Today, we are privileged to hear from Peter Schaeffer, a true gold standard human, an Olympic-level resilient survivor, and a ray of sunshine whose writing radiates insight and clarity. Despite MS taking away his physical mobility, Peter's indomitable spirit soars and stretches us to new heights. We are grateful for his contributions and eagerly anticipate his future insights as his story unfolds. His unbreakable will, humor, and positive outlook on life will undoubtedly leave us feeling inspired and remembering to savor every precious moment.
Childhood – Innocence Lost
On August 6, 1954 my father woke up on his 38th birthday in an iron lung with a very severe case of polio. I was a month shy of my seventh birthday and just one month later I joined millions of American children as a “Polio Pioneer” in the test program for the Salk vaccine which was approved the following year. Timing is everything.
Mom was at his side constantly, leaving my 12-year-old sister, five-year-old brother and me with a rotating procession of relatives and friends to look after us during the day at our house in rural Westchester, NY.
By early March, Dad’s ability to breathe on his own had progressed to the point that he graduated to a “Rocking Bed” at Mount Sinai Hospital in NYC. One day, Howard Rusk (the father of Rehabilitative Medicine) came walking through the ward and stopped at Dad’s bedside, no doubt attracted by his 36-year-old redheaded wife (the cover model on Mademoiselle magazine in 1940). He told my father that he wanted to move him to the Rusk Rehabilitation Institute at New York University Hospital, and that, while it would take a lot of time and hard work, he was going to get him back on his feet!
At this point, Dad was a complete quadriplegic. Undaunted, Mom hatched a plan with Dr. Rusk whereby Dad would go down to Florida and spend a couple of weeks with his mother and father in Clearwater before returning to NYC to begin rehab. To help her in this project, rather than selecting my 12-year-old sister, she selected me. We wrestled him into a taxi, took off for Pennsylvania Station and somehow got ourselves settled into a Pullman compartment on the train. (Talk about exciting! Seven years old and getting to go on an overnight train and sleep in an upper birth! Eat meals in the dining car all by myself! White tablecloth and finger bowls and the whole 9 yards!) When we got to Florida, we got Dad into the car and drove to the beach every single day. Unbelievably, we maneuvered him onto a reclining beach chair. All day long I kept running down to the Gulf of Mexico to fill up a couple of plastic buckets with sea water and bring them back to pour all over Dad to keep him cool in the hot Florida sun.
Those two weeks in the Florida sun worked wonders on Dad. He was finally out of a hospital environment, eating good home-cooked meals and getting his color back. He was ready for the incredible challenge of rehab.
The trip to Florida was definitely life changing for me. I learned how to do lots of things on my own (like going to the dining car, picking a meal off the menu, eating and then paying for it.) Mom gave me tons of responsibility in helping to take care of Dad and all his equipment. All of a sudden, seven-year-old Peter was being asked to be an adult. My life was never the same again.
For the next 18 months, Dad was in rehab with my mother visiting almost daily. We lived in a rented house down a half-mile road at the backend of an estate in very rural Purchase, NY. It was very isolated. I started watching the Brooklyn Dodgers games on WOR-TV on our old Dumont television set. They won their first World Series in 1955 beating the Yankees in seven games, before losing to that same team in seven games (including the Don Larson perfect game) the following year. Boy, was I hooked! I was going to be a Dodgers fan and a Yankee hater for life!
Dad finally came home in the summer of 1956, with a full body brace under his clothes that started hooked onto his right shoe, continued up that leg locking at both the knee and hip and finally wrapping around his entire torso with gizmos at the top to help keep him upright. He used a full crutch on his left side with a forearm crutch on the right. He was unable to stand up or sit down without Mom’s assistance, nor could he drive a car. But he could walk, he could feed himself, he could go back to work and rejoin the world!
Life in our family was never quite the same again. I had neither a mother nor a father, but rather this weird hybrid model where the two of them were joined at the breastbone. They were completely inseparable. Mom was his only caregiver. She did absolutely everything for him, including driving him to work in New York City, being his assistant during the daytime, before driving back to Westchester at the end of the workday where she would put on her housewife hat and make dinner for all of us. Superwoman indeed, except that where Dad benefited from all the attention, the kids definitely suffered.
I was unaware that the owners of both the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants wanted new ballparks in NYC. I was oblivious to the fact that the political winds were blowing hard against them. I did not know that the both franchises were being wooed to move to the West Coast. In December 1957 Walter O’Malley relocated the Dodgers to Los Angeles at the same time Horace Stoneham moved the Giants to San Francisco. While it may not have been a shock to newspaper reading NY baseball fans, it certainly was to me. My 10-year-old heart was broken – my first lover had jilted me.
Suddenly, the Yankees, the team I had “grown up” hating, was the only team in New York. In the spring of 1958, my maternal grandfather, William Langer of North Dakota, was finishing his third term in the United States Senate. Somewhere along life’s line, he had befriended Dan Topping, co-owner of the New York Yankees. Knowing of my love for baseball, he had his pass to Yankee Stadium transferred to my name. It allowed the bearer of the pass to enter Yankee Stadium with three companions, eat at the exclusive Diamond Club and sit in any unreserved seats in the Stadium.
I was always given all the rope I could prove I could handle. In June, 10-year-old Peter started taking his classmate and best friend Steve along with our respective eight-year-old brothers all by ourselves to baseball games at Yankee Stadium. This involved taking the train from Westchester to the 125th St. stop, walking a few blocks and taking the subway up to Yankee Stadium. We would have lunch in the Diamond Club before sitting in the upper deck directly behind home plate. When the game was over, it was subway, walk and take the train back to Westchester. I was all of 10 years old and I was given the responsibility for three other kids all by myself.
Childhood? My innocence was gone before I was seven. Dad’s illness and recovery gave me my perspective on life. How life itself was like skating on the edge of a razor blade. Where it could be taken away in a heartbeat. How important it was to savor the precious moment and always take time to enjoy the “present.”
— Peter L Schaeffer
Oh God Peter!!❤️❤️
How truly amazing! Knowing this other side of your life at present! What an inspiration you are for all of us! Celinas
Thanks for sharing that story and the lessons you learned as a young boy. So well written.