Eric's Story
Our little man will forever be in our hearts!!!”
Eric brought joy from the moment he was born. He was born at Spectrum Health (Blodgett), in Grand Rapids, Michigan on May 15, 2001. It was an exciting day and he was immediately loved and welcomed by Mitch, Alex and, of course, Mom (Mary) and Dad (John).
As Eric grew he continued to develop his trademark smile, showing off his fine dimples inherited from Mary. Fourteen months after he was born, our family was blessed with little Jack. Eric, Alex, and Mitch all welcomed Jack with lots of hugs, kisses and smiles. Our family of 4 boys was now complete.
Our three youngest also enjoyed making tents. They would drape sheets and blankets over chairs all over the family room. Of course that would then turn into hide and seek, and some type of sword fight where they would be hiding in various caverns. It was pure joy watching how well they played together. They also had a common love of Superhero’s. Spiderman was always Eric’s favorite, but Superman, Batman, and the Fantastic Four were close behind. They would regularly be running around in their Superhero pajama’s or Halloween costumes. Eric loved putting on a cape to see if he could run fast enough to make it flap in the wind.
Mitch and Eric also developed a very close and special bond. Eric would regularly go “plop” himself on Mitch’s lap. Whenever we traveled or stayed at the cottage, Mitch and Eric shared one bed and Jack and Alex shared another. They also shared a love for sports. Eric was Mitch’s sports buddy. They would often go outside and shoot hoops or play catch. Mitch loved pitching to Eric and going to his various ball games. Mitch and Eric also took many golf cart and quad rides out at the cottage.
All the boys enjoy PlayStation. Even little Jack. This was something they could do together when visiting Eric in the hospital, when he was in bed. Eric particularly enjoyed a bowling game. Each of his brothers, as well as anyone else who visited him, had a chance to play bowling with him.
Eric simply loved to play... inside and out. He absolutely loved spending time at the cottage. He enjoyed riding his quad or having someone take him for a ride on a bigger quad. He also loved golf cart and Sea Doo rides. He enjoyed being around other people and usually had a smile on his face. He was rarely unhappy or complained, unless it was a side effect of one of his medications.
Another love he shared with Mitch, Alex and Mary was for roller coasters. He enjoyed going to Michigan’s Adventure Park. To celebrate what we thought was the end of his chemotherapy, we took a road trip across Ohio and Toronto to hit 3 amusement parks. It was a wonderful family vacation.
A tradition we have each night occurs when we sit down for dinner. We go around the table and each person tells about 3 things they did that day. At the end, John asks someone to try to recount the 18 things that were shared by the 6 of us. We would go around the table giving the next person a shot to recall what each person said. The first one to get all 18 correct would win $1.00. It was a great way to make sure we spent quality time as a family by sharing what we did. It is so easy to get wrapped up in all the running around between school and sporting events that you forget to ask each other about their day. Eric loved this tradition and it is one that we will continue.
Another corny tradition that we still do from time to time, and one that Eric would often promote, was to make a “family sandwich”. Essentially each one lies on top of the other. Dad and Jack would be the bread as they were the bottom and top. Then we would have fun arguing over who was the cheese, salami, ham, and tomato. Sometimes it would drive Mitch crazy when we would try to pull him into the sandwich, but he still participated from time to time primarily because Eric or Jack would beg him to do so.
Knowing the cancer we were fighting could cost him his life we tried to take many family vacations in an effort to build lasting memories. Our final vacation with Eric was in August, after he had relapsed, but before heading to Duke Medical in North Carolina. We knew it might be our last chance to take a vacation together, so we wanted to do something we had been talking about doing for a while. So we rented an RV and headed west to see Zion Canyon, Bryce Canyon, Grand Canyon, and Lake Powell. Along the way we also stopped at Mount Rushmore and the St. Louis Arch. There are so many memories from this and all our other family vacations that we could write pages upon pages.
It was very clear early on that Eric’s favorite thing to do was to spend time playing with his brothers. Over the years and up until he went to North Carolina for his transplant, one of the favorite past times of our three youngest – Alex, Eric, and Jack – was to wrestle. It got to the point that it seemed to be happening all day long; and as parents we were exerting a lot of energy trying to have them stop before someone got hurt. Well, we finally figured out the secret. It wasn’t to stop it, but rather embrace it with two sanctioned wrestling matches a day. We would hold a 5 minute wrestling match in the morning and another one in the evening, cheering it on. It was a pretty effective means to still let them wrestle but keep it to only 10 minutes a day.
Eric was like a fish and it was hard to keep him out of the water. He loved swimming in our pool or playing in the lake. He loved to go for tube rides as well as ski. In the winter we had to make frequent visits to the pool at Grand Valley State University, visit Great Wolf Lodge or Avalanche Bay. He loved the “toilet flush” ride at Avalanche Bay the best.
Eric also cherished spending time with his friends. He had several “little buddies” that he always wanted to play with. Several were from his kindergarten and 1st grade classes. Eric loved school and was always proud of what he did. His teachers loved having him in his class as his smiling face and personality would light up the room. Many teachers knew him because Mitch went through Bauerwood Elementary before moving on to Junior High. Eric, Alex, and Jack attend Bauerwood.
Eric generally would only eat a few things. His favorite foods, which accounted for probably 90% of his calories, consisted of Wendy’s Nuggets and fries, Little Caesars Pizza, Rice Krispy treats, and Kit Kat bars. Now it may seem like lousy parenting to let that be his diet, but with all the medications and other things going on it was easy for us to live with that. He was always funny about it because even though we bought the same food almost every day, each time we went through Wendy’s drive-through he would ask about 20 times if we were clear about what he wanted. He would make all of us laugh every time because he just kept asking, even while we would be ordering through the intercom.
Eric loved his family dearly and his family will always love him. He will be deeply missed by all who knew him. He had the greatest smile and charm that any six-year old boy could ever have. Our journey with Eric has provided us an appreciation not to take things for granted. We know that he has touched the lives of many people and hopefully part of God’s work through him was to make us all a little stronger in our faith. We have comfort knowing that he is having fun in heaven with Jesus – perhaps the two of them are slinging spider webs together right now! We also have comfort knowing that, in time, our family will all be reunited once again.