Life Knocks You on Your Ass

My son won’t have a normal start to life.

Minutes after leaving the womb, he’ll be whisked away to a waiting ambulance that will transport his tiny, fragile body several blocks away to one of the best children’s hospitals in the world. A spot in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit will be waiting.

There is a 70 percent chance he will need surgery immediately. There is a 100 percent chance he will need a second surgery within months.

And that is the best we can hope for.

I still am not to the point where I can say or write this without tears welling up.

I won’t glaze your eyes with the medical jargon that even I don’t understand. He is among the one percent of children who are born with heart defects. In fact, the odds are much smaller than one percent on some his defects: hole in his heart, two valves coming from the same spot and performing the same function, and narrowed arteries in two places.

My son is broken.

I ache for him to be fixed.

Doctors say it is possible. The surgery that is likely upon the day he arrives in this world can fix the narrowed artery at the top of his heart. The second surgery, which will definitely take place, will fix the hole and the two valves.

The other narrowing, which they are monitoring, may not be fixable. Brooke and I heard different things from the doctor. We were both so stunned at the news, I’m not sure either of us heard anything completely right. Brooke thinks it is fixable. This is one argument I hope she wins.

What I know for certain is he will spend many days in the hospital and undergo at least one open-heart surgery. More days in the hospital to recover, and possible follow-up surgeries. Then he will spend the rest of his life being monitored by a cardiologist.

But, if everything goes right, if the fixes take and the other narrowed artery heals, he could be a fairly normal kid.

I’ll take it. I’d love if he is able to play competitive sports and run freely, without a care, with his dog and neighborhood friends.

But mostly, I want him to be alive and healthy enough to have a decent quality of life.

I was angry when we got the news. I’ve spent many days since telling myself what a good life I have.

I grew up poor, but loved. And being poor was a positive. It sharpened me, made me a fighter. I would not be the person I am, or achieved what I have, without that foundation.

I had more fun in my 20s and 30s than the law should permit. In my 40s, I met and married a beautiful woman with a heart so tender saints move aside for her. Seventeen months ago, I was blessed with the best thing to ever happen to me, a beautiful daughter who is smarter than her age and as fun-loving as they come.

No one I have ever been close to has been murdered or died tragically young.  I’ve lost grandparents to debilitating diseases, but only after they’d lived long lives and showered me with love. I lost my dad to leukemia, but I had him with me into his 60s.

As a poker player, I understand skill is trumped by luck. Sometimes the odds are against you. This is simply my time for bad luck. I’ve had my good streak; now I have a challenge to overcome.

Or it could be karma. Lord knows I have done enough bad things and hurt more than a few people in my life.

But what about my wife, a special education teacher who takes care of the world’s most vulnerable? A selfless woman who lifts up everyone around her?

She doesn’t deserve this bullshit.

Neither does my innocent little son, who will be only minutes into this world when faced with life-or-death situations.

Fuck you, karma.

I don’t know if I am a good dad. I try my best, but without my wife to prop me up, I’d probably be lost. I’m better than my dad, but I am nowhere near the super dads I know, like my brother or a stay-at-home friend, Rory Glynn.  

But I know I am a LOVING dad. If love were water, a titanic swell would swallow Sydney daily.

If love can get us through, that little boy has a really good chance.

I’m glad Sydney is not old enough to know what is going on. A time that should be joyous and full of anticipation has turned to depression and nervousness.

I’m not an optimist or a pessimist. I am a realist. That means I study the situation, understand the odds and outcomes, hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

We all know what the worst is here. I’ll be prepared.

My wife is another story. Being prepared is cheating on the notion that our little boy will be anything but fine. Mothers don’t cheat their kids.

I’m worried about her. Her heart will break when they whisk that boy blocks away to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. She has to stay behind for three days, recovering from a C-section. She won’t be there for that first surgery, if needed. Normal breast feeding and bonding will be difficult.

There will be two people in this family with broken hearts.

No, make that three.

No Adam or Mark or John for Us

Picking a name for our son has been excruciatingly difficult. We just can’t agree on anything.

Really, we can agree. But then Brooke runs it by her family or her friends and if she gets any negative reaction, it is back to the drawing board. Essentially, she is crowdsourcing our name to her family and friends. When can you ever get agreement like that?

(Since she is going that route, I think I will, too. Read to the end to learn our current list of finalists and then cast your vote.)

Picking a name for Sydney was rather easy. Once we got passed the whole stripper argument, we settled on a few final candidates, talked it out and came to fairly quick agreement. With this one, we have narrowed it to a few candidates, talked it out, came to blows, slept in different rooms, threatened divorce and are still trying to come to agreement.

Names are important. We are the type who like something a bit different than the norm, but not weird. I don’t want something so unique they make fun of him, yet I don’t want say, the traditional Biblical names either.

I have friends who name their kids Jack and Mary and Charlie and Sally and I am OK with that. I also have friends who name their kids Sundance and Petunia (not really, but I don’t want to give an actual name here to avoid breaking up a friendship). I’m not ok with that.

Picking a really unique name can lead to a lot of teasing on the playground. Sure, your kid can turn it into a positive and become resilient and tough and a leader and literally turn the name into a synonym for “cool.” But he could also crumble like stale bread and spend the rest of his life on a psychiatrist’s couch wondering why his mom and dad thought Arsehole Gregg had a nice ring to it.

