Perspective…
So my husband has cancer…WOW! And when he told me, I had to process those words, probably still processing. But after he told me, family members had to be told. He made the calls to his family and endured questions with a sore throat, an emotional tight throat at that. I took the easy way and sent text messages to my family. Point blank told them what I knew and turned off my phone. By the time calls were made it was bed time and babies went to bed praying for their dad’s tonsils to get better. The next afternoon was D-Day. Trevor had been playing outside with Eli, he felt good and rested and it was time to tell them. If I ever have to endure that again, I’m going to drink gasoline first!Trevor explained the whole situation as we knew it. Neely puts her head down trying to wrap her head around exactly what is cancer. Eli knew exactly what it was. For a 10 year old he’s so wise. He ask questions that I never would have expected. “Will you be sick?”, “Will you lose your hair?”, “Were you born with this?”, “Will I get this?”, “Will we get to hunt?” Why? Why? Why? We told him everything we knew. That most people that have been diagnosed with this type of cancer have been cancer free 5 years out with no reoccurence. We don’t know if he’ll lose his hair…It’s not contagious…Depends on the medicine the doctors give depends on if he gets sick… I cried, Neely cried, Eli cried and if Trevor had started crying he wouldn’t have been able to stop because of his heart breaking and the excruciating pain in his throat where his tonsils had been. Eli decides we need to leave because he has to be alone…
”um dude, we’re all in the living room, you can go outside or upstairs to be alone”, “oh yeah”.
In the process of talking all of this through there have been a couple of families at our school, Trinity Christian Academy, that have been affected by cancer. 2 kids in Eli’s class have had parents that have been affected by cancer. Both are cancer survivors and Eli is tight with both. He could relate to his mop headed, LIVE WIRE friend because his mom was diagnosed with breast cancer when he was 6. His other friend’s, TENDER HEART, dad was diagnosed with cancer in his mouth and is now back to working and riding horses. We all sat and discussed talking about this “situation”. It isn’t going to not happen if we don’t talk about it. He started talking about LIVE WIRE and how he has endured his mom having a “mastectomy”. Kinda blew my mind what 10 year old boys discuss while playing football on the playground. I told him that if he needed to talk about it LIVE WIRE or TENDER HEART would know how exactly he feels. He could talk to me, his dad, Mr. Steve or Mrs. Debbie anyone of his teachers but talk about it. If you keep it bottled up you can’t think straight, your stomach hurts, you’ll have diarhea, be sad ALL the time…talk about it with someone.
I called and told Neely’s teacher what was going on. That she knew her dad had cancer but how much of it she understood we don’t know, but she knows he’s sick. She thinks he’s going to take a pill, his hair will fall out. He’ll take another pill and be all better…There ya go…Black and white for a 7 year old princess!
When Eli and I were talking before our prayers that night, he’s calm and is processing but “why?” Me, “why did you fall out of a deer stand and break your leg? Has it done any good to question that? If you missed anything in the last 10 months from the deer stand altercation?” Eli…”ummm, no…I do everything I did before except I’m faster” Eli….”why my dad?” me…”why did God choose Moses to lead the Israelites out of Egypt? Why was Daniel in the lions den?” Eli…because they were Godly men. Me…”Why did he choose to send His son to die on the cross? He isn’t asking your dad to die for the world’s sins?”
Eli and I discussed II Corinthians 12:9, how God’s grace is going to carry us through this. We only have to let go and let His strength be shown in all of this. The more we try to do, and be “okay”, the harder it’ll be on us mentally, physically and spiritually. Then he broke down John 3:15…”Then everyone who believes in him can live with God forever.” He began to explain to me that cancer or not that his dad was going to be living in God forever. That his dad may not die of cancer but he was still living in God…FOR-EVER!!!! Broken down by a 10 year old. That was one of those moments God was saying “Angi it is time for YOU to listen”, and I did…to what God had laid on my son’s heart. So much peace after that conversation with my son…I love it when I get an audible from God, I don’t have to figure out what he’s trying to get me to understand!
So my babies get in the car after school and we begin our 10 minute drive home when I have a captive audience and they have my full attention. Neely said she told her class that her dad had cancer on his tonsils and had to have them taken out, she couldn’t do it all so Mrs. Jones had to finish telling her class…Thanks Laura Jones for being her encourager! Eli said that LIVE WIRE came up to him before school and said he wanted to talk. LIVE WIRE said dude, cancer stinks and it really stinks when it’s your parents that have it. But you’ll get through this, if you need to talk or cry, I’m here for ya dude….Eli told him “I’m going to need you to pray for me and my dad”…Those of you that know LIVE WIRE can SOOOO hear this…”Dude, PRAY?!…DUDE, I GOTCHA COVERED, I’M SO PRAYIN FOR YOU!”
Eli said he told his class that he would like for them to pray for him and his dad. I asked how he did it and he said he had to keep reminding himself to “hold it together, hold it together” but he felt so much better now that his friends were praying for him. He said “mom you know when you have to go to the bathroom soooo bad and your stomach hurts cause you gotta go, then when you go you feel sooo much better? That’s how I feel, so much better cause now my friends know and they’re praying for me”! This is why we go to Christian school.
So tomorrow my man has his PET scan. This scan will tell exactly where the cancer is in his body. The last CAT scan with contrast showed it in his neck/jaw line area and his adenoid tissue. Our prayer is that the cancer is localized in this same place and no growth. Then we will meet with Dr. Kauffman the chemo oncologist. The results of the PET scan will be sent to Dr. Kovelic and he will have the results when we see him on Wednesday. We still have TONS of questions, questions from answers that we got from our first questions. I pray that my husband sustain his strenght during this time of chemo/radiation. That God be seen through all of us and that we are blessed beyond measure with a peace beyond all understanding.
I claim his promises in John 16:23, that when I ask my Father for anything in His Son’s name, Jesus, He will give it to me…
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