As Promised...A Mother's Story

A BOY’S FIGHT AGAINST CANCER AND HIS HEALING,
TOLD FROM A MOTHER’S PERSPECTIVE

On September 18, 2001 every parent’s most HORRIFYING fear became reality for our family. Our five year old son, Greg, was diagnosed with Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia, cancer of his blood. Our world was turned upside down. Our son was dying. To save him, the first of nearly 90 chemotherapy appointments, thousands of chemo pills and hundreds of blood tests, began the next morning. Without all of this they told us he would not make it to his 6th birthday, only 16 days away.

Suddenly, we were depending on complete strangers to keep our son alive and we didn’t know enough about the battle he was fighting to advocate for him. I felt overwhelming fear and an anger toward God, “How could You do this to my son?” But then it happened. I realized the problem…the word “my”. Greg, my son, is really God’s son. God has entrusted the body and soul of this little boy to me. I knew that if God would allow me to continue with the awesome privilege to be Greg’s mommy that I had a lot I needed to learn, both about Leukemia and about faith. But I also know that since Greg belonged to God, God could very well call His son home. That had to be OK with me, I had no choice. So I came to the conclusion….Greg belongs to God, his cancer does not. No matter the outcome Greg would be free of his cancer, either here on earth with us and in remission, or in heaven with His Creator, free from his little cancer-stricken body. And so the fight for life and faith began. The fight I am going to share with you is the one of faith. The fight for life and the pain that came with it and still exists in our hearts is an entirely different story, despite the fact that it is completely connected in God’s divine plan to the faith story as they took place simultaneously.

During our 2001 hospital stay, memories of events that had taken place in 1999 came back to me and suddenly began making sense. So if I may, I must back up now about two years, before I continue with 2001. After the birth of our second son (Tim) in April 1998, the Good Lord offered me, through my hard-working husband, the opportunity to be at home full time with our boys so I thought this to be a perfect time to start attending Holy Mass each day. I also found myself with a desire to learn more, much more, about this beautiful faith we call The One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. During my quest I read a book I highly recommend, The Apostolate of Holy Motherhood. Through this book and daily mass Christ inspired us to, among many other things, begin a daily family rosary. As we were growing in our faith I also joined a group of friends in book discussions and the support of a life of holy motherhood.

In 1999, one evening on the way home from this group meeting, as I drove I looked in the rearview mirror which reflected an image from the back window of my car. The image I saw was of Jesus as a child. I could tell His mother was holding Him but could not see her. This image appeared a few times. Never did He speak to me yet somehow He made it known to me that He was five years old. But what stood out to me even more was the fact that he had my son’s (Greg) face, who was at the time three years old. Then there appeared an image of the Blessed Mother. This also appeared a few times. Again, she did not speak to me but yet I knew she was comforting me; for what I did not know.

When I got home the experience kept me awake but I could not bring myself to wake my husband and share it with him. I found myself afraid and certainly not willing to share it with anyone for fear of being judged. I was downright stunned. I even wondered if I was “crazy.” Many months later I finally shared my story with my husband and my friend from whose house I was driving that night. The next month at our mom’s group a woman sitting across from me at the table held up a book, I Am Your Jesus Of Mercy, to suggest we read it next. Sitting directly across from me as she looked at the front of the book I saw the back, and on it was the image of the Blessed Mother that I had seen in the car months prior. That was the last experience for some time. But our growth in our faith continued rapidly. Unknown to me at the time, God was strengthening us for what was going to happen to our Greg two years down the road.

To be continued...