I HOPE...

I hope you never have to hear the words, "Your child has cancer."

I hope you never have to hear, "The prognosis is not good."

I hope you never have to prepare your child to undergo radiation or chemotherapy, have a port surgically inserted into their chest, be connected to IV poles.

Look at you with fear in their eyes and say, "Don't worry Mommy, everything will be okay.'

I hope you never have to hold your child as they vomit green bile.

I hope you never have to feed them ice chips for lunch.

I hope you never have to watch the "cure" you pray for slowly take away their identity, as they

lose their hair,

become skeletal,

swell up from steroids,

develop severe acne,

become barely or unable to walk or move,

and look at you with hope in their eyes and say,

"It's going to be okay, Mommy."

I hope that you never have to stay in the hospital for weeks, months, or years at a time, where there is no privacy, sleeping on a slab, with your face to the wall, where you cry in muffled silence.

I hope you never have to see a mother, alone, huddled, in a dark hospital corridor...crying quietly, after just being told, "There is nothing more we can do."

I hope you never have to watch a family wander aimlessly, minutes after their child's body has been removed.

I hope you never have to use every bit of energy you have left, with all of this going on around you to remain positive, and the feelings of guilt, sorrow, hope and fear, overwhelm you.

I hope you never have to see your child's head bolted to the table as they receive radiation.

I hope you never have to take your child home (grateful but so afraid) in a wheelchair because the chemo and radiation has damaged their muscles, 35 pounds lighter, pale, bald, and scarred.

And they look at you with faith in their eyes and say, "It's going to be okay Mommy."

I hope you never have to face the few friends that have stuck beside you and hear them say, "Thank God that is over with,"...because you know it never will be.

Your life becomes a whirl of doctors, blood tests and MRI's and you try to get your life back to "normal".

While living in mind-numbing fear that any one of those tests could result in hearing the dreaded words...

"The cancer has returned" or "The tumor is growing."

And your friends become even fewer.

I hope you never have to experience any of these things...Because...only then...

Will you understand...

(author unknown)