I didn’t write as much as I planned to this month and it’s not because I forgot, it’s because part of me wants to scream from the rooftops about how important it is to create a united front for childhood cancer awareness, and the other part is aware that most people don’t care. Not in the sense that they don’t feel pity or sympathy, but unless it’s happened to you directly, you don’t have to feel the same way we do.
Trust me, I wouldn’t want you to, it’s hard going. Because it’s like your whole world has imploded, and you want to implode too, but you can’t. You have to put on a brave face. You have to tell your children they are going to be fine, even when you’re scared out of your fucking mind that they’re not going to be.
I never told Aurora she was going to die, I never told her there was no more treatment to save her. When she asked why we came home, I lied. I told her that we just wanted her to have her medicine here now because we knew she didn’t like being in hospital. I’d already promised her three times that she was going to grow up, and I broke those promises.
I told her about 2 of the 3 relapses, and each time I had to hold her why she cried asking why she couldn’t just be better already, and when I remember it, I cry too, because I was so sure she was going to be with me forever. I told her consultant I would walk her down the aisle one day and that she would be invited to the wedding, and now I’m plagued with the reality that it was all a dream. That my little girl was robbed of life.
But people will never get it. I pour my heart into my words and it still doesn’t come close to explaining that there’s a physical pain when it comes to remembering her, and that there’s been so many days when I’ve asked myself if I want to be here anymore. Because I try and be grateful for what I have, a loving partner, amazing children, a job I love, but it doesn’t make up for what I’ve lost. I lost the love of my life to a disease that most children will beat, and I now watch others who went through it growing up and laughing and smiling and I’m happy for them, but I’m jealous too, because I want that.
It’s really hard watching other people’s children growing up happy and healthy, knowing that my little girl should be there too. That she should be dressed up for secondary school, and we should be watching her flourish.
Sometimes it’s a like what the actual fuck did we do to deserve this, or did anyone do. To have to watch their child suffer shitty disease, followed by shitty treatment then either death or a lifetime of issues related to the treatment you had to agree to because if you didn’t death was the only alternative.
We cried when we found out Aurora would never have children. I begged them to take her ovary and freeze it so she had a chance when she was older, but even that wasn’t possible. And it’s the same for so many children, they will need check ups on their organs for the rest of their lives. There’s a high chance of infertility. There’s an increased chance of developing a secondary cancer from the initial cancer treatment. To be frank, it’s a fucking joke, and it doesn’t stop when they’re in remission, doesn’t stop because their hair has grown back. Because as a parent you worry for the rest of their life, and everything points back to cancer. Swelling, bruising, illness, loss of appetite, your immediate reaction is to get them tested.. it becomes your life forever.
You don’t just stop being a cancer patient because the cancer has gone, or because they have gone, because you share the pain of every other parent you meet. You want to give them the support you know you needed when you were in their shoes and you want the world to know that we move mountains to get our babies better, and crumble under the weight of them when we feel like we failed.
Growing Pains and Paper Planes 