In this touching episode of A Guy’s Perspective, we delve into the emotional journey of Andre, a father who shares the highs and lows of raising a child with cerebral palsy. Through candid conversation, Andre reveals the complexities and challenges that come with parenting a special needs child, while offering advice and support to other parents in similar situations. Listeners will gain insight into how he coped with his son’s significant health struggles and ultimately, his passing.
In this episode, Andre also mentions his son’s passing and a GoFundMe that has been set up if listeners would like to contribute
I can’t hide myself I don’t expect you to understand I just hope I can explain What it’s like to be a man It’s a lonely road And they don’t care about what you know It’s not about how you feel But what you provide inside that home
SPEAKER 01 :
Welcome to A Guy’s Perspective, where they discuss real life topics that men today are dealing with. Whether married, single parent, or just single, we invite you to call into this live program with your comments and questions. And here they are.
SPEAKER 06 :
good afternoon everybody this is 5 60 a.m klz you can always reach out and talk to the guys at 303-477-5600 again it’s 303-477-5600 um heath isn’t with us today he’s off doing something i’m not really sure but um we just want to give a shout out to him and Our Reno’s back in the studio with us, boys. Tell us how you been, man. I’ve been good. I’m glad to be back, though. That’s it, man. You’re a part of the group. We love it. Again, if you ever want to talk to the boys, just give us a call again at 303- 477-5600. Wait, wait, wait.
SPEAKER 07 :
You guys might be a boy. I’m a man.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, fine. You want to talk to the men. One other thing we want to give a shout out to the Upper Room. Pastor Derwood Tate, you are the man. We love you to death. Can somebody give the address to the Upper Room? That’s 1001 South Pearl Street. Today, we’re hoping this is our best show yet. Andre is going to talk to us a little bit. I think what we’re going to talk about most people, whether you’re male or female, can relate to all this. With that being said, let’s give you the floor. Before we do, introduce you guys yourselves. I’m the truth. Aren’t you the truth? Oh, okay. I’m Brock.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, I’m Andre, your local electrician. Number one.
SPEAKER 04 :
And I’m Reno, the other local electrician. That’s so funny, man.
SPEAKER 07 :
We got two local electricians. I love it. And I’m the local janitor. That’s funny.
SPEAKER 06 :
Oh, man. Am I the only one in oil and gas, then? Yeah. Dude, you got a lot of gas. Oh! Coming back from Oklahoma, I sure do, buddy.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hey, guys, don’t forget, you guys can catch up in any podcast on a guy’s perspective or the guy’s perspective on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, all these other ones. And KLZ has its own app that you can listen to whenever you can hear us live in that realm as well.
SPEAKER 06 :
That sounds good.
SPEAKER 08 :
all right let’s get to it so now tell us um your your boy what he was yeah so anybody who doesn’t know um i my son um was born in 2007 january or july 5th and uh You know, he had a lot of complications. He had cerebral palsy. And, you know, he just really struggled as a baby. And, you know, we sadly had a, you know, I was gone for about two weeks because in one week we had to pull his life support because his heart, you know, he had a condition that caused his heart to fail. So that’s been pretty hardened and, you know. I ended up in the hospital, too, the week afterward because of a symptom called broken heart syndrome.
SPEAKER 05 :
My goodness.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, it literally was shutting my heart down, and I didn’t realize it was a true out there. I didn’t think that was true.
SPEAKER 06 :
We’ve heard that our whole life. I didn’t think that was true.
SPEAKER 07 :
So did you say that he had a bunch of complications when he was a baby?
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, he, you know, he basically had a lot of, cerebral palsy is one of those things that happens. Yeah, tell us about it. Yeah, where it’s not genetic, even though they tried to find a genetic component. Cerebral palsy usually comes during either, you know, in utero there’s an injury, you know, in utero or otherwise there’s an injury. Right at delivery. And then fortunately, Austin had some things that happened with his mother where she actually fell. And, you know, he started to have clotting and all these other things from, you know, mom’s womb entering his bloodstream. And then, you know, he started clotting too. And, you know, we were supposed to do, you know, he was supposed to deliver roughly the July 4th. But we delivered on July 5th. And, you know, they basically pulled him out and he was in what they call neonatal intensive care. And what that is is where they basically, you know, keep your child alive sometimes, you know, if they’re premature or if there’s some type of birth defect or, you know, if there’s other additional causes like, you know, cerebral palsy, for instance.
