This is true fatherhood: My dad’s final act defined love and manhood

Almost 17 years ago, the Washington Post reported that a father had drowned while saving his son’s life. That man’s name was Tom Vander Woude. He was my dad.

Every Father’s Day, I reflect on what I learned from his life and death.

‘It is usually pretty easy to know what is right or wrong. We are usually the ones who make it more difficult.’

In many ways, he was an ordinary man. He was born on a farm and died on a farm. He loved watermelon and ice cream. At age 22, he married his high school sweetheart, and they raised seven sons together. I am the fifth. He flew for the Navy, coached basketball, and prayed every day. Dad selflessly served God, family, and country.

My youngest brother, Joseph, was born with Down syndrome. From the moment he entered the world, Joseph and Dad were inseparable. When Joseph was a toddler, the doctors told my parents that crawling, though difficult for him, would help Joseph’s physical and mental development. Dad made makeshift elbow pads for them both and got down on his hands and knees to spend hours with Joseph crawling around the house. As Joseph got older, he went everywhere with Dad — sitting on the bench while Dad coached, attending daily Mass, riding in the truck while listening to country music, and working on the family farm.

Then one fateful day in 2008, my dad taught me something I will never forget: True fatherhood requires sacrificial love.

That day, while working on our house, Dad noticed something wrong: The top of our septic tank had collapsed, and Joseph, who was 22 years old, was nowhere to be found. Dad rushed to the tank and found Joseph struggling to keep his head above the pool of sewage. Wasting no time, Dad dove into the muck and managed to get beneath Joseph.

But realizing he couldn’t save Joseph on his own, Dad told a nearby worker, “You pull and I’ll push,” took his last breath, and descended beneath my brother to lift him above the deadly fumes.

Shortly afterward, my mom watched helplessly as the first responders treated my brother and retrieved the lifeless body of my father, the love of her life. Remarkably, Joseph survived, and he assists my mother to this day in her golden years.

On that tragic day, I lost my role model and dad, but I learned a profound lesson about sacrifice. Habitual small acts of service prepare you for acts of heroism.

Dad often said, “It is usually pretty easy to know what is right or wrong. We are usually the ones who make it more difficult.”

For Dad, doing the right thing meant performing quiet acts of service and sacrifice for others. To save money for our college tuition, he would only buy older cars. When furloughed from the airlines, he worked as a laborer at a horse farm to pay the bills. When a family of 12 moved to the area, my dad offered for them to stay in our already-full farmhouse while they looked for a house; then he co-signed their mortgage. When the local Catholic parish was founded, my parents volunteered as sacristans and altar server coordinators.

Because of my dad’s courageous example of service and sacrifice, the local Catholic diocese is considering opening his cause for canonization.

The Catholic Church, through a lengthy and detailed process, can solemnly declare that individuals who lived a heroically virtuous life are saints with God in heaven. In 2017, Pope Francis added a new path to sainthood for those who lay down their lives out of love for others. If my dad’s life and death fit these criteria, his story may inspire fathers, husbands, and all people for years to come.

Dad’s untimely death was tragic. To this day, I miss his smile and guidance. I am grateful for the profound impact he had on me in his short life, not only as a man but as a father and a husband. His joy, his determination, his dedication to his family, his quiet strength, and his deep faith are just a few things that motivate me to be the best version of myself.

Every day, and especially on Father’s Day, I hope and pray that I can be like my dad.