Part 2 – The Hospital

I spent my morning at the hospital visiting some friends who’ve been stuck inpatient for weeks.  It had been way too long since I’d had a chance to get up there to actually see any of them, and we keep in contact through calls and emails, but nothing is better than being able to just give them that big hug.

I was absolutely thrilled to see Connor’s little face light up and give me a HUGE grin when I went in.  I don’t know if he’s just happy to see me or if it’s because he’s a notorious “groper” and he likes it when the ladies lean over him.  But it was tremendous to see him smiling and interacting and obviously much better than when I’d seen him last.  He was still in the ICU hooked up to a vent, too many questions to ask to even know where to begin.  Now he’s progressing in positive directions and he truly is a miracle boy to keep leaping over each hurdle.  There are many more big steps before Connor is out of the woods, his body is going to have to endure a lot and heal from a long list of illnesses and damages.

Spending time with Christy, Jimmy’s mom was harder because Jimmy is not doing so well.  Jimmy’s cancer has relapsed 3 times and the chemo protocols they have had him on are failing to put him in remission.  The new protocol they started yesterday is the last resort…the LAST option…and it’s awful.  We talked a long time about the side effects, we’re not talking nausea and bad counts, it’s a whole new level of heart, kidney, liver failure.  14 days of these chemotherapy drugs and they could destroy his body.  We’ve always said that chemo is a fine line between killing the cancer and killing the kid, but this protocol really takes it to the absolute limits of that description.  It’s so hard to be with a friend and know there’s nothing more that you can do than offer a shoulder and listen and love. Because there’s nothing anyone can do.  But all hope is that after 14 days, Jimmy’s body will have withstood the drugs and the cancer will be gone so he can move into bone marrow transplant, that his body will still be able to endure bone marrow transplant.

Walking in to see Brooke was a little heartbreaking because she is such a bubbly little girl, a big smile and a funny laugh.  There are no signs of that smile or laugh right now. She has the saddest little face and she is so unhappy.  This is a miserable disease that takes so much joy out of these kids’ lives and it’s unfair and I hate it. She’s jaundiced from her liver taking a beating, she’s unable to have anything to eat/drink for 7 days because her colon is swollen, she’s been vomiting blood for an undetermined reason and she’s got fevers that can’t be diagnosed.  There was phenomenal news, her bone marrow results came back that she’s in remission!

To say these kids need our prayers goes without saying. Please pray for their strength, comfort and healing.  We have a mighty God with strength to heal these kids, but we need the faith to trust in His plans when they don’t match our own hopes and wishes.  I work and work to achieve that peace with God’s choices, but I never pretend to be anything less than confused with it a lot of the time.  I guess that’s where the faith comes in, I don’t have to understand it 100%, I don’t have to get it, but I do believe it.