Well, as I have written in many blog enteries before, my 6 year old son experienced, in my humble opinion, a miracle of healing last year in his fight against cancer. Since April 2011, I have been in complete awe of events that have unfolded and "signs" I have experienced which I have perceived as assistance to lead me through my sons ordeal.
It was week 51 of a 52 week treatment schedule this past week. We were excited and waiting to re-enter life as a healthy family with a boy who literally TROUNCED one of the worst childhood cancers known to man (rhabdomyosarcoma) when last week he started waking each day with migranes and vomiting. By the second day of headaches the doctors wanted to give him a CT scan of the brain to see what was going on. Sure enough...since April 2012 (his most recent set of cancer free scans) it had returned to coat his brain. Tuesday we were told it is inoperable & incurable. We are at the stage of just making him comfortable until his passing.
So many emotions, so much pain and grief, the agony is beyond words. I wish it on no man.
So where is God in all of this? Does this mean that all of those miraculous "signs" were mere figments of my imagination? Am I truly just a warped, zealot, Jesus freak who saw signs as a coping mechanism? As I look back at all of the AMAZING events that have taken place over the course of the past 14 months I can honestly say NO! My son not only beat stage 4 cancer (with bone marrow 100% diseased, ONE HUNDRED PERCENT! And tumors on his bones etc.) but he did it with virtually no side effects. He was taking NINE different chemo drugs and had to endure 40 radiation treatments in six differnet areas of his body...he woke everyday with a smile & his job to do & he did it without question and making us laugh all along the way. He never got sick to his stomach (until just last week.) He did it all with what I would consider MINIMAL issues compared to what I have witness other families having to endure. He did experience fevers when his blood counts dropped too low but in my opinion, these were more annoyances than anything of concern or worry. It would have not been humanly possible for him to endure the drugs he was taking without SOME type of reaction & the low grade fever was his Achilles heel. They were all in awe over him & how quickly & seemingly EASILY he rid his body of this horrendous disease.
My confidence (as you all witnessed) was so high that this kid was being asked to share his story of faith & struggle with the world. I was praying that he may one day consider the priesthood possibly BECAUSE of these events.
But then this. This CRUSHING and DEVASTATING news on the very last week of TREATMENT. This was a cruel & sick joke for sure.
My mind has gone to Abraham & Job so many times throughout this experience and this week in particular becasue in my heart of hearts I know this is no other work than that of Satan. God does not create sickness...God creates only that which is good. Sickness and death was born out of sin, it is polar OPPOSITE of God.
In Job we recall that Satan kind of tried to trump God, right? If we recall...he said something like "Give me one of your most faithful and I will show you how quickly they will abandon You" so God agreed & gave him Job the righteous man who lived a charmed life with wealth and a large family and who always praised the Lord. Satan killed all of his children, diseased his body, made him lose his wealth and was tossed to the outskirts of town due to his disease and was abandon. All the while his "best Friends" tried to get him to lose his faith in the Lord by blaming God for all of his woes. Time after time he continued to defend his faith. Finally God relieved him of his pain and anguish and restored Job to his respectable life, he had more children and he gained his wealth back and lived for the rest of his days favored by God.
I have heard it now many times "This sort of thing should never have to happen to a child!" and to see my son even twinge in any pain wrenches my heart in two. I do not understand why the Church has moved away from speaking about the evils of Satan on a regular basis, I know how scary it is but being witness to his work, so up close and personal and SEEING how he attempting to ruin my family by ruining our faith in the Lord by ravaging what is so dear to us on this earth is what is needed to be shared so we know how to weather these storms.
God gave my family all of last year with a sick boy who never really acted sick. We got to intimately enjoy him in a way we would have never otherwise. It is why my husband was out of work so he could spend that time too. We grew as a family that the otherwise busy, family life would have never allowed us to do. I was taking all of our good blessings and Divine "signs" to mean we were gifted with the miracle of HEALING so we could go on to share God's witness as a family but now I see, all of those gifts He bestowed on us was 14 months of a gifted and happy boy that we got share before he was going to need to leave us.
We are prepared for the worst but would take a healing miracle if God grants us one. I beg all of you to pray the rosary for my son and family. Lets give Satan something really to boil about...we know he HATES our devotion to Mary hence we see him at work through the so very many who hate Catholics because of this admiration and love we have for her.
Over this past week I thought about how it is a Mother's main job to work as hard as she can to make sure her children reach Heaven. Well, given my son's age and just what a remarkable, holy soul he is he will go straight to Heaven without ANY assistance from me, so my heart can rest easy in knowing that one of my children will have already made it there to Mother Mary arms.
Good people, I have written to you all about death before. We are blessed to be Catholic! It is not an end for my boy...it is a beginning. My husband, daughter & I just have to figure out how to manage our next handful of decades until we see him again. It is now my main focus to do EVERYTHING I can to make sure my soul is worthy enough to enter the gates of Heaven to be beside my boy again FOREVER. My boy will assist us through it, as he has assisted us through his illness from the beginning. My husband is having a very difficult time accepting that this world will have missed our boys potential...but I argue, in Heaven he will so far surpass any earthly potential God gifted him that we cannot even fathom it.
Pray for us dear people. Pray for all who are in Purgatory. And pray for the poor souls who do not believe in God and their conversions. Rejoice in the fact that we are Catholic because our bodies are mere vessels for short periods of time before we have a chance to be in God's presence.
Get right with God good people. Go to Confession, cleanse your souls be ready.
God love you.
