastily assembled and faxed to local schools, child care centers and pediatricians. Janet called back later that afternoon to set up an appointment but it wasn’t until then that I finally thought to ask her who it was that she lost-- she answered that it was her brother who was missing, a fact I had never registered.

They came in the next morning. When I met Laura her face and demeanor reflected the strain of the past 48 hours. I am not sure I could even describe her features, so distorted were they from grief and horror. She came wearing her husband’s clothing, not able to take them off, knowing they were as close to his touch as she would ever be again. Laura shared a lot of information about her courtship with her husband John, how many cities they had lived in, where their children were born. She described the last phone call from her husband, crying because she had told her husband to get out of the building, fast, but had not told him she loved him.

I was lost with her, not knowing how to help. I knew she had a three- week- old baby and I asked, as I would normally, to tell me about the delivery and what her baby was like. She sighed and talked about how hard her labors had been, sounding like every mother I had ever spoken with. Laura then said that while they had already picked out a name, in the delivery room she asked her husband if he would like to name this baby, his second son, after himself instead. Her husband, named after his own father, said that he would like that very much. I told Laura it seemed that she really had remembered to tell her husband how much she loved him, and crying still, she agreed.

I saw Laura again three weeks later, when she came in with her four year old daughter. Laura was exhausted and worried by her children’s endless questioning about where Daddy was. Charlotte, who turned four a week after the World Trade Center attack, was a beautiful, chatty and energetic little girl who wasted no time telling me that her daddy died in a fire and would I like to hear about the dream she had about a fire. She played with the toys and was full of imaginative play, charm and curiosity and told me she had a baby brother who got bigger every day. Laura knew that I had just been enchanted by her daughter and said, smiling, “She is pretty amazing and I have another one like that at home.” We spoke about her two year old son and his precocious language skills and the newborn who was nursing constantly. We talked about plans for the future, nursery school and dance lessons, and where to look for part time work. As we spoke I began to see in Laura the outline of the person she had been before September 11th, and the strength she was reclaiming for herself and her children.

Every person I speak with, every parenting group I lead, every conversation this past month has been a stumbling attempt to make sense of the events around us. With each passing, day my work as a clinician seemed to get harder as people just now begin to find the words to express what they feel. And yet, in the work with families and their babies, I feel amazingly lucky to be witness to, and buoyed by, the hope and promise that young children bring. Drowning out the endless newscasts, the escalating worry, are the giggles, the growth, the wonder that the young child brings to the world.

In this unspeakably frightening time, with so many families struck by sorrow and devastation, the babies seem to lead us, to push us all, to be strong, to stay loving, to build a future. Even in families where spirits seem crushed, these miraculous little magicians will bring out the best that is possible in all of us.

The Unveiling

2010-06-02T22:29:00.000-07:00

I couldn’t speak at my son's funeral. Besides, what could a mother say? At the prayer service at my house the rabbi asked if I wanted to say a few words, that it was customary. What I said then, what I try to answer now, is how can I breathe when he can’t, how can I laugh when he can’t, how can I live when he doesn’t?

I still feel that every day. There is something unseemly, unnatural, about being on the earth when he is in it. While the pain does not seem to diminish, the shock, the stunned breathless horror does quiet down for moments at a time. In those spaces, I remember not only his death and the continuing nightmare of the senselessness of the accident, the unimaginable changes that emerged in our family, but I remember him. I remember his birth, his bris, the contagious elation of his first giggle. I remember my baby, my toddler. I remember the feel of his gum as first teeth were coming in, his crawling and saying the alphabet at the same time. I see him on the couch next to me, our famous brown velvet couch, rubbing his little belly as he saw me rub my big one, saying solemnly, “ I have a baby in my uterus, too”.

I remember his soft tiny flannel plaid shirts and corduroy jeans, his hands on the nape of my neck, his fingers in my hair, his body resting on my right hip.

I remember the heat of his forehead when he ran a fever, the sound of his sneakers as he learned to run down the steps, the smile on his face when he moved up from big wheels to real wheels. I remember cutting his hair, reading stories together, and then sharing books, passing our favorites back and forth. I can, and do, in my hands, heart, mind, skin, stomach feel this child of mine, feel him all the time. I see and know the boy he was and the man he became.

I am living with a loss that can’t be contained by words, but, I also received the incomparable gift of seeing a child grow into a man who was loved by others, clearing his own way in this world and leaving a bit of himself behind in those he knew. There are now many who know his laugh, his words, his smell, his hands. In love, in friendship, in work, in real and virtual worlds, he has left behind treasured gifts for many people.

Although selfish love rages and begs for just one more minute, one more lunch, one more conversation, one more discussion about an editorial in the Times, one more hug, a mother could really ask for no more.

I don’t say goodbye to Steven today, or a year ago, and maybe I never will be able to. But I do say I remember, I thank you for giving me such gratitude and I love you.

Grieflife

2010-02-06T06:49:00.000-08:00

“…not , where does the tragedy come from, but where does it lead (Kushner, 1981)?”

Dear Steven,

I went to your grave today. The sky was so blue, with wispy cirrus clouds and bright sunshine that seemed to mock the icy cold air. The glare of the sun made the naked branches look black against the sky, the ground hard and frozen. I wondered how the butterfly bushes would survive this long hard frost. Each one had a few dusky green leaves making their way through the pine mulch. I wasn’t so worried about their dying.
It was 11:11 when I got to you today. So many times we would look at the clock at 11:11, morning and night. We would both notice the time and smile; for years it was a joke, a cue to think of one another. I looked at the clock in the car and I was certain you knew I was there and I was sure you were laughing, maybe not in your blue pajamas like you did years ago, but I heard it nevertheless. I walked over to you and it was different. This time, the first time, I asked what I could do for you. Can I still do something for you? Can I make your path easier? I have mourned because I couldn’t stop your life from ending, but now I was asking, as I had done so many times, what do you need? What can I get for you?
I have needed so much help. I have tried to read other people’s ideas on how to go on living after a death. I can’t bear another article on making meaning of, or finding comfort in, the randomness of life, or accepting that there is a purpose to death. I am so tired of trying to find the reason for your accident, and yes, my kind friends follow my lead and continue to refer to it as your accident. Much easier for me than “ your death” which I can only write by holding it far from me, with my fingertips, like something vile. But I was flipping the pages of a book last night, another book on grief, and some words jumped out at me.
The words that caught me were simple; the question to ask after tragic loss is not “why did this happen to me”, but rather “where will my grief lead me?” Well, maybe not exactly those words but close enough. I liked that someone recognized how strong grief is; its permanence in our lives is undeniable now. My grief is tall, dark and handsome, not so unlike you. My grief has grown in and around me, every day changing me from me into something different. But the idea that my grief moves ahead, that even this insane killer of life is alive with movement, makes me hopeful. Grief has grabbed my hands, my heart, my legs and is dragging me, somewhere. This grief is so powerful that it has created a whole new life for me; my grief life.
I have known since the beginning that there would be more tomorrows for me, but they are very different than the tomorrows I had hoped for. This new grief life has hunger, sleep, hot coffee, good pizza and hearty laughs. It could pass for real life, but I know the truth, and Steven, if you can hear me, you know what I mean. While you may live on another side, those who love you sit on the wall that divides, hoping for a glimpse of you, still waiting to hear the sound of your hello, your laughter. Something. This new life has so much longing in it.
I want my life to lead me to you, but maybe it knows better. I have a life, still, but now I know it is a grief life.
I love you, mom