David Bruce

Dad, Mom, Debbie and Cindy 1953

I grew up a always knowing I should have had a brother.  He would have been two years older than me. In a family where the age gap was ten years between me and my next sibling, I longed for a sibling closer to my age.  My sisters thought I had it easy because I didn't have to compete with another child for my parents attention.  I was always reminded that I was the child of my parents older years so they had more money to spend on me.  I learned to drive on a Mercedes Benz, I got to spend summers in Santa Barbara and travel the country with my parents.  I was fortunate to have my parents to myself, but it was lonely too.

I always wondered what it would have beenlike to have a protective older brother. Would I have been more popular in high school?  Would he have been an athlete (probably not) or in the band like my dad?  I would have had a playmate and someone who knew me when I had to start over at a new school.

David Bruce should have been born in 1960. I don't know the month, but he would have been about 2 years older than myself.  Instead he was a stillborn.  My mom had to carry him almost full term and deliver. Him.  My parents knew he was no longer alive at about 7 months gestation.  Can you imagine such a trauma?  I was too young to understand when my mom would mention it.

Instead they allowed me to dream about a older brother.  Of course, He would have been handsome and funny and fun.  It was years later when I began to research the health effects of radiation exposure that I realized still borns were a result of radiation poisoning.

My mom never knew.  Instead she carried the guilt of not being able to carry a child full term and my fathers only son.  I wish I could tell them.  I wish I could tell them that 5 years after my dad was within a mile of a nuclear bomb being detonated their baby boy would be a casualty of radiation poisoning. The at least their disappointment would have a reason.

There is a silver lining to this story.....me!  I was born two years later, a big bouncing baby girl (8 pounds) with curly hair and a big belly laugh.  I've been perfectly healthy most of my life.  When I think about how different things could have been, I praise God for he has been very, very good to me.