Great Expectations

By Karin Melberg Schwier

This must be how it feels to be expecting, a lady in waiting, with a bun in the oven, heavy with child. Not exactly that this kid is an infant, but in two weeks, our lives will change. My husband’s 21-year-old son, my stepson, will be arriving to live with us, complete with Beatles and
Elvis tape collection.

He’s already been asking about his room and when we talked to him on the phone Sunday he said, "I love you, Dad, Mom." Jim, who has Down syndrome, my eldest of three stepchildren, is no longer a child or even a teenager. He is a man and he is moving in.

For 10 years since I married the kids’ dad, I’ve been Karin, Karin Mom, Mom and Stepmother and even, affectionately, Evil Stepmom Lady (ESL), in honour of a family favourite "Calvin and Hobbes" cartoon. To Erin and Ben, now 18 and 14, I’ve usually been just Karin. But to Jim, I
was soon Mom.

He would periodically explain, with great pains, that Charlotte was his mother and I was his stepmother because I married his dad, Rick. At the end of these laborious explanations, he would always ask, "Right, Mom?" It was always a source of stepmaternal joy that he, of his own accord, decided to honour me with the title.

At times I worried about how his mom would feel, hearing him yell, "Hi, Mom, what’s up?" on the phone during the weekly Sunday call, but I always took comfort in the knowledge that it was Jim’s choice and not my lead that caused him to call me Mom.

Since their parents’ separation and divorce, Jim, Erin and Ben have spent their summers with their dad, and each Christmas, he flew to see them for a week in California. I came along when Jim was 12, Erin, 9, and Ben, 5, so I was lucky enough to have summers and Christmases with them when they were young children.

They would bound down the Air Canada gate with shrieks and hugs, backpacks, red and white "UM" buttons dangling on their shirtfronts to identify them as "unaccompanied minors." Six weeks later, a glum, tearful bunch would cling at the airport until it was finally time to go. Our
solace was in knowing that before the inflight meal was served, they would be already looking forward to going home.

Today, we speak every week on the phone at least once; letters and postcards and gifts are exchanged. Erin seems to call every other night with excited plans of going to San Diego for her second year of college. Ben talks of the school play in which he will perform. Jim talks of his job at the YMCA and asks about farflung relatives in Indiana, Florida and the Yukon.

When the children were little, the summer six weeks seemed long enough to be a real family. The time seemed to shrink as they grew. We held onto our time together as long as possible until they wanted more time with friends and summer jobs.

Parenting for summers and at a distance is different from the day-to-day stuff faced by custodial parents. Even with joint custody, we’ve been periodic parents and have been reminded, by many well intentioned people, that "it’s not really like having the kids all the time." We know that very well and it has been, and always will be, a loss.

When the kids moved with their mom from Canada back to the States, their dad (and, a few years later, we) did not follow. It was a painful decision, but decisions are made and life goes on. We try different strategies as the years pass to stay involved and in the kids’ minds and hearts as circumstances and players change. We tried to be involved with their education as much as the schools would allow, insisting our suggestions be heard when we felt we were being ignored.

We have always worried that the time with all three children was never enough, but the trick is to relax and be a family when we are together and stay in touch when we are apart. We think the kids developed a sense of who we were, what to expect of us and what our family was like when they were very young. That consistency has been a sort of grounding for them when times are difficult and we hope, as they grow into adults, it can be something on which they can rely.

For Jim, the consistency has been important. For years, the on-the-dot 9:00 a.m. Sunday phone call has been met with not "Hello?" but a jubilant, "Hi, Dad, Mom!" The gift of calling cards stepped up the calls originating from California, and often take the form of jokes left on the
answering machine during the day. Its flashing green light often marks the spot of a gift left by a child.

But soon I will be a day-to-day parent. In a few months, Jim will arrive with belongings crammed into his backpack and a few suitcases for the first of what we hope will be an equal sharing of him on an annual basis. At 21, he is finished with school in California, so we do not have to plan our time together within those constraints. Though we’ve always tried to make the kids’ summer time with us as much like regular family time as possible, we were always aware of time ticking away so quickly. For us and Jim, at least, that is about to change.

