When I look back at the photos from that time, I see the calm before the storm. Beneath the holiday buzz, there was a soon-to-be revealed truth hidden right in front of our eyes. A truth that would turn our world upside down just a few short weeks after Santa’s visit.

I’ve confided in my mother far more times than my little brain can recall. But, her simple words of guidance - a mantra of sorts - were often exactly what I needed to do. I needed to get whatever I was feeling ‘out of my body.’

Those closest to our family knew my father was a man nearly obsessed with certain rituals. When I was growing up on Long Island, watering the grass in our front yard by hand after work in spring and summer was one of them.

Faith traditions are part of what connect us to other people, what bring us comfort and hope, and for some of us it is a deep part of our identity. Everyone deserves access to that.

Over the last six months, I’ve been able to pin point exactly which emotions held me hostage in that first year or so. Was I grieving? Sure, but there was something else. Something more specific that was chewing my insides back then, distracting me. I am still haunted by them 13 years later.

My concern about children with hearing loss grew during COVID-19, but not in the way I might have predicted.

Hindsight is funny. It has a way of changing our view completely. In hindsight, we notice things we never would have noticed at the time. Details both large and small. Important and inconsequential. In hindsight, we acknowledge that we might have made different choices.

For fifteen years I have been a front seat witness as the parent of a child who lost her hearing as a toddler. I have seen time and time again important information float past my child because she didn’t accurately hear it; although she thought she did.

After pouring myself my first cup of coffee this morning, I wandered into our family room and stumbled into this scene.

Some of us are also experiencing something else. An unexpected time to thrive. We are witnessing something in our children that is inspiring something within ourselves.

April 19, 1992. I remember waking up to the aroma of yeast and flowers coming from a nearby apartment. But, then I don’t recall the details of that morning’s journey. Did I take the metro? The bus?

A few nights ago, I woke up in a deep panic. My heart was racing, I felt queasy. I turned to my husband, who was resting undisturbed – unaware that I had flung the comforter across the bed and that I was now standing up wide awake in the dark.

At one point, I realized it was no longer morning. My husband was looking down at me, smiling. He had gone for a walk and decided it was time to wake me up from the deep nap that had kidnapped me. 

I realized today that long after I am gone, maybe when my girls are bouncing their grand babies on their knee, they will tell their children’s children the story of COVID-19. I wondered about what they will remember...and what they will forget.

Alone in a public hospital-overseas. Just me, a window and a red silk journal. I caught a glimpse of my future self - but I didn’t recognize her.

It happens all the time. I’m in a large meeting or at a presentation or at church service or at our local school and the presenter decides they don’t need a microphone.

More frequently than not, the decision to find another professional and get another evaluation from someone who likely doesn’t know our child isn’t easy. Our anxiety increases, our sleep is interrupted, we sit on the fence for a while – why is that?

After our brief encounter today on the shore in North Carolina, I felt compelled to say a few things to you. But, I couldn’t – because you had already packed up and headed home after a long, exhausting day. So, now I’m faced with choosing to say nothing…or write an open letter to you: the mother of the boy with autism that I met today.

It was while one of us was unwrapping the bottles of bubbles that a four-year old little girl ran across the field toward her mother. I watched from across the concrete pad. Clearly something was wrong. The little girl’s eyes were wide with panic, her little hand feeling the side of her head and searching through her blonde hair.

I don’t recall a specific event that led me to contact the National Fire Protection Association seeking information about how to protect my child from fire related injury or death. But, that one call quickly led to another.