This essay is part of an ongoing series of articles I wrote for newspapers in Canada. It appeared in the Globe and Mail on September 4, 2009.
We were expecting an uneventful birth, and all seemed well when Nicholas entered the world weighing eight pounds exactly, with a head the size of a football.
"Don't worry," my mother said. "Your brother Bob had a big head, too. He'll grow into it."
Something was wrong. Nicholas was jaundiced, as babies often are, but the doctors could not figure out why.
"We think he might be hydrocephalic," my family doctor said, adding that water on the brain could have caused an enlargement of his skull, which could destroy much of his neural tissue.
I blamed myself, wondering what I had done during my pregnancy to give my child this terrible life sentence. He looked so perfect, I thought, how could he be so broken? That night I tossed and turned, waiting for the nurse to bring Nicholas into my room. I held him close, whispered how sorry I was, how maybe if he'd had a different mother, he wouldn't face these challenges.
The next morning, the hospital pediatrician paid a visit. He carefully explained the initial diagnosis had been wrong. "It seems your son has no thyroid gland," he said.
"What does that mean?"
"He'll have to be on hormone replacement for the rest of his life," he said. "Otherwise he'll be fine."
Well, he never was fine. As a toddler, he couldn't walk across a room without falling down three times. He couldn't talk until he was almost 6, and had a profound learning disability. He was a medical make-work project.With the help of a legion of speech, occupational and physiotherapists, Nicholas was able to overcome all difficulties but one - he had a severe case of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
As he got older, Nicholas became more difficult, a danger to himself and all around him. He rode his bike looking backward. He grabbed a bottle of cough syrup and chugged it when I wasn't looking. And he nearly sliced his finger off with a soup can lid.
When Nicholas was about 5, he started roaming the house after we went to bed. Many mornings, we discovered cookie crumbs strewn about the floor, drinks spilled or an open can of half-eaten Kool-Aid powder. We finally put an alarm on his door so we could head him off on his nightly exploration of the fridge and the pantry.
His behaviour became more and more erratic. He was thrown out of several daycares and practically lived in the time-out room in public school.
He gave his brother a black eye on Christmas when they were fighting over a toy and landed his sister in the hospital after he distracted her while crossing the street. She saw the bus too late and found herself under its back wheel with a severe leg injury.
We tried putting Nicholas on Ritalin, but it turned him into a zombie. He was able to focus and do his school work, but it seemed to rob him of his big personality, which was what we loved most about him. Instead of running around the house in a cape singing I Just Can't Wait to Be King , he sat quietly in his room with his books.
He found it humiliating lining up for medication at school with other unruly kids. He often palmed the pills instead of taking them. Eventually, we took him off the medication and decided to live with the consequences.
As a teen, Nicholas got into illicit drugs in a bad way. He ran away from home and lived on the street for a few months, returning only when he fell ill from not taking his thyroid medication. By this time, he had cut school for nearly two years, and the thought of returning was unbearable to him.
One day, the doctor suggested I take Nicholas to a psychologist for an IQ assessment. He thought it would help Nicholas to better understand his mental state and take charge of his life. The results were astonishing. The psychologist explained that she was unable to give Nicholas an accurate IQ reading because his results were off the charts. His intellect was high, but his ability to deal with his emotions and social situations was low. She gave him strategies to help him develop better social skills. It was as if a light bulb had turned on in Nicholas's head. He began to understand why he acted the way he did. He also understood that he wasn't stupid - something most ADHD kids believe about themselves. It wasn't his fault; his brain was just wired differently.
That was eight years ago. Today Nicholas is a high-school graduate, working full-time, living on his own and in a serious relationship with a wonderful girl. He tried university, realized it wasn't for him, then moved into a college program with hopes of becoming an addiction counsellor. He is determined to put that big brain of his to use.
When I think back, I now understand that Nicholas always had it in him to be a success. He just had to do it in his own time, and in his own way. He still does things differently than other people, still marches to his own drum. He knows he's not stupid or a loser. He's different. He's not the ADHD poster boy any more; now he's just eccentric.
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