Daddy, Did You Hear That Bird?: The Miracles of Hearing, Family, and Love

By Calvin L. King

On a cloudless spring day nearly three years after Cal and Michele met, they stood before a preacher and Cal promised to love Michele and to give her everything. Soon after, they began an almost fairy-tale existence of wedded bliss, complete with a white picket fence, two cats in the yard, and a perfect familyincluding the baby girl Michele always wanted.

They had carefully planned and prepared for the arrival of their daughter, Lourdess, whose name means miracles of healing. Although she entered the world perfect, the standard hearing test mandated by the state produced spirit-crushing results. To their shock and disbelief, their wonderful little angel had profound hearing loss.

Daddy, Did You Hear That Bird?: The Miracles of Hearing, Family, and Love shares the touching story of how they got through the trials of having a deaf child, including the natural grieving process they experienced upon learning the news. Even though they wondered about her future, their strong personal relationship helped them overcome the stress that destroys some marriages burdened with caring for a special-needs child. The toughest tasks involved working with service systems and professionals who were guiding them through the process. Through it all, they had each other and the knowledge that God was there for them, always.

Daddy, Did You Hear That Bird? reminds us that love always trusts, hopes and perseveres but it never fails. As Cal and Michele yearned for a miracle, a striking and poignant series of events would reveal a miracle no one saw coming.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9781491719909

Calvin L. King

Calvin L. King has enjoyed a long career in the financial services industry as an operations executive. He is also the author of Never Better a memoir about faith, perseverance, and bravery. He lives in Houston, Texas, with his wife and their young daughter.

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Introduction

PART I LOVE WINS

Chapter 1:  How I Met Her Mother

Chapter 2:  Family Planning

Chapter 3:  Fearfully And Wonderfully Made

PART II THE LOVE CHILD

Chapter 4:  A Weeklong Odyssey

Chapter 5:  Family Matters

Chapter 6:  The Gold-Standard Test

Chapter 7:  Molded In Love

Chapter 8:  Santa’s On The Way

Chapter 9:  The Journals

Chapter 10:  Dolly’s Baby

PART III MEMORABLE MOMENTS

Chapter 11:  Yeah, Mon!

Chapter 12:  Only Her Hairdresser Knows For Sure

Chapter 13:  It’s No Joke!

Chapter 14:  The Miracle Baby

Epilogue

To Lourdess—a tenth birthday present from Daddy I hope you’ll always remember!

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I gratefully acknowledge my lovely wife, Michele, for her support of this project. She helped me proof drafts and provided the records and photographs that reminded me of most of the events shared in this story.

INTRODUCTION

N ot long after the turn of the century I found love. The crazy thing is I wasn’t looking for it at all. I had been busy establishing myself at the perfect spot along the corporate ladder. I thought that surely the euphoria of attaining that role coupled with the move to a new town would keep me content. However, the loneliness of living far away from my Midwestern roots gnawed at me in the quiet evening moments when most people rested in the warm, secure fold of f amily.

A routine business meeting arranged by Michele, an executive assistant with striking beauty, immediately changed the course of my intentions. Cynics might say blind love hinders common sense, clouds otherwise good judgment, and even turns some people into fools. Maybe that’s true for some, but all I know is my new love Michele made me feel warm and alive. On a cloudless spring day almost three years to the day after we met, I stood before a preacher with a thick East Texas drawl and I promised to give Michele everything. It didn’t take long to begin an almost fairy-tale story of wedded bliss, filled with dreams of white picket fences, two cats in the yard, and a perfect family, including the baby girl she had always wanted.

We had carefully planned and prepared for the arrival of Lourdess, whose name means miracles of healing. The East Texas preacher had called her our love child. Although she entered the world looking perfect, the standard hearing tests mandated by the state produced spirit-crushing results. Much to our utter shock and disbelief, our wonderful little angel had profound hearing loss. The audiologists made us understand that she would never hear normally. Her only chance of hearing any sounds and having a chance at developing a language-speaking ability would come with invasive cochlear implant surgery. Our love would have to make room for a special-needs child.

Faith taught us a thing or two about love during the first six months after our daughter’s birth. Scripture says love always protects, trusts, hopes, and perseveres but never fails. Michele and I hid these principles in our hearts as we began a long journey of learning about caring for Lourdess and working with medical and social services professionals. Living with a child who is deaf brought challenging experiences and had quite an impact on our little family. Like many other parents stunned with the news that their baby requires a higher level of care than normal, we began an inner search for answers that would go on and on.