SPEAKER 06 :
Let me ask you a question. He has cerebral palsy for… Anybody out there that’s listening to this, any other man whose child has cerebral palsy, what’s the best advice you would give them?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, you know what’s funny is I think for a lot of us parents that have had any type of child with special needs, there’s nothing that really people know what to say. So that becomes understandable as well. But I would say that if you can find anybody or any groups or Bible studies or, you know, whatever it may be that can support you guys, that’s the best thing you need because, you know, your friends don’t know what to say. Your family doesn’t know what to say. And, you know, the average person, whether they’re at church or they just know about it, they don’t know what to say. So they just say the cliche, you know, I mean, better you than me. No, I’m just, no, that’s not true. No, no, no, no, no. No, but, you know, really, I think sometimes we think that because most of the time, you know, most of the time when you have a child, it’s usually, hey, you got a healthy baby boy or you got a healthy baby girl.
SPEAKER 06 :
So let me ask you this. So leading up to, so basically your boy passed away recently. Yeah, yeah. Let me ask you this.
SPEAKER 08 :
he’s in heaven oh this is this is what i want to know on this show when you get to heaven will your boy know who you are yeah i i believe so so i i mean you know the bible talks about we’re surrounded by you know a great you know amount of witnesses and like i’ve had to tell you know his brothers because his brothers also took a heart you know most You know, the biggest thing that his sibling, you know, that was a year apart, he’s taken a little heart. It’s also a faith thing where you just got to figure, you know, did God really heal him? Did God not answer my prayer? And, you know, I had to tell him, God answered your prayer. You know, the healing came, but sometimes it’s not what you expect a healing to look like. Wow. You know.
SPEAKER 07 :
So what does cerebral palsy, what caused the effects like?
SPEAKER 08 :
Good question. Yeah, cerebral palsy can actually, so basically the effects, it’s a brain damage at birth. And the problem is that, you know, when someone is born, you know, they start to wire, you know, pathways through their brain. And that’s why people that have a stroke, sometimes if they catch it quick enough, they can start to be rehabbed and they can start to walk, talk or whatever. Again, the sad part about cerebral palsy is that when there’s a stroke or some type of brain damage, that wiring never took its initial course. So there’s no pathway to generate. So sometimes children with cerebral palsy have problems. You know, hearing loss, vision loss. But most commonly, it’s a loss in your muscle and motor control.
SPEAKER 07 :
So when you would speak to him or play with him, he knew you were there? Always. Yeah, he was very… Yeah, that’s another good question.
SPEAKER 08 :
And so it depends on the severity. I mean, it is a good question because you can also have, you know, there is, you know, by virtue of the disability, you do have some… um you know they austin never really fully learned everything but i’ll tell you what he was one of the smartest children and he brought a big smile to everybody he knew you know that um he was so aware of uh you know just the simple jokes even adult jokes i mean he loved he loved blondes i mean he was he was totally into blondes you know and so he would just totally check them out and scope them and You know, and if, you know, any of his nurses, if they just weren’t attractive, he’d just turn his head away. That’s super funny, man. Yeah, yeah. Have you ever seen a good-looking, you know, blonde, you know? You know, he basically just would just stare at him and, you know what? So he must have got that gene from his dad. Yeah. You good. See, now you’re speaking truth again.
SPEAKER 06 :
But, so, I mean. Go ahead, man. You guys can go. I was just going to say, how are you coping with it now? How are you feeling?
