Finding Dad: From "Love Child" to Daughter (18 page)

As the baby grew inside of me, so did my spiritual curiosity. I started to make time for silence each day so I could feel my own inner guidance more. At first I was demanding. I wanted to touch it, talk to it, ask it how it spoke to me, give it a megaphone and ask it to talk louder. Being a reporter means I’m nosy and impatient, so it’s natural I wanted answers. Yesterday. I thought if these mysterious universal forces helped me find Dad and now have a baby, I wanted to know how they work.

Okay, soul, just talk to me and make it quick, I have stuff to do.

Doreen taught me that Truth moves at a slower frequency, and it starts with tuning into yourself and slowing down—not something I wanted to hear but earnestly gave it a try. Even today, it’s still hard for me to slow down, but I know that silence is a requirement to have peace. Ever the restless reporter, I’ve tried to ask my inner voice to speak up and talk louder, only to remember that it’s my job to quiet down. One of the reasons I do stories on mindfulness and healing is because we tend to teach that which we need to learn. I’m happy to say that after eight years of reporting
Kara’s Cures
for the mind, body, and spirit, I have mastered a bit more patience.

The day I went into labor, we were anything but patient. Dennis called our parents right away so they could race to the hospital, only to wait, and wait some more. While I was pushing, Dennis tried to keep tabs on our parents by checking in from time to time. Since the baby was taking its sweet time of making an appearance, I worried about any fireworks that might happen with my parents locked in a waiting room together for hours. At least Soozie was there, too, and she was a calming presence for Dad. And thankfully, she and Mom got along great. Plus cousin Fenton was there, which always meant we’d be assured of some comic relief. He had never witnessed a baby being born and couldn’t wait to be part of the action.

“What’s it look like out there?” I asked Dennis in between sucking on ice chips.

“Your father arrived with two giant stuffed bears, one pink and one blue. He says he wants to be prepared.”

I couldn’t help but laugh over my contraction.

After a long and exhausting labor I gave birth to a baby girl on February 23rd, 2007. Dennis cut her cord and placed her swaddled, warm body on my chest. We fell instantly in love, and I was transformed by a feeling of exuberance I’d never experienced before. She was perfect. She had a ton of thick jet black hair and olive skin, and clearly favored Dennis’s Italian side.

After the nurses gave the go-ahead for visitors, Dennis grabbed the video camera and raced outside to tell our parents the news. His plan was to videotape their reactions so I could watch them later, which frustrated our eager parents to no end, since they had to wait for Dennis to set up the camera before he finally said, “It’s a girl!”

My father grabbed the pink bear and leaped to his feet, moving much faster than most eight-seven-year-olds, and looked like he was ready to break the door down to see the baby and me. My mother was giddy and jumping around like a cheerleader, while Dennis’s mom started crying, thrilled to finally have a girl since she only had boys in her family.

Of course they all wanted to know the name, but Dennis kept the suspense going. “Kara wants to be the one to tell you her name.”

My creators entered the delivery room. As they jockeyed for a space close to me and the baby, I realized the little bundle of joy in my arms, our little girl, had the power to bring my parents together in love. She would only know them as her grandparents and not the warring souls they had been for me.

“Her name is Helena Sundlun House,” I announced.

“It means beautiful,” Dennis said—and she was clearly that.

Dad’s eyes lit up when he heard we had chosen Sundlun. I knew it might upset Mom, but I didn’t know how much longer I would have Dad, and I wanted him to share in our joy and see how we’d honored his name. I promised Mom the next baby would have a name from our mothers’ sides.

Everyone took turns holding Helena, starting with Mom and Dennis’ mother, Marilyn. When it was my father’s turn, he seemed nervous since babies weren’t exactly his forté. He sat down in a chair, and we carefully placed Helena in his lap. Holding her tightly, his tough exterior melted as he gazed into her tiny face. Her birth was the game changer that made everyone want to do better, love more, and heal the past.

Fenton’s words summed it up best when he got his turn, “Amazing! I mean really amazing! This is just incredible—so cool!”

In the weeks to come, our mothers jumped in with offers to bring food, offer advice, and volunteer to babysit so Dennis and I could sleep. Dad called every evening. Sometimes I was nursing the baby and could only listen to him talk on the answering machine: “Kara, it’s Dad. Just want you to know I’m thinking of you and wanted to know how that beautiful baby, Helena, is doing. Call me back. Love you.”

