Warren Holleman - It's Your Job to Hold Your Baby

 

 

My mother believed that it was wrong to hold a baby. She said, “Holding babies makes them soft, it makes them weak and it makes them dependent.” She said, “Cribs were much better. They fostered independence and self-reliance.” To her, life was hard and parents did their children no favors by coddling them. The job of the parent was toughen up the child. If we went out in public and she saw a young couple kissing and cuddling with their children, she would just get so irritated and agitated. If she saw them holding a baby for more than two or three minutes, she'd say, “They need to get a crib for that baby.” 

 

She didn't believe in kissing either. I never saw her kiss my dad. If she kissed me, it was just a peck on the cheek, which isn't bad if you've been pecked by a chicken. That's what it felt like. [audience laughter] But it didn't exactly feel like a kiss. What I later learned was a kiss. She thought kissing was bad for your health, because it spread germs. As for my father and his side of the family, there's a very telling story about my dad's return home from World War II that pretty much says it all. He's been away for three years. He's anxious to get home. 

 

The war ends, he has to take this long boat ride across the Pacific Ocean. Then he has to take this long train ride across the United States. And on top of that, he has to walk 40 miles through a snowstorm. He was supposed to take the bus, but the buses weren't running, because the roads were closed because of the snowstorm. He wants to get home. He picks up that big duffel bag and just starts walking. And two days later, after dark, he arrives at the home place. 

 

The family's not realizing he's about to show up. They're eating dinner. The door flies open and there stands my dad, Carl Holleman. And here is how his mother, with her rich North Carolina accent, welcomed her son home from the war. “Well, there's Carl. We got plenty of food in the kitchen. Put your stuff down and go in there and get yourself a plate and come join us.” [audience laughter] And that was it. [audience laughter] There were no hugs, there were no kisses, no nothing. 

 

Now, don't get the wrong impression. My parents, my grandparents, had many fine qualities, but they were not the warm and cuddly type. I think the way that affected me, is that as I went through adolescence especially, I had a lot of trouble with hugs and kisses, a lot of embarrassing moments, a lot of awkward moments. I found myself longing for this something I couldn't even name at the time. I later learned it was warmth and tenderness. My friends, it seemed to come easily to them, not so easily to me. 

 

I got lucky and met this wonderful woman. We got married. A few years later, we're in the delivery room and she's about to give birth to our first child. It's June 1987. The midwife turns to me, she says, “Get ready. As soon as I catch this baby, I'm handing her to you, because--” And then, of all the things she could have said to me, “Because it's your job to hold your baby.” 

 

So, my head is doing this. [audience laughter] Part of me honestly wants to give it a try. I'd seen my wife's family do it, [audience laughter] and I thought it was one of those life experiences everybody should have. [audience laughter] But honestly, those tapes were still playing in my head of my mother and I guess my grandmother. I muddled through. That's about the best I could say. And would you believe that of all the names we could have chosen for that little girl, we chose Annie. I'm sure it was influenced to some extent by the musical, but the real reason was that's my mother's name. 

 

So, the nice thing about having your baby birthed by a midwife, is that you get this special private suite for the next 24 hours in the maternity suite of the hospital. It had some nice name, like the family bonding room or something like that. That was the perfect place for me. I got 24 hours of practice learning to hold that baby, defying my mother every single minute. [audience laughter] 

 

But what my wife and I realized was that once that 24 hours was over, we would have to leave that wonderful cocoon and we would have to leave that drama, that drama of wonderful new beginnings, and become a part of a second drama. It's a drama I haven't even told you about yet. I mentioned 1987. I mentioned, well, that we'd be going home to our apartment in our neighborhood. That drama was, of course, the AIDS epidemic. 

 

We lived in Montrose, the so-called gay neighborhood of Houston. And at that time, it seemed that every young man we knew wasting away and dying. It just seemed so wrong. I'm talking about young men who are in their 20s and 30s. There was a Walgreens pharmacy on Montrose Boulevard. It's still there. Over the next few years, it would sell more AZT than any other drugstore in the entire United States. So, we were in the middle of what would be recognized over the next few years as one of the worst epidemics in American history. 

 

Of course, many of our friends and neighbors were dying of this disease, but the one we knew and loved best. Excuse me. We'll call him Charles. Charles shared an entryway with us in our apartment enclave, and we spent many great times together. When he got sick, he moved into a home hospice arrangement that was a few blocks away. But we continued visiting. At first, even going out to dinner together. He was so supportive when he found out that my wife was pregnant. Honestly, [chuckles] I think more supportive than I was. 

