Getting Through It

It's funny how some of the simplist words can bring me to tears.

"If God brings you to it, He will bring you through it."

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Pulitzer Prize Winning Photo Series Features NB Patient

I have not looked at these photos, because I can't. I understand what happens to the children that die from this horrible disease - I've read much. If you think you can handle this perhaps it will prompt you even further to help us find a cure for neuroblastoma.

This was posted to ACOR by Jennifer Crowley, an NB mom who's son became an angel six months ago:

I am pasting a link below to a simply heartbreaking yet brutally real series of photos taken of Derek Maden and his mother Cyndie French during his 11-month battle against neuroblastoma. These photos won the photographer a Pulitzer Prize.
Having lost my son only 6 months ago and knowing that others on this list have also recently lost their children, while others are receiving palliative care, just a word of caution that these may be too much to look at (as I sit at my desk wiping my tears) right now - but they are amazing.
My heart goes out to Derek and his mom. I apologize if this has been posted previously, but I don't recall seeing... Part of me feels like... finally, some attention to how ravaging this disease is.

http://www.pulitzer.org/year/2007/feature-photography/works/index.html

Top 10 List Additions

From various parents after being inspired by Margo's List:

• You carry a tube of Emla (skin numbing lotion) in your purse instead a tube of lipstick.
• Kids with hair look kind of strange to you.
• You can sleep anywhere, and anything that reclines more than 15 degrees looks "comfy."
• You don't realize the sharps (syringe) container is on the kitchen table until halfway through dinner.
• You enjoy the drive at 3:00am to emergency because there aren't any other cars on the freeway.
• Your child's first word is a medical term.
• Your child's bedroom looks like a Toys R Us store.
• You have a syringe in your purse and you're not a diabetic .
• You start teaching your daughter the parts of her body, you point to her chest and she says that's her port.
• Your kid won't let YOU touch anything in a public restroom.
• You don't have to give your name at the local pharmacy counter, they just say hi and grab the meds.
• You keep completed copies of each department's intake forms in your purse to save time. Just date and sign.
• You know more about nurses holidays and vacations than your immediate family.

A Funny: Top Ten...

I stole this from Margo Hutchinson:

Top Ten Signs You’ve Been Fighting NB Too Long

10. Every time your child gets a fever you hope it spikes to 101 or higher.

9. You’ve ceased to register the shocked faces at preschool when you off-handedly say, “Oh we can’tmake it, we have chemo that day.”

8. You’ve started inviting the nurses over to dinner.

7. When you are at the ENT with your other child talking about removing his tonsils and the doctor says, “It’s surgery you know, it requires general anesthesia.” You involuntarily go “Pfff.”

6.When your child is diagnosed with pneumonia, you hope it’s the viral kind on the off chance pneumonia is an oncolytic virus that kills neuroblastoma cells.

5. You can spell "pneumonia" and "oncolytic virus"

4. You don’t even flinch at throw up at a birthday party and help clean it up even when it’s somebody else’s child.

3. You can sleep through a stem cell transplant (stole that from the Londons)

2. When your child says something hurts you hope he or she has broken a limb somehow.

1. You have a hard time drumming up sympathy for Elizabeth Edwards and get ticked at all the cheery articles on how great it is to live with cancer these days.