Daddy, Did You Hear That Bird? is all about how we got through the trials of having a deaf child, including the natural grieving process. Even though we wondered about her future, our strong relationship helped us overcome the stress that conquers some marriages burdened with caring for a special-needs child. Lourdess also had the benefit of neighbors, siblings, and relatives, who adjusted to living with her condition and took it in stride. Our toughest tasks involved working with service systems and professionals who were guiding us through the process. Their bedside manners and messages challenged our faith and belief that things would work out fine. As such, for confidentiality’s sake, their names have been changed in this story.

Love and faith are a powerful combination. I had a long-standing belief that the two emotions together could conquer almost any obstacle or barrier. When I was a kid, I learned faith is the essence of things people hope for and the demonstration of things they haven’t seen before. Michele and I had been yearning for a miracle in our baby’s life. Our faith waned but it never completely evaporated. Almost every night she sang a sweet lullaby to Lourdess. The tune happened to be one of my favorite hymns, Amazing Grace. She would draw Lourdess close to her bosom and press her lips right next to her little ears. The lyric that said, I was blind but now I see, always got me. God’s grace is strong enough to open blind eyes. Surely our faith was strong enough to believe God’s grace and love could open closed ears.

Someone else unwittingly sent that powerful message to me during one weekend when Michele, Lourdess, and I flew to Michigan to attend a wedding. Michele’s sister Jillian stopped by her mother’s house to visit us while we were in town. While the girls were visiting, I stepped outside to enjoy the cool spring breeze. As I walked by Jillian’s car, my eye caught a solitary, black bumper sticker with bold, white letters. Why did she do that? I thought. I had never liked bumper stickers because I thought they took away from the natural beauty of automobiles. Some car owners plaster obnoxious stickers all over their vehicles, but Jillian hadn’t committed that atrocity. Her small dark sticker actually blended in well with the small sedan’s dark hue. Its simple message stirred my faith: Love wins. That succinct yet profound message began to play itself out in Lourdess’s life in a striking and poignant series of events that would reveal a miracle no one saw coming.

PART I

LOVE WINS

CHAPTER 1

HOW I MET HER MOTHER

A summer of love leads to family

A lthough April Fools’ Day jokes are best played early in the morning, some happen to linger on well past good timing and wiggle their way into the late afternoon. The colorful clock in the comfortable room at Texas Children’s Hospital read 4:00 p.m., and in our minds this signaled the end of any reasonable patience with this particular gag. Lourdess had been anesthetized well before 9:00 a.m., and despite Michele’s persistent inquiries to the beleaguered surgical hostesses and nurses, we’d heard nothing. The smart, young doctors who had conducted the auditory brainstem response procedure on our baby girl had disappeared without a trace. This gold-standard hearing test and analysis should have taken no more than two hours. We had endured at least eight unsettling hours of anticip ation.

Just before our tolerance of the waiting game reached a boiling point, the youthful-looking doctor in a pristine white coat, flanked by three residents, parted the doors on the opposite side of the room where our baby slept peaceably and strode purposely toward us. I grabbed Michele’s hand when I read the doctor’s face and body language. His stoic countenance and solemn proclamation caused my heart to sink. I fought courageously but without success in stopping the waterworks. My mind made an urgent plea: Be strong now, Cal, be strong. Michele’s grip was firm and desperate. Tears began to stream down her cheeks.

Mr. and Mrs. King, I can’t recommend cochlear implants for your daughter. He paused, shook his head, and took a measured breath.

In that instant all our prayers and faith over the last six months that Lourdess might one day hear our loving voices melted away. The support of our family and friends had been for naught. Even though Lourdess had failed several other ABRs, this one was supposed to be different. Maybe the other experts had been right. God had clearly decided that we would be the perfect parents to love and rear a profoundly deaf child, despite the fact that that destiny had never been in our plans. Our years together were supposed to be uncomplicated and magical, including my promise to give Michele the perfect baby girl she had always wanted.

In that moment when my loving wife’s eyes beckoned to me for comfort, I gently touched her face and searched deep within for the right words to say. Neither one of us noticed that the doctor wasn’t quite finished with his assessment of our daughter’s condition. My mind had already wandered back to the wonderful beginning of our journey together toward dreams of white picket fences. It had all started with a simple phone call nearly three years before, just a month after the Y2K scare.