 

He was so emotionally connected to the whole thing in a way that I didn't even comprehend at the time. But looking back, he was a mentor for me through that process. He was so excited about the baby and getting a chance to meet the baby. Well, there was a rule that after the baby's born, there's a period in which the baby needs to develop its immune system. So, we were going through that, and we were nearing the end of that, when one day the phone rang. This was our friend, Martha, who was the friend who was coordinating Charles home hospice care. And she said, “I got some bad news.” She said, “He's taken a turn for the worse.” I said, “Well, we'll be there tonight.” She said, “I need to warn you, something's happened with his mind. He won't even recognize who you are.”  So, she said, “That's particularly bad, because he was so looking forward to meeting your new baby.”

 

The other thing she said she needed to warn me of, was that she said she kind of whispered in the phone, “His mother, she's here.” I knew what that meant. So, we went that night. And we took our baby. It was as it always had been. Charles was in the center of his living room, lying on his back on a hospital bed. His shirt was off. And in the corner of the room, as far from her son as she could possibly be, was his mother. She was sitting on a folding chair. The chair wasn't even facing her son. It was turned sideways. 

 

If she ever looked toward our way, it was just to stare at the floor. And I tell you, that seemed so wrong too. Martha had told us that she was afraid to touch him because of the disease and because of her prejudice against him being gay. And as for Charles, it's true he did not recognize us. But the thing was, we barely recognized him. As I said, he was lying there with his shirt off, and you could see every bone. He was as skinny as a person can be and still be alive. He had these awful sores in his mouth, and breathing-- Every breath was a struggle. It would take about three efforts to raise his chest, and then it would collapse down. You just knew it would be the last. And you hoped it would be the last, so he wouldn't have to suffer anymore.

 

As for his mind, it was clear that the Charles we knew was no longer there. He just babbled. It didn't make any sense. So, in a short period of time, we realized he wasn't there. So, we stood around him and talked over him to each other. After a while though, he started doing this one thing that made some sense. I was standing there holding our baby, doing a good job like this, and he would look at her out of the corner of his eye. And in time,, he started looking more. I could swear, it was almost as if he was trying to flirt with her. [audience laughter] 

 

And one by one, we started recognizing that our conversation ended, because that was so much more interesting than whatever were talking about. And then, we got curious, what does his mother think of all this? She was sitting over there, staring at the floor. Her son is making this connection with our child, but she is making no connection at all. And that just seems so wrong. Even, by that point, the only thing I wanted to do was to hold and touch our child, and she was afraid or unwilling to do that. 

 

So, my wife and I were frankly offended by his mother. We felt sorry for her, but were also offended. So, we had the same idea at the same time. It just was one of those things. We took our baby, we thought we got to do something about this. So, we laid our baby face down, her chest on Charles chest. Her face fit right in the cavity of his long neck. He was 6 foot 5 inches tall before he got sick. He was the best looking, friendliest and humblest person you could ever meet. And the funniest. Everybody loved him. And of course, now, that's why we didn't recognize him.

 

So, we placed our baby there and her little arms dangled over his bony chest. We stood closely by, because we really didn't know what would happen. What happened at first was actually scary. He started doing this, and then we realized he's having this spasm because he is trying to remember how to use his arms. He hadn't used them for a while. But in time, the spasm, he got control of it. And those scarecrow arms started doing this. And then, he got good control and they formed this arch over our baby. And then, his arms just relaxed and they relaxed around our baby. As his arms relaxed, his breathing relaxed, the painful expression on his face went away and we actually recognized that old Charles again. He looked so contented.

 

I've often said, “If that's all that had happened that night, it would still be one of the most amazing or memorable experiences of my life.” But one more thing happened. This time, Charles spoke. And his words made sense. He said, “Annie” and then he smiled. And then he said, “Came to see me. Annie.” 

 

Sorry. So, we went home that night, went to bed. Middle of the night, I woke up. I had this huge jolt of energy. I couldn't get back to sleep. I went outside, sat on the back steps with our dogs. Sun came up. Phone rang, and it was our friend, Martha, again, the same one from yesterday. And she said, “I wanted to call you earlier, but I thought I should wait till the sun came up.” She said, “I wanted to let you know that, excuse me, at 4 o'clock, he died. Charles died.”

 

Now, I've had 30 years to think about this, and I still don't understand how a young man who has severe advanced dementia awakens out of that and has a moment of perfect clarity just hours before he dies. But I know what I believe. I'll always believe that it has something to do, sorry mom, with the healing power of human touch. Thank you.