SPEAKER 08 :
So, you know, it’s another good question because I had one minister reach out to me and he said, you know, I know that this has been going on. There’s a struggle where at some point you thought that Austin, you know, was going to pass away younger. And, you know, this is true. However, he beat all the odds for quite a while. He had just a great span for having cerebral palsy where there’s a lot of children that they go for multiple surgeries and then, you know, eventually they die of complications because Austin was paraplegic, you know, so the ability for him not to stand and all that really affects people’s health. And it affects your GI. Everything connects to everything, right? Right. So with that said, you know, yeah, we knew it was coming, but, you know, he finally had one major surgery. And I really think that’s, you know, in June and then all of a sudden everything just started going. And I, as a dad. You know, knew something was very wrong. Oh, you could tell. I knew so. And I just kept my wife and I kept on saying, you know, because I’m remarried. My wife and I kept on saying he’s he’s dying. He’s just there’s something changed. And, you know, sadly.
SPEAKER 07 :
So why why give him a surgery anyway, if he’s a paraplegic?
SPEAKER 08 :
Um, because he, um, so another thing with cerebral palsy is that, you know, all of us, believe it or not, are contracting or holding our positions together. If you get picked, if I picked you up, Brian, you know, you would be able to assist me in some way, unless you were absolutely passed out, you know? And that’s kind of what it is with paraplegic is they don’t have that ability to assist you because they don’t have the tone, if you will. Their brain isn’t firing enough to kind of assist you and contract muscles to aid you. With Austin, sometimes you have a hyper and then you have less of that muscle tone where his brain basically continues to say, you know, fire away and um he started to push his legs out of socket so he had a hip dysplasia starting to build in where it becomes you know really painful you know and it’s only because he didn’t it’s he couldn’t control how much you know his brain was telling his hips do you do you feel like because you have two other boys yeah that that’s that was your oldest son right yeah my first
SPEAKER 06 :
Do you feel, wow, you’re first, wow. Do you feel like you loved him just as equal as your other two boys, even though he couldn’t function like your other two?
SPEAKER 08 :
So that’s a really good question. I always loved all of my boys, you know, all of them.
SPEAKER 06 :
Austin, and I try not to play favoritism, you know, by virtue of his… Because I will say this, Joseph’s father was at the wrong in the Bible by taking Joseph above his other brothers.
SPEAKER 08 :
But with that said, though, you know, when you have your siblings, you rely heavily on them. And, you know, but it made my other two sons better. It made, you know, even my, you know, stepdaughter better, you know, because… You know, once you got to realize, you know, this is how, you know, things work. And, you know, other kids would always stare at him like, you know, why can’t he eat? Why can’t he talk? Why can’t he walk? Why is he in a wheelchair? But, you know, and the odd thing is that just became the new normal for us. But it wasn’t easy. I mean, you get as a caregiver, sometimes you get what’s known as caregiver burnout, right?
SPEAKER 07 :
Wow, yeah, for sure, though.
SPEAKER 08 :
What do you mean caregiver? So naturally, you know, you’ve had your daughters. And naturally, you know, as a father, all of us, you know, except for, well, Brian, with your fur babies. Now, naturally.
SPEAKER 09 :
Why do you got to interject that?
SPEAKER 08 :
But I didn’t want to leave B Rizzle out. I mean, the truth. But so naturally, you know, as a dad, there’s things, expectations that you have. You know, you live vicariously, truly. You look at the things, you know, I didn’t get to do this in high school, so I want him to do that, you know, or… You know, there’s certain things, you know, I didn’t get these type of shoes. So now I’m going to hook my son up or whatever. With Austin, you know, the morning started the day that he was born because of what he could not do. And that’s typical. You know, I learned it through a Bible study. And albeit it was hard, you know, it taught me a lot. And the kids, you know, they… basically learned in my opinion you know a lot about grace and a lot about patience and a lot about mercy because austin was able to only do what we could move him to do you know if he wanted to go somewhere it was because we moved him somewhere if he was going to eat it was because we fed him through a tube you know so um life expectancy of somebody with severed palsy is not too long right Unfortunately, yeah, because especially when they’re paraplegic and, you know, the saddest part is I remember you and I can talk about that. But when you ask back in the day, I would ask that, you know, at one of the hospitals and it’s almost they looked at me with contempt. But the simple truth is I needed to know. And, you know, sometimes they live up to their teens and sometimes they’ll live, you know, in their late adulthood. But And, you know, the way Austin was going up until that surgery, we were just preparing and trying to get ready to, you know, move him into the adult, you know, disability programs and try to figure out what’s going, you know, what to do next, you know, in the event that we pass away as, you know, parents. So, yeah.