* * *

Tom covered the mouthpiece of the phone and called to his confidant in an exasperated tone. Hey, Michele, would you come in here, please?

The tall woman’s eyes moved gracefully from her workstation to her boss’s spacious executive office overlooking the vast Houston center city skyline. Clearly her boss had been agitated and she would have to settle him down as only she could. He’d been like a gracious father to her these last several months. She in turn tried to make his life in the office as peaceful as she could.

Michele was determined to make something of her life. She had moved to Texas from the Midwest with her two young boys to make a fresh start and better future. Tom watched over her with the care of a doting father. He cast a wary eye upon any stray trying to swoop down upon her. She returned the kindness by being the most attentive assistant she could be.

Tom greeted his protégé with a smile even though he had just slammed down the receiver of his phone after grousing with a misguided colleague.

Michele giggled and then asked, What’s up, boss man? Don’t let anyone get you all worked up today. It ain’t worth it!

Her warm voice immediately calmed him.

You’re right as usual. Life is way too short. Anyway, I need you to get on the phone with that new guy Cal King over in operations and set up a meeting. Let me tell you he is one sharp young executive. He’s making some changes over there that make a lot of sense. They should have brought him in a long time ago instead of guys like the one I just talked to.

Sure, Tom. Do you want go to his office, or should I have him come here?

Have him come down here. He probably needs a break from his shop.

Sounds like a plan. I’ll get him, said Michele.

A few days later, after a lighthearted exchange on the phone with Michele, I headed downtown to meet with her boss. I rode the elevator up to the executive floor of an imposing skyscraper and wandered around the eerily quiet office space in search of the lady with the silky smooth voice who made me laugh out loud over the phone. A young man noticed me and kindly pointed me in the right direction to Tom’s enclave.

When I rounded a corner, I saw a woman so stunning that my eyes hurt. Oh my God, she is fine … super fine! I hoped my face conveyed nothing but the customary professional courtesy instead of the ocean of infatuation washing over me like a tsunami. Over the years I had developed an attraction to tall women. When she stood up, we were eye to eye. I slipped to the very edge of her personal space to behold her beauty and stature. The distinct fragrance of her perfume danced in the air.

Hi, you must be Cal. I’m Michele. We spoke on the phone. It’s so good to meet you.

My normal bravado evaporated. The young, tongue-tied nerd who didn’t know how to interact with girls suddenly reappeared. She bailed me out by extending her hand. The softness and warmth of her gentle touch shot a soothing wave up and down my back. A voice screamed in my head: Say something, dummy!

Hey, you! It’s good to finally put a face with a name! How’s it going? I said.

Just then Tom stepped out of his office and extended a firm handshake. I wished it had taken him longer to come out to greet me.

Hey, Cal. Come on in.

Do I have to? I’d rather stay out here and chat with this young lady! Finally the man of charm and wit returned.

Michele giggled and then nudged me ever so gently toward the expansive office.

You better get in there and talk to him, or he’ll be a grouch and it will take me the rest of the day to get him right again.

Tom shook his head.

She’s right. Let’s go.

It was all I could do to concentrate on Tom or anything he said after seeing Michele. My mind lingered on her lovely frame, the smile that warmed the room, and the way she looked at me when she touched me. I had never believed in love at first sight, but there was no mistake—we had an instant connection. When Tom invited me to sit at his small conference table, I chose the seat facing the door so that I could catch glimpses of her.

I couldn’t wait to finish my business with him to get back to Michele’s workstation to interact with her again. Everyone knows proper business etiquette requires visitors to spend a few moments with the assistant who arranged meetings, in order to introduce themselves and then express gratitude for any kindness after the meeting. I felt like that moment could not arrive fast enough.

Thank you so much, Michele, I said when the meeting was over. It was so good to finally meet you, my dear! I expect to see you again soon.

The pleasure is all mine, Cal. Tom told me you’re new in town. How do you like it here? Her eyes twinkled and her perfect smile warmly welcomed me into her world.

I love it here. There is so much to see and do. I’m just so busy that it’s hard to find time to get around, see, and experience everything in the city, you know?

I understand. We’re busy here too. Maybe I can show you around sometime. Let me know.

Her tone was tender and sincere. I couldn’t take my eyes off her.

I’d absolutely love that. Let’s try to do it real soon. Deal?

Deal. I’ll be in touch.

During some late summer days the Texas Gulf Coast plays host to storms that bring strong