Holy Mackerel

Part of the challenge of having a child who has had cancer is the after effects. Of course, when you're in the midst of the major challenge of trying to save your child's life, the poisonous drugs the doctors pump into him are welcome. Anything to make that ugly beast go away. Life after cancer is not something most people really think about. Get rid of the cancer, that's the goal. Although we were warned numerous times about how the doctors weren't really sure what the effects of the chemo would be on Dee, we knew we had no choice but to use the drugs in an effort to kill the tumour. This, along with everything else done to Dee, was in an effort to save his life. The nature of Dee's cancer (Stage 3 Neuroblastoma) required heavy artillery. In addition to numerous surgeries, there was a medley of chemos injected into his tiny body on a regular basis. One of the numerous and varied chemo cocktails injected into Dee was Doxorubicin, a drug the colour of blood. Doxo is...

Dee's annual oncology appointment on Thursday went swimmingly. Another year cancer free! Not that Dee needs any reason to jump off the living room furniture and do cartwheels. The sun rising every morning is reason enough for him. By the way, please excuse the mess in the living room. I've been too busy picking my toes.

So, today's the day. "Dennis" is scheduled for his annual cancer check-up. We go this afternoon. I feel okay about it, really. Better than I did last week when I thought about it, after little Tuesday's passing. I still have some butterflies in my stomach, and I know I always will, everytime this time of year comes around. I won't show Dennis my fear, the tornado roiling around inside of me, as we enter what used to be our second home and is now just a place we come to every month or two, but would much rather not. Instead, I'll hold Dennis' hand as he gets his blood drawn, and as the doctor pokes and prods his belly and his glands and asks him lots of personal questions that a 10-year-old boy really would rather not answer. And I will try not to stare when I see little children on various beds, with their baby bird bald heads and big, scared eyes, and their parents sitting there, the look of abject fear on their faces. I will try to forget that that was ...

A rather uneventful weekend here, which is so very unusual, given that we are who we are. What I mean is, something is always happening around here, whether it be a car accident, someone getting a finger caught in the basement door, or having to throw the children into the dungeon for bad behaviour yet again. The reason for such uneventfulness this past weekend: the kids were sick. Our daughter, "Milly", came down with a nasty cold last week that seemed to eat the inside of her throat and nasal passages, creating raw patches that made her cry. So she's been home for most of the week lying on the couch with Kleenex stuffed up her nostrils and the remote in her hand, a creamsicle in the other. Pretty awful virus, I must say. Knocked her out for days, which is a bigger deal now that she's in Grade 8. Missing a couple of days is much harder to make up for than it was when she was in Grade 4. I felt for her as she lay there, comatose on the couch, which is so unlike her. ...

I thought of posting something amusing today because Saturday seems to be my favourite day of the week because I can stay in my pajamas all day long and drink coffee and Bailey's and ignore the world around me. But I came upon this, and I am so glad I did, and yet so very sad. Little Tuesday Whitt . Stage 4 Neuroblastoma. Such sadness this life brings us, and I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why. And it again reminds me of how extremely lucky we have been with our "Dennis", that this terrible beast has not taken him away from us. What would we do without him, and his smile, his laugh, his happiness, his joy, his "boyness". And I feel so guilty that we have been "chosen" to be one of the fortunate ones who gets to keep their child. I will forever be asking "why?", but I know the answer: no one knows. There is no rhyme or reason. It just is. And that is one of the hardest things to deal with day to day. I will forever think of little T...

I hesitated to talk about this, but I so want to and need to, so I will. It's just a very sad, very difficult topic, and we've all had enough sadness, I think. This story comes very close to home, however. Too close for comfort. And I think it's something we all need to be more aware of, regardless of its horror. I've decided I know way too many little children who have died. There is something so wrong with that. A little while ago, I talked about a little boy named Dante who had Stage 4 Neuroblastoma , the same type of cancer my son "Dennis" had as a baby. Little Dante passed away last Tuesday, Jan. 6, in the arms of his mom and dad. He suffered with this cancer for a year, which was half his very short life. He fought hard, going through more than most people go through in a lifetime. So many of these children do, and that's the horror of it. Neuroblastoma is a nasty cancer, not that there is such a thing as a "good" cancer. The problem with ...