Having a baby opened up a new avenue for Dad to show his love, a path to show his soft side in a way that didn’t scare him. He could do things for Helena he missed out on with me, like buying her presents, coming to her christening, and playing with her in the sand at his home in Jamaica for Christmas vacation.

Occasionally, he still needed to be reminded about how to be a Grade-A Poppy. As Helena’s first birthday approached, we were busy planning a big party at our home for the family. Dad and Soozie planned to drive down, until duty called. Hillary Clinton was running for President and wanted my father at her fundraiser in Rhode Island.

“Kara, I have to go—I’m the last sitting Democratic governor in the state. The party needs me there, and I want Hillary to win in Rhode Island.”

“Really—well, I want you at Helena’s birthday party,” I shot back. I was upset he couldn’t see which one was more important. Sure, he could have seen her another day, but I wanted pictures of Poppy holding Helena on her first birthday. I wanted to rack up the moments, since we had missed way too many—and I thought he owed me this. I decided I wasn’t going to make this easy on him. He should be there, and that was that.

After about a week, Dad came up with a solution. He was going to attend Clinton’s fundraiser, then get his friend, who owned a private plane, to take him to Hartford in time to cut the cake.

“I might be a little late, but I’ll be there.”

Dad made it, and enjoyed watching Helena bop to the children’s musician we had brought in. Later, she crawled up on his lap to grab his nose, one of her favorite things to do, as we tried to teach her to say, “Poppy, Poppy.”

“Pa, Pa,” she mimicked.

Dad had figured out a way to make it right, and I couldn’t help but laugh that we had a great story for Helena’s baby book. Dad had always been a man of extremes and would stop at nothing to get something done, so this was his way of getting the job done. In the grand scheme of things, Helena wouldn’t have known or cared whether Dad was there or not, but
I
needed him there. Showing up to her parties went a long way to helping me forgive him for missing all of mine. Sometimes I still had to teach him what was important, but I loved him for being willing to learn.

Having Mom at the party was equally important, and I never got tired of watching her bouncing Helena around. “Your Gigi loves you, yes, she does. You’re my little baby.”

All that love pouring out of Mom made her more at ease around my father, and that made it easier on me. I didn’t have to worry about her getting upset over Dad as much, since she was so focused on the baby. Evolution was underway!

If planning Helena’s birthday party—and convincing Dad we were more important than Hillary—wasn’t enough, I discovered the morning of the party that I was pregnant. After all my struggles the first time around, I was shocked and relieved. The timing could have been better, since this was the morning of a big party and I had to focus on that. But what a miracle! It happened without even trying.

The memories of my miscarriage had taught Dennis and me to be more cautious, so we decided we would break the news a couple months later at Easter, when the whole family would be together.

Dennis’s brother, Chris, and his lovely wife, Jodi, had offered to host an Easter egg hunt for the kids at their new home in Walpole, Massachusetts. Their son, Tommy, was born nine weeks before Helena, and I loved the fact she’d have a cousin her age to hunt for those eggs. Dennis, always the producer, came up with the idea of stuffing our ultrasound pics into plastic Easter eggs and giving one to each family member to open. Our mothers, along with my father and Soozie, would all be there, so it seemed like the perfect plan.

As Helena and her cousin, Tommy, played on the floor, Dennis passed out the plastic eggs to each family member. “Kara and I have a special Easter gift for you all.”

My sister in-law Jodi figured it out first. “Oh my God! Congratulations, they’re having a baby!”

The moms and Soozie got it seconds later, but my dad seemed a little confused.

“Honey, that’s an ultrasound picture of the baby they are going to have,” Soozie explained.

“Well, that’s wonderful,” he said, turning the paper around to find the baby. “Doesn’t look like much now, though.”

“Dad, the white outline there is the baby,” I said, laughing.

Moments later, Tommy came into the living room wearing a t-shirt that said, “I’m going to be a big brother” on the front.

”Oh my gosh! Congrats to you, too!” I said, hugging Jodi. “Can you believe it, babies at the same time again? That’s awesome!”

“We’re due November 6th,” I said

“That’s my due date, too!” Jodi shouted excitedly.

