American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U. S. Military History

G
ETTING
 B
ETTER
T
he doctors performed all sorts of tests on my little girl. Some of
them really pissed me off.
I remember especially when they took blood, which they had to
do a lot. They’d hold her upside down and prick her foot; a lot of
times it wouldn’t bleed and they’d have to do it again and again.
She’d be crying the whole time.
These were long days, but eventually the docs figured out that
my daughter didn’t have leukemia. While there was jaundice and
some other complications, they were able to get control of the

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infections that had made her sick. She got better.
One of the things that was incredibly frustrating was her reaction
to me. She seemed to cry every time I held her. She wanted
Mommy. Taya said that she reacted that way to all men—whenever
she heard a male voice, she would cry.
Whatever the reason, it hurt me badly. Here I had come all this
way and truly loved her, and she rejected me.
Things were better with my son, who remembered me and now
was older and more ready to play. But once again, the normal
troubles that parents have with their kids and with each other were
compounded by the separation and stress we’d all just gone
through.
Little things could really be annoying. I expected my son to look
me in the eye when I was scolding him. Taya was bothered by this,
because she felt he wasn’t accustomed to me or my tone and it was
too much to ask a two-year-old to look me in the eye in that
situation. But my feeling was just the opposite. It was the right thing
for him to do. He wasn’t being corrected by a stranger. He was
being disciplined by someone who loved him. There’s a certain
two-way road of respect there. You look me in the eye, I look you
in the eye—we understand each other.
Taya would say, “Wait a minute. You’ve been gone for how
long? And now you want to come home and be part of this family
and make the rules? No sir, because you’re leaving again in another
month to go back on training.”

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We were both right, from our perspectives. The problem was
trying to see the other’s, and then live with it.
I
wasn’t perfect. I was wrong on a few things. I had to learn how to
be a dad. I had my idea of how parenting should be, but it wasn’t
based on any reality. Over time, my ideas changed.
Somewhat. I still expect my kids to look me in the eye when I’m
talking to them. And vice versa. And Taya agrees.