Jump

I always loved going to the pool. We went every Saturday night, for $2 each. The chlorine would sting my eyes, leaving them red and sore, and looking up at the bright yellow lights would hurt, every time.

I wasn't an athletic swimmer, I didn't know any particular strokes or skills, but I was always happy in the water, happiest floating. 

There were tiny windows in the main room of our public pool, high up on the side. I would float on my back with my ears immersed, and watch the sky fade from bright to dark, knowing the big red and blue clock would soon strike 9 and our time would be up.

 

I remember being small enough to need water wings, small enough to jam my arms through the fat pink triangles of plastic and air, reveling in the wonder of being able to launch myself into the pool without anyone there to catch me ... but Grampie was always there to catch me.

He would hold me in his thin, strong arms and then let me go, carefully, keeping one hand, four fingers, three fingers, two fingers, then - impossibly, thrillingly - just one finger on my back to hold me up against the tyranny of gravity. 

One night, we were all there - the unexceptional, ordinary collective We that made up my world: my parents and grandparents, my young and silly and sweet aunts, my three older sisters, my baby brother who was basically just a bundle of blankets. And I was squatting on the deck, by the ladder, waiting for Grampie to put out his arms for me. And his eyes got very far away and his face was suddenly grey.

“Dad.” my mom said. And suddenly they were gone.

And of course, there were water wings and swimming lessons and I never think twice about swimming but I just 

can't 

bring myself to jump in.

I will wade in and climb in and slip in.

But part of me is still waiting for that kind, lean old man to say, “jump.”

 

Have you tried turning it off and back on again?

On Monday after school Kachi was walking home and said his heart was pounding. I thought it was a bit of an exaggeration from the walk home on a warm day, but I got him a drink and told him to rest on the couch.

He didn't move the rest of the evening, but when I hugged him before sending him upstairs to bed, his heart was rocketing out of his chest. 

We ran out the door to emerge.

His pulse was 240.

They tried to slow his heart with manoeuvres and meds, and it didn't work.

Then they asked me for permission to stop his heart and restart it. (It didn't hit me until later how terrible and wonderful this question was. Such a gift.)

So they did, and immediately his pulse flatlined, then came back on around 130, which is still high but much less awful.

(Can I just say how grateful I am for competent and knowledgeable doctors and nurses, who jumped into calm and swift action as soon as we arrived.)

They did blood work and tests all night in Emerge, and then sent us to CHEO in the morning. (After a night of no sleep, I was worried about driving into the city in rush hour but we had a very peaceful and pleasant drive. Thank you, fam, for praying!) There, the cardiology team did more tests, including a thorough ultrasound of his heart, where they found that he has extra electrical signals in his heart - and these had gotten stuck, firing in an increasingly rapid loop.  They think it was triggered in response to two viral infections that Kachi is fighting (it's been a sick autumn).

This is a congenital heart condition called Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which we didn't realize Kachi has.

I've always called Kachi my sunshine boy, and my little bright heart, because he has always been a kind and loving and joyful lamb. 

On Tuesday, watching the ultrasound screen spark and flare in wild and wonderful ways, I realized it was literal. When they talk about the electrical pulses firing, they're fire-ing - there's an actual spark. I hadn't known that before. Like, I know there's a spark plug in the car, and I know there's an actual spark when the car starts. But I didn't know that the electrical signal in the heart also sparks.

The first pulse we looked at sparked steady and orange, a little blast of light with each beat.

Then they found the abnormality, the atypical pathway that was discovered by Wolff, Parkinson, and White, and it was sparking and flaring like a sparkler; blue and red and orange and white.

Like a lightning storm viewed from space, it burst irregularities and brilliance all over the place. It just made me stand in awe. Kachi's heart is even brighter and more beautiful than I knew.

Today we were so grateful to wake up at home and have the day off together to rest and reset. We sat down to play Ransom Notes this afternoon and the first two words Kachi pulled out of the box? 

My heart.

It just felt like a little gift from God - he saw, he knew, he held us through. This wild and wonderful heart is his, and I am so privileged to watch it grow.

sleepy, precious, and HERE! so thankful for my bright-hearted boy.