The synchronicities of our lives were almost unbelievable. We had both gotten married in Newport, and now we were having babies at the exact same time, creating a bevy of cousins to make family events fun. It all seemed so meant to be, until it wasn’t.

  
19
Who Do You Want In the Foxhole?

At nineteen weeks, I lost the baby. In a cruel quirk of fate, my doctor informed me the baby hadn’t formed correctly and my pregnancy was not viable. Once again, the sting of miscarriage burned through our hearts, only this time it hurt even more. We thought we had made it into the safety zone only to have to face losing a baby we already loved so much. Unlike last time, everyone, even the TV viewers, knew I was pregnant.

Mom called non-stop, trying to get answers from Dennis that we just didn’t have. “Kara, this is your mother, please call me right away. I really need to know what’s going on.”

When I didn’t call back right away, she called again, and again.

Each time I saw “Mom calling” across my cell phone, I knew she was trying to understand it all so she could be there for me during this horrible time. But I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I just lay motionless in bed, popping Advil on schedule. I couldn’t bring myself to talk yet, I lacked the energy to try and explain the unexplainable, so I just let Dennis field the calls from family.

My father had left a long message on Dennis’s cell phone. “I just want you to know I’m here for you. I am so sorry. I can’t imagine what you both must feel, but I’m here, I’ll do anything for you. I don’t want to intrude, but Soozie and I are here if you need us. Love you.”

When I finally got the strength to call him back, the tears welled up in me the minute he said hello. My emotional walls were collapsing, and I couldn’t say anything. I needed him to be my rock, someone to crash into besides Dennis, who needed to do his own grieving.

Dad was always so proud of his ability to take a mess and fix it. From broken companies to shattered economies, Dad was the guy you called when you had to clean up a mess. He couldn’t fix this for me, but his instincts to stand back and listen were exactly what I needed. His strong, reassuring voice repeated offers to help, but he didn’t badger me with what I needed him to do. His nightly calls were like a buoy in my sea of pain.

“How are we today?” he would ask.

If I didn’t get my phone right away, he would keep calling, trying to find me to make sure I hadn’t slipped too far into a depression. “Kara, it’s Dad, hoping you’re okay. Call me soon.”

Though my father didn’t raise me, somehow his instincts told him exactly the right way to care for me. My own emotions were so fried, and I needed someone cool and calm around me. Conversely, my mother’s heart was breaking for me, and her own distressed emotional state was too much for me to face. She absorbed and amplified my pain, while Dad managed it.

With my family’s support, I eventually pulled back into the realm of doing okay, but I still wanted to know
why
this happened to me. My spiritual core centered on my belief that everything happens for a reason, even if I don’t understand the divine timing. It was a belief that helped me on my quest to find my father, to marry my husband, and have my daughter. I remembered the spiritual messages on Doreen’s table when I was pregnant with Helena, and wondered what the angels could be telling me now. I wanted a sign.
Dear God, just give me a sign
.

I looked out the window and saw a coyote in my driveway. I was still on painkillers and wondered if I was delirious since we lived in a busy city next to a main road where coyotes were not part of the landscape.

“Dennis, come here! Is that a coyote?” I asked.

“Oh wow…yeah, I think it is,” he said, rushing to grab his camera.

He snapped shots of the wild beast on our blacktop and sent them into the station to use them on the news—a coyote in the city was a good talker. While Dennis captured this strange sight, something told me there was a deeper meaning than my eyes could see. Then my inner voice tried to speak. Something told me to Google “spiritual meaning of coyote.” A website reported that the coyote is associated with a “deep magic of life and creation,” saying if a coyote crosses your path there is “hidden wisdom for you to reap…Call on the coyote to support you in refreshing your perspective, and lighten the weight of your circumstances.”

Could the coyote in my driveway be a sign telling me to have faith? Once again, it all sounded crazy, but the deeper place inside me felt a sense of peace wash over me, and I just knew everything would be okay, even though my heart was still breaking.

I had toughened up my spiritual muscle on my journey to find Dad, and once again, my faith was being tested. But this time, I knew more about surrender. Of course, my arms ached to hold my baby, and I cried puddles of tears because I’m human and I hurt. While faith doesn’t take away the pain, it takes away the fear. If my experience of finding Dad taught me anything, it was about trusting in the process without fear. And now I didn’t have to go it alone. I’d found Dad, and he was right there waiting to shield me if I couldn’t take the flak. Just knowing that made me feel safer and better able to weather the battle ahead.