So I chew my fingernails. The daily, steady family time with Jim (the time for him to feel heard and respected and appreciated) will be the prime time for learning self-help and greater skills to help him move into a more independent life. Cooking, laundry, making and taking phone calls,
making conversation, paying attention to his appearance, thinking about himself and the world around him: all the things Jim’s dad and I need quietly to support him to learn.

What I have to remember is not to pounce on Jim the moment he walks through the door to begin our "work." He is not a project, but our expectations are high. Hopefully, he is strong enough to ,fend me off from time to time! He is, thankfully, forgiving of my mistakes.

His community involvement will take some orchestrating, but already some wonderful possibilities exist. Jim is a friendly, considerate person who always remembers to say thank you for birthday presents, letters and postcards. He asks about our colleagues and friends, and recalls
parties from years past; his favourite, yet perhaps the most confusing, was the Murder Mystery party where everyone arrived in costume and played a role, refusing to answer to their real names until the murderer was found out.

It’s important to us, and for Jim, that we construct some of his life so he will interact with a variety of people. Programs come and go, and may not always view him as a whole person, but rather only as "disabled." Relationships and friendships in the community will sustain him. We
just have to ask, and keep asking, and ultimately teach Jim how to ask for himself.

A simple letter of introduction to our within-walking-distance neighbourhood business district, suggesting a volunteer role during the few months Jim is here, brought warm and interested phone calls. Within two months, we had arranged for volunteer tasks at the Country Butcher, the Broadway Theatre, the Institute on Community Living, the YMCA and the Fringe Festival.

Business people not only agreed to try Jim out, but without exception called and said, "We’ll have a few different things he can do and if one doesn’t work out or he doesn’t like it, we’ll just try something else." Those opportunities, combined with odd jobs for Rick at the University and for me at the Association for Community Living, should provide Jim with an interesting and varied weekly schedule that will put him in touch with a lot of people.

Balancing all this activity with that quiet time for learning and listening at home (us from him as much as the other way around) will be the trick.

The YMCA, we think, will be one of his anchor jobs where he will manage the tote desk with a very friendly weightlifter named Ian. At the Country Butcher, the young owner has suggested they need help with delivering advertising flyers in the neighbourhood, so "maybe we can go together and Jim could take one side of the street, I’ll take the other and we can stop for a Slurpee when we’re done. Do you think he’d like to learn how to wrap meat?"

For the Institute on Community Living, a service that picks up recyclable goods at the homes of donors throughout the city, Jim will wear the company jacket, ride in the truck with the "guys" and make sure the homeowner is personally thanked and receives a business card. At the Fringe Festival, we’re all volunteers at the merchandise table and busing tables at the street cafe.

Add to that weekly speech practice at the home of Alison Blair, a speech therapist and audiologist who believes the best way to help Jim improve his speech and take more control is to "spend some time together and talk about stuff." Top all that off with a regular fitness routine, maybe aerobics and aquafitness at the Y.

In recent months, as his arrival nears, we’ve let Jim know of these things, reminding him of people’s names and what he might be doing at each place. He wants to do it all.

I’m tired already. Rick and I are looking forward to Jim’s arrival with a surreal mixture of nervousness and utter joy. In the meantime, I’ll work on my fingernails and practise my breathing. If that doesn’t work, the next sounds you’ll hear are the labour screams of a woman giving birth to a young man (with good social skills) echoing from coast to coast. And this is a BIG country.

(Karin Melberg Schwier is an author and illustrator. Her most recent work, "Couples with Intellectual Disabilities Talk About Living and Loving" (Woodbine House, 1994) received a National Media Award from the Canadian Association for Community Living and the Joan Kershaw Publications Award from the Council for Exceptional Children. She lives with her family in Saskatoon, SK.)