Make sure to let your dad know how special he is
- Randi Pokladnik
- June 14, 2018
- 1467
It has been over 20 years since I lost my dad to cancer. He was only 66 at the time.
According to his doctors, his malignant skin cancer was probably a result of having had to take immunosuppressant drugs for most of his adult life. At age 39 he was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease called myasthenia gravis, which means grave muscle weakness.
Ironically the same drugs that kept his MG in remission also contributed to his skin cancer as they weakened his immune system. This disease causes the body’s immune system to produce antibodies that block or destroy muscles’ receptor sites for a neurotransmitter called acetylcholine.
This chemical messenger bridges the gap between the muscle and the nervous system. Basically his brain would transmit the message to move an extremity, but the message never made it to the muscle.
I was only 15 at the time of his diagnosis. I watched my dad, a strong iron worker, get progressively weaker and eventually need a tracheotomy to breathe and a wheelchair to get around. After about a year he was able to regain some of his mobility and had his breathing trach removed.
My dad had to learn how to cope with this disability as well as being forced to retire at age 40. While I didn’t always see eye to eye with my dad, I don’t think I would have had the strength he did to face this incurable disease and later on his terminal cancer. Like most dads, he was not perfect, but he did the best he could.
I often refer to my dad as the “unintentional environmentalist” because he did so many things that today are referred to as “environmentally conscious” behavior.
Maybe it was because he grew up in poverty, or maybe it was just a characteristic of his generation, but he saved everything that he thought he might use again. That included saving the string from doughnut boxes, odd screws, various nuts and bolts, parts from broken appliances, and any type of container.
We joked that he had a small hardware store in our basement.
He never wasted anything, especially food, and he recycled long before it was a widely occurring practice. I will always be grateful that he was able to spend so much time with our son as they had a very special relationship.
I never got a chance to bond with my grandfathers as one died before I was born and the other died when I was 2 years old.
There are some pretty famous eco dads and granddads that have been inspired to save the environment because of their children and grandchildren; one of those is Prince Charles. The Prince of Wales has been leading the environmental movement in England for some time.
He first converted his Duchy Home Farm to organic practices in 1986. In 1990 he began urging action on climate change long before any other leading world politician. For more than 40 years he has spoken up to promote sustainability.
In 2012 he was given a Lifetime Achievement Award by the International Green Awards. The prince said recently that after becoming a grandfather he became even more committed to his causes because “saving the planet is a grandfather’s duty.”
Noted author and founder of the climate change organization, 350.org, Bill McKibben has written many books about environmental issues. His 1999 book titled “Maybe One” defends his choice to have only one child.
In a world of dwindling resources and overcrowding, this is one choice that a parent can make to save the planet. He has said that he keeps his daughter’s photo nearby to always remind him of what he is really fighting for.
“Hey, I’ve never shot video for grandkids. I don’t have yet, but I want any grandkids to know that once upon a time people burned oil, and they put it in these underground pipes, and they burned enough, fast enough to cook you guys out of existence, and we had to stop it any way we could think of.”
These are the words of Michel Foster, one of the four people who helped turn off the oil flow from the Keystone Pipeline in North Dakota on Oct. 11, 2016. This pipeline carries oil from the tar sands region of Canada to Texan refineries.
Foster, a therapist and outdoor educator, has two children and lives in Oregon. He, along with the other “valve turners,” cited a “necessity defense” when their court cases were heard. It basically says that a crime was committed in order to ward off a more dire physical threat. The threat they are referring to is climate change and how it will impact their children and grandchildren.
This Father’s Day, Foster will not be home in Oregon. Instead he will be in a federal prison in North Dakota serving out his one-year prison sentence. He tries to make the best of things, saying that Thoreau’s cabin was not much bigger than his jail cell will be. His actions may have been treated as criminal in nature, but he sees fossil fuel companies as contributing to the death of our planet and threatening the future of our kids.
If you are lucky enough to be able to spend this Father’s Day with your dad or granddad, make sure to let them know they are special. You don’t have to be famous or world renown to be a great dad.
I am wishing all the dads out there Happy Father’s Day including my great hubby and son.