23/06/2023
CancerDad Blog:
My good friend, John Halter, once said, when asked what's one of the hardest things about being a parent and watching your child battle cancer, is realizing that you aren't in control and that it's one big test in what you thought you knew or believed to be true, and that statement has so much truth in it. I've realized just how much truth is in it over the last year and a half or so, as I have reflected back over our son's journey. There has been so many things that have changed for me personally, mentally, physically, and even spiritually since the beginning of the journey. I really don't know if I realized the changes were happening but looking back now, I can almost pinpoint the moment they did. My perspective has changed on so many things, and there are things that I onced believed in whole heartedly, that are now a struggle to continue believing, or for some, I no longer believe in at all. This what a journey like what we watched our son go through will do to you. They say a person is not the same person once they go through a storm as they were before the storm, and I have no doubt that is true for me. Now some will say that the changes are most likely because of the outcome, with losing our son, and there's probably some truth in that, but I also know that the changes in me, started way before March 28, 2022. We live in a world where so many push the idea that everything is black and white, and for the most part, the black and white of it all has stayed the same for me, but it's that grey area of it all, that I see the most change. When you come out of a storm like my family has endured, you do and see things so differently, and even though you wish you didn't see or do some of those things differently, when the storm is over, it really leaves you no choice. Principles, beliefs, values, or everything that you can think of that makes up who you are, or how you live, changes in so many ways. The storm is so intense, that you honestly lose yourself or lose your way, over and over, and when the storm passes, or lightens up a little, you are left trying to put all the pieces back together, the best you can, all the while, knowing the puzzle will never look the same again. Honestly with us, there's no way it will because we will forever be missing a piece that completes it, because nothing this life has to offer, will ever be able to fit where that piece should be. You find yourself, everyday, trying to make the most out the puzzle that you have left, but are constantly reminded of what's missing, when you step back and look at the puzzle as a whole, and see the piece missing every single time. On top of that, several of those pieces that are there, are torn, or just don't look the same. I am going to be doing a series of episodes over the next few weeks, where I go into detail about several of my internal battles as a father, a husband, and just a human being in general. Battles that were just a few drops of the rain from this storm that my family has had to endure.