SPEAKER 04 :
So I didn’t realize that was his senior year.
SPEAKER 08 :
That was.
SPEAKER 04 :
And the amount of talent he had. Yeah. So I was kind of blown away with the artistic ability.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah. He even lettered. He lettered in academics.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, he was a smart kid.
SPEAKER 08 :
And, you know, this was going to be his prom weekend, or the beginning of his prom. Well, no, that was last weekend while I was in the hospital. He even had a date set up. Yeah, I was going to say, I had a prom date. Yeah. I mean, but… Super cool, man. Yeah. It’s just, you know, you hate to say it. Sometimes with a disability, it’s kind of a shatter of dreams. But, you know, at the end of the day, you know, everything that people would tell me and try to comfort me with, you know, they had almost did a full… You know, 180 or 360 were basically, you know, the things that they said I couldn’t take when he was born. But then that life cycle and just that life reflection, I realized a lot of what they had to say, even though they didn’t probably were ignorant, but they’re trying to use the comforting, you know, things to say. it came back and taught me a lot because Austin taught me a lot, you know, and maybe I miss circle and maybe you addressed it at the start.
SPEAKER 06 :
Did you in your ex know that your boy was going to have cerebral palsy when she was pregnant with them?
SPEAKER 08 :
So yeah, I think no, I mean, realistically speaking, cerebral palsy, again, is like an injury, you know, typically, you know, did the doctors have any knowledge? Well, if they did, you know, they’re not. I think they. Well, so my ex, she she slipped and fell right on Austin, you know, when she was probably seven months pregnant with Austin. So and we did go to the hospital and it looked like he actually was going to be delivered. You know, it would have been delivered a pre preemie somewhat, but still, you know, viable to keep him alive. And I wish they would have because, you know, but, you know, they sent us home. I don’t know why. And I’ve had an attorney look at it. And on the day he was born, I had an attorney look at that record, too. And they said, you know, he sat when it was time for him to give birth. He was flat for about four hours, meaning that the contractions didn’t match the heartbeat. Because usually when a baby, when a, you know, the mother contracts, the baby’s heart rate also contracts or moves along with the contractions. And Austin wasn’t, but apparently they sat for four hours on him. So we probably had a lawsuit, but the saddest part is at that time, you know, in 2007, we The attorney told us, you know, it’s you against, you know, a hospital and a bunch of lawyers.
SPEAKER 06 :
They’re practicing. Again, if y’all want to reach out and… So talk to Andre. If you have a question for him or more you want to know, please give us a call at 303-477-5600. Again, that’s 303-477-5600. Oh, so you guys are thinking that from the fall this could have damaged his brain.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, I don’t know that it damaged the brain, but it caused damage in utero, yeah, where there was clotting and such. You know, he lost his kidney because it went into atrophy. So that kidney, he only had one kidney for his whole lifetime. And then, you know, once a baby has any type of clotting, you know, they start to treat it with anticoagulant. That presents a new danger that it could cause a stroke.
SPEAKER 07 :
So when she was pregnant and seven months and fell, he lost his kidney then?
SPEAKER 08 :
No, it’s just a cycle of time, you know, so he was probably pained. I don’t know if anyone’s had a blood clot, but it’s a very painful experience.
SPEAKER 06 :
If it because like the medical field is so advanced now, you know, it’s way different.
SPEAKER 07 :
It’s I don’t think it’s as advanced as you think. I think surgery nowadays is worse than. In the 80s where people had to go to the books and actually study. Oh, no. I think surgery today is worse than back in the 80s.
SPEAKER 04 :
What were you saying, Reno? I disagree. Oh, I disagree too. It’s way more advanced now. It’s way more advanced.
SPEAKER 07 :
I guess it depends on the surgeon you receive. No.
SPEAKER 06 :
No. I’ve heard so many bad stories. Look at all the knowledge we have of it now.
