Blow to the Heart

There are moments in your life you never forget. Moments that pierce the heart forever leaving its imprint. Some are joyous, and others sorrowful. For me some of those moments are my first love, meeting my husband, graduating college, my wedding day, becoming a mother, losing my grandmother, my son's diagnosis, his first day of school, and then today - June 1, 2017...... the day we found out my 10 week old niece has leukemia and is given a 10% shot at survival.

BAM! Blow to the heart.......  Like a left hook you never saw coming.

You hear these stories. Stories of little ones battling this horrible disease and think "Thank God that's not us; not my child."  You can't fathom the thought of it "happening to you" or anyone in your family. I had that teenage euphoria when I heard those stories. The "it'll never happen to us" complex. But it did.  Like a knife, it pierces through your heart down into your soul.

You begin to question a lot -- why our family? why her? why are you doing this God? is my faith enough? will my faith falter? will I falter? can I be strong enough for them? where will I find the strength?

You want answers....will she beat it? are you sure? what's the next step? how long will it take?

You want to wake up because surely it's just been a horrid dream; a bad joke gone wrong; a royal mess up in the lab...... but you don't awake, no one screams "you've been punked" and the lab confirms its findings.

As I stood in the ER room and then the PICU room, listening the doctors give diagnosis and prognosis, watching my sister and brother in law's bodies sink with sadness, their eyes welling up with tears, I fought that urge to break down; to cry along with them. They needed a solid ground, a solid soul - a calming soul as my BIL called me.  6.5 hours later as I walked away from a sleeping baby - my sweet, angelic niece, I began to break. The blow to my heart was slowly breaking it in two.  I opened the door to my car and before it shut I lost it. The ugliest cries of them all I am sure.  As I drove home I'd have a moment of calm, then the blow would come rushing back and I'd lose it again. When I got home I went straight to my son's room and crawled into his bed, cradling him in my arms (his 9 year old body) and wept some more. After laying in my own bed the blow hit one more time..... knockout. It won.

June 1, 2017 forever marked in my heart.