Guest Post for Father's Day from Joanna Charnas: My Father's Influence
Joanna Charnas, author of several award-winning books, has provided the following guest blog post.
My
Father’s Influence on Managing Chronic Illness: Common Sense and Saliva
By
Joanna J. Charnas
I’m always
striving to manage my multiple chronic illnesses effectively and with more ease,
and less stress. My eighty-one-year-old father entered a nursing home this year
due to worsening Alzheimer’s symptoms. Since his placement, I’ve considered his
influences on my life and have particularly savored memories of my early
childhood with him. As I contemplated this period, I began to appreciate the
long-term effects his parenting style had on my health challenges.
Dad was a
hands-on, no fuss parent. If I wet my bed in the middle of the night, I was
instructed to wake him up, not my mother. He’d calmly help me into fresh pajamas,
lay a large towel over the soiled linen that would be changed in the morning, and
then tuck me back into bed. My occasional bed-wetting was drama free.
He often
utilized a unique and memorable grooming technique in public. In his early
divorce years, Dad frequently took my older brother and me to eat at a diner on
Seventy-Third Street and Third Avenue in New York City where we lived. In the
mid- 1960s, restaurants didn’t automatically serve water with meals. If Dad
noticed any post-meal mess on my face, he’d tell me to spit on his hanky, and then
proceed to clean my face with my own saliva.
I’ve
always remembered this parenting quirk as disgusting—for obvious reasons—but
also endearing in its primal nature: Dad as Cro-Magnon Man caring for his
young.
I changed
my mind about his cleansing technique a few years ago when I heard a broadcast
on National Public Radio regarding the restoration of mummies at the Boston
Museum of Fine Arts. Incredulous, I learned that the restoration team used
human saliva to clean the mummies. The narrator explained that the enzymes in
saliva are a gentle and effective cleanser. I’d listened to NPR in the car, but
when I arrived home I phoned Dad immediately and recounted what I’d learned,
reminding him of his own creative cleaning method. Although declining from
Alzheimer’s, Dad was sufficiently alert to grasp the basics of our conversation
and chuckled as I told him about the saliva news.
I often
marvel at my father’s good parenting instincts. The earliest photos of me at
three weeks old show one of his ties draped over my bassinet. Dad, who didn’t
have any scientific or medical training, had insisted that the patterns in the
tie supported my brain development. Decades later, science proved Dad
correct.
Love and
good instincts are powerful forces in a young parent. Born in 1934, Dad had only
post-war, traditional male role models available to him. Neither my brother nor
I had been planned. Dad reported some initial shock at my mother’s pregnancies but
then took to fatherhood with ease. He didn’t fret about the details of our
early lives, and he dove into fatherhood relying on his own good nature and
common sense. My brother and I reaped the benefits of loving, relaxed, sound parenting.
I’d like
to believe that when facing health challenges, I apply the same common sense to
my physical needs that Dad modeled fifty years ago. Although I don’t groom with
saliva, when my health goes haywire, my initial response is to review the
basics: Am I doing anything differently? Have I started taking a new over-the-
counter medication or changed my routine in a manner that might have adverse effects?
Did I alter my eating habits in some small way? Sometimes I don’t see a doctor for
weeks or even months because I’m hopeful there’s a simple solution. I don’t
alarm easily unless I’m in severe pain or have had an accident. My calm
approach developed over an entire adulthood of managing numerous, complex
health issues. I’d like to believe, however, that Dad’s parenting style also
influenced my reactions. He was loving and creative but fundamentally calm and
sensible. As he slowly leaves us, his gift
keeps giving.
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