Book Review - A Heart That Works by Rob Delaney
We’ve all experienced grief in our lives, but it’s hard to imagine anything worse than the death of a child. And it is this particular grief that the actor Rob Delaney talks about in this heartrending book.
The Delaney family had recently arrived from LA when in 2016, his one-year-old infant Henry is diagnosed with a brain tumour. What follows is an unflinching account of his surgeries, the ups and downs, the treatments, and the people who come into their lives during this time.
During this time Delaney is acting and co-writing the TV comedy ‘Catastrophe’ so we know he’s a skilled comedy writer. And there is plenty of dark humour in this book, and it is much needed.
Henry
Henry dies two years later, and in ‘A heart that works’ Delaney talks about the grief, what he has learnt during this time and how it has transformed him. It’s about a pure limitless love and a bottomless grief and raw anger that is hard for me to fathom but Delaney brings it out into the open.
"I dream about Henry often. I dream he’s alive, and in those dreams, it’s not as though he was never sick. He’s the Henry that might have survived, some possible future where he still needed help with a few things. So in my dreams, I’m still caring for him. We do things together; I even take him with me to work. In some dreams, he’s recovered, and sometimes his cranial nerves have been repaired somehow, and it all works out. He runs into his mother’s arms. He plays with his brothers or even fights with them, and I love it all.”
Love
What comes across, repeatedly, is the love that Delaney has for Henry. The attention and care given to Henry by Rob and his family are apparent throughout. His life is a short one but the author brings across the wee man’s personality and the things he loved.
“One thing that fucked me up badly was losing the callouses that built up on my fingers from operating his suction machine… After Henry died, those callouses began to fade away. I hated that. I hated it so much. Please let me have my little hard bumps on my fingers that I can rub and think of him. They reminded me of helping him breathe, which it was my privilege to do. I could touch them and know they were there because of him. They told me that I loved him, and he needed me and that he was real.”
Throughout the book, Delaney details the full range of emotions. There’s fear of course, especially at the beginning. A raging righteous anger and despair. A huge amount of love; sadness and grief. I’ve read other books about loss, and I think it can be hard not to resort to cliche, but I feel that Delaney never does that.
Care
I also liked how his relationship with his wife deepened during this time, and how he used art, particularly music, to get through this time. I know for me personally that music helps me to process my feelings during times of intense sadness so this something I could really relate to.
The descriptions of the care Henry receives from Rob, from his family and relatives, are deeply moving. Cleaning Henry’s tracheostomy is described in such detail - it’s such an act of love.
Grief
Rob Delaney is brutally honest throughout, and it’s one of the best books about grief and loss I’ve ever read. It's an incredibly heartfelt memoir and a tender portrait of a beautiful boy who was loved so very, very much.
"I find myself in a state of disbelief again. My son died? He got sick and they couldn’t cure him and he died? And now he’s dead? He was cremated and we had a memorial for him? I talk myself through it so I can almost believe it. I talk to him—out loud—and tell him I miss him and I wish I could still care for him."
It may seem strange to say but I also found this book life affirming. After all, ‘A heart that hurts is a heart that works’.
135 pages Published November 29, 2022 by Spiegel & Grau
Book Review - A heart that breaks by Rob Delaney