Every generation pays a price

When my father was ten, his father died. They lived on a farm outside London, Ontario, and his father's death meant he and his mother had to sell the farm and move into town. Not long afterward, they immigrated to America, taking a ferry to Detroit. In those days, they were known as "nickel immigrants," because the one-way boat fare was five cents.

Growing up as his only son, I could always feel the lingering sense of loss my father felt for his own Dad. It sounded as though he never really got to know him, partly because of the dawn to dusk workload on the farm, and partly because was gravely ill for some time before he died.

I more or less ended up with custody of my father's dreams and fears. One of his desires was that I become a successful athlete. There were signs early on that this was not entirely fanciful -- I was coordinated and could run very fast. Baseball was our chosen sport.

He coached a team and wanted me to play on it and to be a star. I was an outfielder, with my speed I had good range and was learning how to track down fly balls hit all over the field. He was proud of me.

But then something happened. My energy started dissipating, I'd get out of breath easily and break out in a sweat. I kept trying to run but I stopped being able to reach fly balls that weren't hit straight at me. It was confusing.

My Dad somehow became convinced I had a character weakness, that I was "lazy." "You have got to have to want it really bad to become a good ballplayer. If you lag behind like you are doing, it won't happen."

Back at home, my mother noticed I was running a slight fever -- 99 degrees.

The next week at baseball practice it happened again. I couldn't run very fast or very far anymore. My father was getting pretty angry now, and threatened that if I wasn't going to keep up with the drills, he'd have to send me "home to your mother."

The following week I was no better, so home to my mother it was. I never again played baseball on a team until I was 30 years old. Mom was concerned that my fever never went away. Dad argued I was just using that as an excuse to be lazy. I didn't know who was right or what was happening.

We went to our family doctor, Dr. B. who ran all sorts of tests and finally concluded there was nothing wrong with me physically. "It's all in his head. It's psychological." He said this to my father with me sitting there.

After this, I had two years of very low energy and stamina. The other kids were out running around, while I tended to lie on the couch, reading. My father's disappointment in me was palpable.

The fever never left me. Two years after my baseball "career" crashed, I finally collapsed, and was taken to the hospital. I'd had rheumatic fever all that time; it had gone undiagnosed.

So I didn't lose my Dad around age ten, but on some emotional level, the sad truth is that he lost me.

We did our best to reconnect the rest of his years, and we both tried to be close, but this hole in my heart toward him was something I found difficult to heal. I didn't blame him, he wasn't a doctor, and he didn't know what those symptoms meant.

But I wish he's sought a second opinion. And that he didn't think I was lazy. The worst of it was living with the diagnosis that I was crazy. Dr B.'s words still ring in my ears, even now.

One legacy of this childhood experience is that I never quite seeem to know whether I'm sick or not, unless undeniable symptoms appear. Whereas other people say they have a cold or the flu, all I may know is that I don't feel very well -- but maybe it's all in my head.