This pregnancy has been more difficult than when I was carrying Mandi or Sam. I was bleeding again on Thursday, so the doctor wanted me in on Friday for an ultrasound to make sure that the baby was still doing okay.
In this picture you can see Wee One’s spine. It’s head is on the left and off to the right you can see the little legs tucked under.
Seeing the baby provided Mike and I with reassurance that it was okay. I would have loved to have seen a doctor as I would be even further assured if I could have been given even a possible cause of the bleeding.
Last night after Sam was put to bed Mike, Mandi and I watched “My Sister’s Keeper.” We ran out of Kleenex before it was over.
Sam didn’t go to sleep after she was put to bed. She kept opening her door and saying “I love you Mom” “ I love you Sister” “I love you Dad” and would wait for a response from each of us before moving to the next person. Then she’d start with “Goodnight Mom” and work her way through each of us again before closing her door and going back to bed for a little while before starting all over again.
Overall it was a very well done movie. I felt they did a good job portraying how family dynamics can change when a child has cancer and they did touch on some of the reality and pain of treatment. I guess if they showed it more real no one would want to see the movie because they’d get tired of seeing this poor girl get sick.
The actors were wonderful. I love that the girl who played Kate (the patient) actually shaved her head and her eyebrows. This made it a lot easier to get sucked into the movie as it just made it more real.
If you plan to, but have not yet seen the movie you may want to stop reading as I will be discussing the ending.
Mandi has been wanting to see the movie since it came out, yet I know for her it was exceptionally difficult to watch as she could really relate to both Kate, and Anna (the sister). In one scene Kate looks in her scrapbook and opens it to Anna’s page where she had written “I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you.” I know Mandi felt the same way when Sam was going though treatment.
In the last three minutes of the movie Sam opened her door again and asked if she could come down. Mike and I figured it would be safe and they hadn’t shown Kate bleeding or getting violently ill recently and we knew the movie would soon come to an end.
Sam curled up on Mandi’s lap. On the screen was the image of Kate curling up with her mother in the hospital bed and her little sister narrating that Kate fell asleep and died quietly that night. The next scene was at her memorial service.
It was impossible not to cry, both for the characters we had connected to in the movie and more importantly for the memory of so many of the friends we made during Sam’s treatment.
It never ceases to amaze me how observant and curious our little Sam is. She asked “Why did she die?” “I was sick and I didn’t die.” “Why didn’t the medicine help her?” “If she went to heaven why were her mommy and daddy sad?” “Why did she die?”
Isn’t it amazing that three minutes of the movie could cause so much curiosity from little Sam. This wasn’t from what she saw, but what she heard through the Anna’s narration. It also amazes me that Sam could make the connection from when she was sick with the brief scene of Kate in a hospital bed.
It stinks and it’s unfair that children ever have to suffer from cancer and its treatments. It’s nice to go day to day imagining that Sam never had AML, but the fact remains that she did. We pray that she stays in remission for the rest of her life and has no complications from treatment. Every day a little of that pain from when Sam was going through treatment is felt. Every day a little of the fear of relapse is felt. Although I would love to live without those feelings of helplessness, hurt, and fear it doesn’t take much for any or all of them to crop up.
One day last week Sam didn’t want to eat breakfast. Had it been Mandi at the same age I would’ve just thought “Huh, I guess she’s just not feeling well, or maybe she’s just not hungry.” Because it was Sam my first thought was “Oh s___! She stopped eating prior to diagnosis…is she relapsing?” With Samantha every little thing requires an assessment on my part to have peace of mind that she is not relapsing. I can’t help but wonder if it will ever stop.