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, you got to remember too, Brian, as doctors are practicing, you know, anytime you have a practicing physician, they’re really just practicing on you as an individual. That’s what I’m saying.
SPEAKER 07 :
I’m scared, bro. I have a back problem and I’m too scared to go to the doctor.
SPEAKER 08 :
I can tell you what you need, bro. You don’t even have to go to the doctor.
SPEAKER 06 :
I mean, think like the medical field in the 80s, 90s, 2000s. I mean, you’re looking at 30 years of advancement, better equipment, more knowledge.
SPEAKER 07 :
Let me ask you a question. Everybody I’ve known that had back surgery had to have another back surgery. They had to have another back surgery. But you’re telling me these people are advanced. So why do you have one back surgery? You got to go in for another back surgery and another one after that.
SPEAKER 06 :
Help me. So the way the medical field works, like let’s say his back, like he’s talking about. They can diagnose what it is and try to fix it. But your body compensates for it being off, so you might damage something else. So now they’ve got to fix that part of your back.
SPEAKER 08 :
I can tell you from my experience is that the syndrome that basically they told me essentially that I had a – Broken heart syndrome. Well, that just came out, that diagnosis. But the reason why is because you have empirical knowledge now. You have decades of knowledge back behind it. Oh, for sure. Decades of advancement. For instance, like the broken heart syndrome was called Takato Subo Cardiomyopathy. Man, that makes you want to do a Chinese thing right there, buddy. It’s actually a Japanese physician that figured that out. And it basically is that… When you get a whole bunch of physical stress, it shoots a bunch of hormones and stressors and whatnot in and it starts to shut down your left ventricle. And that’s what was starting to happen with me. My heart started coming down.
SPEAKER 07 :
And so you think this is a result from broken heart syndrome?
SPEAKER 08 :
Well, the doctors diagnosed that. But I would kind of have a… But see, that’s the thing about you, B. Rizzo, is that no matter how many times people tell you something, you ignore it. You start YouTube and stuff, and you go on Dr. Google.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, let me ask you this. For people who are… And this is back to being a serious question. For a man who, let’s say his child is going to have… a lifelong of complications, and he’s thinking about abortion. What would you say for something like that? That’s deep.
SPEAKER 08 :
You know, that’s funny because when Austin was born, they rushed him immediately to resuscitate him with not even asking us, not even telling us. Hey, you know, I mean, he had an emergency C-section. So when they pulled him out, I remember looking at a lifeless and what I thought was more lifeless because his arm was just dangled and they just rushed him off to a different area. Would not explain to us what was going on. And, you know, my wife then, you know, Austin’s mom, you know, we only knew what we were told. And so, you know, I’ve contemplated that because, you know, in this case, I loved my son so much. And I do see where people say he was a gift from God because he did teach me a lot. Um, but like my dad said in his time, you know, Austin would have naturally passed away. And sometimes I think we intervene too much that, you know, if nature should take its course, especially on me, for instance, I’d be, do not resuscitate. Cause you know, the second time around with Austin, he, you know, first time around, he was a child. I seen everything. He had the intubation, all the EEGs, EKGs, all these things they were doing to him. Then when he had the heart failure a couple weeks ago, they resuscitated him, but he was not there anymore. And I’d seen the big difference. And I knew he was gone. For a fact, I asked God, is he with you? And absolutely overwhelmingly, I knew so. But to answer your question about…
SPEAKER 06 :
I mean, because it’s going to be different for everybody. And listeners, listen, we’re a guy’s perspective. We talk about everything. There’s nothing we don’t talk about. So that’s a deep question. If you don’t want to answer it, that’s fine.
SPEAKER 07 :
I don’t know how to answer it.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, gotcha. Because it would be different for everybody, right?
SPEAKER 07 :
That’s a tough situation to be in.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, because in one sense, people are so against abortion, other people aren’t. But when you have somebody that may suffer their whole life, how do you balance? Because then you’re judge and jury at the same time.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, see, I don’t think I could for the simple fact that he might touch somebody’s life. That’s a good answer.
