Christian's Fight: Store up for yourselves treasures in heaven....God said

Soccer goal celebration !

I am sitting in Christian’s room and watching him sleep. The radiation and chemotherapy is demanding more and more from his little body. The drugs we so desperately seek to destroy his tumor are bringing him down and the implications of having a child with cancer are only a fever away. We are thankful to the means that are destroying his tumor but we are also at their mercy. The side effects are a small price to pay and we are thankful that the Children’s hospital is able to help us manage his symptoms. As we speak somebody else’s blood is running into his heart to be disbursed to the rest of his body. This will be his fifth blood transfusion and once again a stranger is to thank for saving our son’s life.

Thank you to my colleague and friend Nicole, who since Christian has become diagnosed with cancer, has signed up for the bone marrow registry and has recently received her three times blood donation sticker. It is the good in people and the good things that people do that make this journey easier to travel. I think back to the day not too long ago when the librarian from Chris’ school and her mother showed up on our doorstep with a gift for Christian. They wanted to know exactly what to pray for so they could visualize Christian getting better. It made Chris and I feel lifted up to know that people are continuing to think of Christian and praying for his healing. It has been a long haul so far – can you believe almost five months has passed? Ryan was just little baby when we started and today he crawled right out of Christian’s hospital room and into the hallway! Next week will officially be our half way point of treatment and we are cautiously looking for the light at the end of the tunnel. Chris and I are both wondering if life will return to the way it used to be….. is that even possible? I have been told by other parents on the unit that nothing will ever be the same. I like to think of this as a gift. That we have had the opportunity to look death in the eye and then realize the potential and opportunity that each day gives us. The opportunity to be thankful for every breath my children take, every smile, every giggle. It helps me to be thankful for the times when Evelyn wakes us up in the middle of the night with her legs straddling her crib and she is saying, “Yahoooo. Giddy up Giddy up!” It helps me to try and be calm and be still and look around and take a breath and say thank you. I know a lot of people who know me would find it hard to believe that I would sit still and relish in the day but I do try. I know I enjoy my children more, I try to get angry less, and I feel sympathy for those in need. I keep hearing the verse in my head from Matthew 6:20, “Store up for yourselves treasures in heaven,”. Not to be focused on material wealth but things that TRULY matter in the day. My family, my children, their happiness, the goodness of mankind.

Golfed a full 18 - what a great day

On a lighter note…..thank you to my pops who had us down for a visit to St.Albert this past weekend. It was sooooo relaxing and calm. Christian and Evelyn had a great weekend of swimming and watersliding, soccer in the back yard, every play park in the city of St. Albert, golfing with dad, and a small amount of children’s festival. We ate good food and drove around a bit and just hung out as a normal family might.