I’m also not necessarily enamored with names that can be shortened to something that I don’t consider equal to the given name. For example, Brooke likes Jackson. I think Jackson is cool, but I have a feeling everyone will call him Jack. Then he is just another of 22 million Jacks in this country. (Actually, according to howmanyofme.com, there are 498,107 Jacks in this country. It is only the 115^th most popular name. But John -- the name from which Jack is often derived -- is #2 with more than 5 million!)

And, of course, on the playground, he will be Jack Off, or, worse, Jack MeOff.

I also don’t want my kid named after me or anyone in our families. I want him to have his own identity and not have the burden of carrying any legacy. Brian is a cool name (the 29^th most popular in the U.S.!) as far as I am concerned, but one is enough.

Brooke likes a lot of sissy names. I won’t repeat them here, in case your kid has one of those names. But some names just conjure up prep school wimps more than others. Names like Chauncey and Kip and Grayson. I don’t want my kid to carry that burden.

Being a teacher, Brooke rules out a lot of cool names because she has encountered a student at some time whom carried that name and pissed her off in some way. Yeah, elementary school teachers can carry a grudge, too. Somewhere out there is a teacher who hates you because you put a tack on her seat as a devious little sixth grader. 

So let me run through our latest list of candidates. I will give you the pros and cons, but try not to bias you in any way. Nor will I release which is my favorite or which is Brooke’s favorite. The truth is, we are still entertaining new names; this is just the current list.

You can cast your vote in the comments section. Of course, it will hold no sway in our decision whatsoever (unless you pick my favorite – then I am marching the results right to Brooke!) But it will be fun.

Here they are, in no particular order:

Braeden: Pro: I like the “Br” sound, as in Brian and Brooke. Con: Sydney would be left out of the “Br” game.

Tyson: Pro: Even the shortened Ty is cool. Con: Tyson’s chicken.

Kellen: Pro: Rather unique, without being crazy. Con: Keenan and Kel?

Tate: Pro: Sounds manly. Tate Gregg. Con: It is rather unique, but is it crazy?

Max: Pro: Manly. And has an X, which is just cool. Con: Certainly the most common name on our list.

Jax: Pro: Again, it has an X. Con: Will it be mistaken for Jack? Is it too prep-schoolish? Is it crazy?

That’s it for now. I am interested in your opinion. Crowd sourcing is always a good idea, right?

I'm a Hit in Romania

If you are one of the half dozen or so regular readers of this blog, you are probably wondering where I have been for the past month and a half. Certainly something exciting must be happening in the world of Sydney that I have neglected to tell you.

You would be wrong.

I don’t really like to write unless there is something funny to write about. Have you read some of these blogs where people just post braggy stuff about their kids every week? “Johnny got straight A’s this week.” “Millicent was chosen to be the lead in the school play this week.”  “Billy scored two goals in last night’s soccer game.”

Yawn.

I’d much rather read a blow-by-blow account of how Johnny tried to stuff a whole McDonald’s cheeseburger in his mouth at once and ended up puking in the back seat of the mini van. Or how Millicent got in a cat fight with the school bully and dad scolded her in the principal’s office, but high-fived her once they got in the car. Or how Billy scored two goals in a soccer game, but is so directionally clueless he scored them in the other team’s goals.

Those stories, I can laugh at.

Sydney has been quite the joy lately. At 17 months, she’s getting a touch of the Terrible Twos. We will have a melt down every now and then. But nothing major. Just regular kid stuff. Not really any blog stuff.

We have had some milestones. She can count to 20, with a little help. She has about half of the alphabet down. She had a nice first Christmas, where she delicately opened each gift with one hand and one hand only, thereby making Christmas morning a three-hour affair.

We had our first haircut this week. She wasn’t scared. She didn’t throw a tantrum. Cute, but boring.

It is nice that she now can communicate with us, even if it isn’t in words. She can call out for Daddy when Mommy is annoying her and vice versa. I can always count on a “Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!” when Sydney gets out of the bath tub because she hates when Brooke dries her off. She wants daddy to come to the rescue.

She smiles and laughs a lot, now. She likes to go to the park and swing and slide, shouting “Whee!” as she glides down. Her favorite show is Caillou and she will stop all playing when it comes on, sitting still and watching intently. She likes pizza, hot dogs, yogurt, cottage cheese and cheese and pretty much spits out everything else.

She’s been sick a couple of times, but recovered quickly. She seems to like child care and gets along with the other kids. She can climb a flight of stairs in record time, ensuring mommy and daddy have to be alert at all times. (I once put the gate down and then went to get her glass of milk that sat in the refrigerator. In the time it took me to retrieve it, she was nine steps up and daddy almost had a heart attack.)

None of this makes for real funny blog fodder.  

As I have said before in this blog, we have settled into parenthood. I am sure there will be upheaval in May when Baby Gregg 2 comes along, but, for now, our lives are blissfully unbloggable.

But I realize I have regular readers who may want me to check in every once in a while, so I will try to pick it up.

For the six of you.

(I actually just checked the stats.) I have more than 14,000 page views all time. While the majority of those views are in the U.S., I have nearly 700 from Russia, more than 400 in the United Kingdom and almost 200 in Romania.

Russia? Romania? Apparently my comedy plays well in the Eastern European bloc. I’m glad the Iron Curtain no longer exists.

I’m not sure how my blogging translates in any of the dozen or so foreign countries that have registered more than ten views on my blog. Perhaps I am viewed as an obnoxious father in France. Maybe I’m laugh-out-loud, Benny Hill funny in the UK. I have to believe I am a little scary to the Taiwanese.

But they are reading. So I need to be writing. Sydney needs to start doing more funny things. The pressure is on, child. You might as well learn to deal with it at a young age. Deliver.

Your Romanian fan base is waiting.