SPEAKER 04 :
You would never know. Yeah, you would never know. You would never know. He might be there to save your life. What do you mean by you would never know? You don’t know the outcome. Gotcha. You would never know what’s going to happen. Gotcha. So the only way to find out is to let it play out. Yeah, for sure. Let it play out. And that’s hard. Like Andre said, if it takes its natural course, that’s not really abortions.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, who are we to intervene? Yeah, for sure. You know, that’s why, you know, when he was on life support, you know, his mother and I spoke and, there’s no reason to keep him like that. You know, I think he already left his body, his, you know, his spirit left and his soul went to, you know, rest with the Lord. And, you know, and I, like I told my boys, you know, he made it before all of us. So now it’s up to us to make sure we make it and see him again. So, yeah, I do believe he’ll see me just getting back to your question.
SPEAKER 06 :
The original question. Yeah. You believe he’ll see you. Cause I do believe that. I believe children that go on before their parents will know their parents. No, for sure. Yeah.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
But so how many surgeries did he have to have? And that’s the irony is that, like I said, Austin did a great, uh, he, he lived for the most part, all things considered, you know, he did maybe three surgeries, four surgeries. The fourth one was the one that I think did him. Yeah. And that was for his hips, right? Correct, yeah. Yeah, the first one was a cochlear implant. Then he had some other. Now was that to help you eat? Cochlear implant? No, because he, you know, he lost his hearing at about age two, you know, because they would not treat his ear infections in the timely manner.
SPEAKER 07 :
So they, but they know he’s just, he had cerebral palsy at birth. Well, after birth. After birth, they know that. Again, just reiterate. Yeah.
SPEAKER 08 :
Cervical palsy is usually done because of a birth or damage at birth or delivery. But, hey, guys, I just want to say one quick thing. You know, a lot of people have helped us out through the way, you know, and it’s amazing how many people have come so far and we haven’t talked forever. And, you know, I want to thank everybody who has. We have my wife, you know, Andrea. She set up a – yeah, Andre and Andrea – my wife set up a go fund me because you know it’s expensive and we’ve had to deal with a lot of different you know unfortunate things that have happened and so i might post put that on our facebook page if that’s okay with you guys yeah by all means post it in in yeah and donate yeah let people donate you know i mean that’s have you donated no i haven’t no i’m going to i just got back in town no Honestly, I’m thankful. There’s more people that amaze me that haven’t seen Austin forever and they just contributed. So where do you go to donate exactly?
SPEAKER 06 :
That way everybody knows.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah, and that’s the hard part. The irony is that GoFundMe can set up an account for people that can buy million-dollar homes or multi-million-dollar homes because they’re accused of a crime. And then, you know, you have a poor, you know, innocent child. And, you know, it’s odd how many people just want to hold on to their money and use it for Starbucks or triggers or, you know, some other things. I’ve seen so many things. But anyway, I do want to be – I appreciate you guys asking. You know, I’m thankful he is with the Lord. And, you know, it’s been –
SPEAKER 06 :
Again, this is KLZ 560 AM. That was Andre talking. And, again, you can always reach out to us at 303-477-5600. May 31st, remember, go to Facebook and donate to Andre’s situation. And if you would like to participate in our fundraiser, post a picture of the best-looking dog. And we’ve got a jersey in. a dinner we’re giving away to people. And again, you know, God bless everybody. And, um, next week we’re going to start going an hour and, um, we’re just going to keep getting better boys.
SPEAKER 08 :
Yeah. And catch up with us on, uh, you know, Spotify or any of those podcasts forums. If you miss the live broadcast, you can always catch us.
SPEAKER 03 :
It’s not about how you feel, but what you provide inside that home.
SPEAKER 05 :
is what you make it you can’t always live up to expectations you try to please everybody while you struggle so you fake it and end up out of balance compromising situations as a good man do what he should man I’ll give everything he has and do everything he could man you might find yourself feeling all alone inside a house you built that you don’t recognize as home and that’s what my
SPEAKER 02 :
The views and opinions expressed on KLZ 560 are those of the speaker and do not necessarily reflect those of Crawford Broadcasting, the station, management, employees, associates, or advertisers. KLZ 560 is a Crawford Broadcasting God and country station.
