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Monday May 12,2008

HOPE

by Dkasey

Hello,

The following is a very clinical, brief outline of a very sad, traumatic period that our family endured. It is meant to portray the incredible, indomitable strength of the human spirit. My wife luckily has this strength in abundance.

At approx 5:45 p.m. on the 18th February 1996, while I was employed on an oil rig offshore, my wife was driving a car that was struck by a train traveling at 87 kph on a level crossing, killing our only 11 year old son instantly.

The car was pushed 550 meters along the track with the train under emergency brakes before finally stopping.

She survived only because the car was noticed embedded on the front of the train as it was pushed past the local Ambulance station by a child playing outside. Hence, the ambulance officers were alerted and able to attend almost immediately.

Our 11 year old son was killed instantly by the impact and my wife was rushed to the hospital, where she spent two weeks in intensive care. This was followed by long weeks of specialized hospital care with very serious injuries from which she will never fully recover. Her injuries can be imagined and the pain of losing our 11 year son was/is immense.

At different times we talked about the possibility of having another child and at different times we both separately decided against it, however the possibility of another child was attractive to both of us and approx 14 months after the accident we made an appointment to see our local female doctor.

The Doctor had first hand knowledge of what had happened to us and so was familiar with my wife’s condition. She said that in her opinion there was no medical reason why we could not try to have a child, thinking perhaps that our plans were a long shot and that we would not succeed in our endeavors.

However to be on the safe side she insisted that we see a specialist to make sure.

The specialist was also of the opinion, after giving my wife a thorough checkup, that there did not seem to be any reason why we could not try to have another child. So, with their blessing we started to get down to business. This part was totally devoid of stress mainly because we had made up our minds that if we were lucky enough to have another child than so be it, and if not than OK, we would move on.

We were not concerned if I was no longer able (I was born, 20/9/51) or if she was past her child bearing years, (My wife was born 6/7/54) we just gave ourselves about six months to make a baby and if after the allotted time had passed and we were unsuccessful than we would cease trying.

The time that we agreed to end all baby making activities was New Year’s Day. She fell pregnant after about the second month. This brought every thing to a head quickly, and some hard decisions made earlier would now come into play.

We made an appointment to have an intrusive probe and sample taken of the placenta as early as possible at a large Medical Center in the city so that we could determine whether or not the fetus was healthy.

This is an excellent idea for couples as old as us, my wife being 43 at the time, because we were told that after the age of forty the chances of having an abnormal baby were far greater.

The scan although not without risk would tell if the baby had any abnormalities and it would also leave all our options open. We had made up our mind that we would only have one shot at this and we would not try again.

We received the news after we waited about a month that all had come back positive and the hardest decisions that we had to make then was how we were going to tell everyone our secret. Every aspect of conception, pregnancy and birth were totally natural and normal. (Daughter born, April 23, 1998)

My work on offshore rigs still takes me away from home every other week but sometimes on an irregular basis. Our seven year old daughter goes to a private school and is very happy.

There is a shadow and sadness however that will never lift for her parents, but she deserves and gets unqualified love and happiness. We make sure of that.

I have also written a comprehensive account of what transpired during the lead up to those dark days and aftermath, so that my daughter has something that may help answer the many questions that she will surely have when she gets older. The account would be invaluable to her if something happened to me.

The account may or may not be the way others recall those events so this account is only the truth according to me and it would be in no way the complete story.

There are many other occurrences intermingled within this time that are not covered by this very broad personal overview

I am just a normal dad who wants the best for his family.