My family has been dealing with a stomach bug the past few days. This evening, as I wash the things that have been thrown up on, I am thankful. I know that sounds funny, but I am so thankful for all three of our sweet children. I am thankful for every second that I have them in my care, every moment that my husband and I get to cherish them and teach them the beauty of life. Now, I get to the hard part.
September is a hard month for me. It is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. As the mother of a Cancer Survivor, I want September to be a joyful month, when we celebrate that our son is a survivor, and trust me, we do celebrate that, but September is hard. You see, I always think about the families who don't have the same outcome. I think about the parents and siblings who see the empty chair, the empty room, the empty spot in the car. The families who had to bury their CHILD because of cancer. The doctors do everything they can do, the nurses, the families, they fight tooth and nail for their children. They all have their prayer warriors working overtime, praying for a miracle. The reason we still fight for awareness, the reason we still fund-raise, the reason we let our past hardships be known is because we don't want this harsh reality to happen to any more children, any more families. It hits really hard when anyone is lost to cancer, but it hits hardest for us when it is a child.
This year multiple friends of ours lost their children to cancer. Their beautiful, happy, energetic children who were so full of life, fought hard, they had people praying round the clock, they did EVERYTHING they were supposed to do, yet their children lost their lives to Cancer. Every day, they live with that reality, every day, they see that spot at the table, that gap in their family photo, that empty room in their house.
I share quite a bit of cancer information throughout the month of September, and all year really. I have to admit, sometimes I feel like I do awareness a disservice, I don't want to talk about how hard it was, how much our son Blake had to endure with his treatments. How we got attached to other families and watched their journey through cancer treatment and prayed for them too. How heartbroken we are when any child died/dies from this horrible disease. I think people don't want to hear that, I smile and say Blake is doing great, because, really he is. We are so thankful for that, we are so thankful for the prayers, the medical team, the friends and family who saw us through all of it. We just want to do more, we need to do more, for those who are still fighting, for those who lost their lives to cancer.
Blake had ALL in his B cells, He was diagnosed at 2 years and 4 months old, he had one of the most common types of childhood cancers and he was in the age range that responds best to treatment and has the highest cure rates. There are so many levels that we had the best case scenario (aside from the diagnosis of cancer). What Blake went through to treat his cancer was REALLY HARD, especially for a child. Other kids have even worse diagnosis and treatments, and way too many kids do not survive. While we celebrate Blake's life, his survival, we cannot even begin to express the profound loss we, as a community of cancer parents, healthcare providers, prayer warriors, etc. feels every time a child is diagnosed with cancer, or loses their life to cancer.
If you have questions please feel free to ask us any time, I will always do my best to answer with complete honesty.