Dad loved to say, “You know who you want in your foxhole when you see how they act under pressure.”

My father was someone I wanted in my foxhole—he knew exactly how to protect me without making me feel like I would suffocate. He also helped me with damage control: “Kara, what will the station do without you, and how will they handle this story?”

“They’ll have to make an announcement on my show, and on the news, since everyone knew I was pregnant. My bosses are being great and have told me to take all the time I need, I don’t know when I’m going back yet.”

“Make sure you rest and take all the time you need. I know you, so don’t try to rush it.”

He knew me, because I was like him. Funny, I was getting a lesson in patience from a man who had none. At the age of eighty-eight, he still went to the office every morning because he thought he had to.

“Thanks, Dad, I won’t.” I felt better about missing work after my hard-driving father just told me to stay on the couch. He had been a media mogul and knew how competitive my field was. Usually, he would have advised me to work harder, get there first, go home last, but instead, he was urging me to slow down and just take care of myself. It was exactly what I needed to hear in order to let go of any guilt and angst about taking a leave of absence from my job.

I still had to worry about the fact that our very private pain would need a public explanation. I had long passed the three month quiet period, and we hadn’t worried about sharing my adventures in pregnancy with the audience. Handmade blankets and booties from viewers piled up on my desk.

Now, my co-host on
Better Connecticut
, Scot Haney—who’s better known for his zany antics—had to make a very serious announcement: “Kara and Dennis have suffered a miscarriage. Our thoughts and prayers are with them during this difficult time.”

Dennis’s co-anchor, Denise D’Ascenzo, who was like a big sister to me, appeared close to tears when she made a similar announcement on the evening news before calling to comfort me.

“I know how painful this is, Kara, and my heart is breaking for you both. If I can give you any advice, it’s to just take your time— it’ll be a long time before you feel like yourself again. I’m praying for you.”

Denise had been such a role model for me—she had been the face of our station for more than twenty years, and was the epitome of professionalism and grace under fire. She confided she’d been through the exact same thing, and knew how hard it was to come back to work. She also told me to listen to my father: “He’s right, Kara. Your father is a wise man, so listen to him and take all the time you need. Your career will be there when you’re better.”

Dad didn’t consider himself a spiritual man, and he wouldn’t have shared my excitement about the coyote “sign,” but I think he was trying to teach me what he wished he would have learned earlier. He knew we were both wired for charging forward, but he wanted me to know it was also okay to take a step back—that he would still love me, even if I was wallowing on the couch instead of winning Emmys.

Sympathy cards replaced baby gifts at the station, and I wanted to crawl in a hole and hide. I appreciated the love, but I wasn’t ready to mourn in public. I decided to just listen to my father and crawl up with popsicles and cry when I felt like it. Mostly, I focused on Helena, our beautiful girl who could always make me smile.

Dad was right to tell me not to worry about work, but it helped when our General Manager, Klarn DePalma, called to tell Dennis he was thinking of us and offered to help in any way we needed. Dana Neves, our News Director who had the same due date as I did, and Patience Hettrick, our assistant News Director, were both young mothers, and brought a box of yummy baked goods to my house.

“We know you love your chocolate,” they said, enveloping me in a warm hug. In spite of my sadness, I was so grateful for our co-workers at Channel Three—they were a second family, and they grieved right along with us.

When I finally did return to work, the head of Meredith Broadcasting, Paul Karpowicz, came into the studio as I was getting mic’d up for my first live
Better Connecticut
. He didn’t ask me anything and, instead, just gave me a big hug. “We’re so happy to have you back.”

I was stunned the man in charge of all fourteen of our TV stations made time in his busy day to offer me some support, and it gave me the courage I needed to start the show. Paul had also been a Rhode Islander and knew my father, and I think he felt like giving me a little paternal support at a time when I needed it.

The opening music rolled, the audience clapped more loudly than usual, and my smile turned on. Getting back to doing the job I loved turned out to be great medicine. I left work knowing I could find the old me—it would just take a little time. I was happy to know my father would be in the foxhole for as long as it took.