Cindy Jo's Story, November 2, 2018

Now for the odd twist.  My brother, John, is 15 years older than me.  This wasn't intentional on my parent's part.  They had tried to have another baby through those 15 years but it didn't happen.  I don't know what year the 50 bed San Bernardino Community Hospital was built, but it didn't have all the leaded walls, etc. for protection from radiation.  Not long after they built the new 350 bed hospital, my mom started feeling sick.  My mom had fibroid tumors and was scheduled for a hysterectomy.  They did the "rabbit test" (which was done at the time) twice to test her for pregnancy.  The tests showed negative.  About a week before surgery she insisted that they test again.  Sure enough, she was right.  She was pregnant at 39 years old!  If she hadn't insisted on them testing her again, I wouldn't be here today.  And regarding my dad, they thought that maybe the radiation had been sterilizing him all those years.  They weren't sure if I would be a healthy baby because of all his exposure to radiation.  They didn't know what to expect.  Because I was sharing quarters with the tumors in her uterus, my mom was bed ridden during her pregnancy.  My dad wasn't real thrilled because my brother was almost college age and he didn't really want to start over with raising another child.  But there they were.  Next week, the beginning of my life.