Saturday, July 7, 2012
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
AMAZING Story
My dear friend Tricia sent me this story because of how it reminded her of my son's story of healing. When my son was first diagnosed I felt an overwhelming urge to ask ANYONE and EVERYONE I met on the street to say the rosary for my son and if they would say it as often as possible. I got word that a small Catholic school in CT started saying it daily for the month of June in 2011. My own children's school here in NJ also took to saying it daily for him. I was contacted by so many people telling me their stories of how by saying the rosary for my son it changed their lives. Whole families took to saying it together...I was told that Masses were being said for him all over the US and prayer groups that reached all over the world were praying for my son...people who had left the Church returned to it because of my son's story. Wanna talk about a gift that keeps on giving? This is why we are called to evangelize! My heart rejoices to know that by me asking for help for my son, not only assisted in saving my son's life BUT helped bring people closer to God. ENJOY this remarkable story and what a great story to come across the week the Gospel was of when Jesus brought the 12 year old to life AND right when Archbishop Sheen was venerated!
Thank you Ignitum Today for sharing this story http://www.ignitumtoday.com/2011/09/16/61-minutes/
Thank you Ignitum Today for sharing this story http://www.ignitumtoday.com/2011/09/16/61-minutes/
Monday, July 2, 2012
Just Found This
From the Intergrated Catholic, advising us on what we should do this politcal season
http://www.integratedcatholiclife.org/2012/07/deacon-bickerstaff-six-important-things-catholics-must-do-this-political-season/
http://www.integratedcatholiclife.org/2012/07/deacon-bickerstaff-six-important-things-catholics-must-do-this-political-season/
FEAR
So at mass this week we heard the great Gospel of when the ill woman touched
Christ's cloak and was healed and then Jesus went on to bring a 12 year old girl back
to life.
As I stood listening to this PHENOMINAL story, my eyes watered up & I found myself holding back from crying. At that moment I really couldn’t explain WHY this was happening but it soon made sense. This Gospel was just more proof for me that our awesome God will intervene personally for us and all we need is faith.
My life has been so gifted by God giving me my son, his grave illness and miraculous recovery. To witness such events first hand has been quite overwhelming. I try hard to share these things because I know these gifts were not meant for just me. God wants me to write them down. He wants me to help others find this amazing place of peace, calm, stability and happiness. So, I think a lot about how best to express myself. The complexity is so far more than just explaining remarkable events as they unfold because I feel I can do that fairly easily…it is what occurs as a RESULT of being witness to such things that are life altering and I keep trying to put into words all that transpires so I might be able to help others to this wonderful place.
So during my parish priest’s homily yesterday he focused of the fact that we humans have a lot of fears. The most common of which is the fear of death. And I liked what he said about it, he said ‘God did not create fear…if we refer back to the creation story…all God made was good. Satan created fear to prey on the weakness of humans’ and I couldn’t agree with him more. We are so lucky to be Catholic but I think many of us FORGET what we are suppose to believe and have FAITH in. We believe that our physical death is merely a process that needs to take place so we can move onto our next and greater chapter. Why are we so fearful of it? We are fearful because Satan tells us to be so. He does this by making the unknown seem scary…our mind equates the unknown to darkness, loneliness, danger…remember the ONLY reason there even IS physical death is because of the sin of humans to begin with, but God never told us any of these frightening things about human death. Why don’t we have faith in God on this matter yet feed into Satan allowing his fear to take over? God told us that if we follow Him and have TRUE faith in Him there is NOTHING to be frightened of in death. Maybe we fear the possibility of hell? If that is the case...we can rectify that any time we choose through Confession and changing of ones behavior. None of us want to face any pain but to spend one moment of life worrying about a potential painful death is just wasted time. A HUGE lesson I had to learn quickly when my son got sick is that time is too short to waste one second on “what-ifs.” There were real time concerns to concentrate on and to spend a moment on worrying about “what if my son needs another operation, what if he gets left back in school, and the worst of them what if my son’s cancer comes back…” was/is fruitless and a waste. I have learned that I cannot waste any time or energy on POTENTIAL bad scenarios. Real ones need all my attention and efforts. I think of all the worries I had about my kids PRE-stage 4 cancer hitting one of them & I have to laugh at how ridiculous they seem. I'd be lying to say that there aren't moments of weakness I experience but I don’t allow them to stir up debilitating fears because that is EXACTLY what fears main objective is…to stop us from proceeding. I recall all the things I did not attempt in life because of fear of my inadequacies. HA! I was so silly and foolish looking back now. I think about all the limitations I put on myself, all the missed opportunities and dreams that went untouched. Fears like that are all gone now thank God. Fear of failure is so far down on the list of concerns...I view everything with the mindframe of "what is the worst that can happen..." I tell dear friends that I am no longer the person to come to if they need someone commiserate with because the only advice I’m gonna give them is “Ah…no worries, this too shall pass.” Because...it WILL so why spend time stressing over it?
When you are literally holding the hand of your own child who is very close to death and you have come to accept that death for this child is a very real probability and you have allowed God into this dark and threatening place with you…things happen. If you ask Him, He will gift you with inspired thoughts. Thoughts that bring stability to your overwrought mind that; “All will be well if you give over all suffering Him.” You think to yourself…well OK…how does one actually DO this? Well, I can recall the day I sat beside my son, who was doped with morphine as I held his little hand and my heart and mind cried out to God and said “This is too much for me God. No human can withstand this…please, please take this pain & worry away from me. I have to be strong for my 5 year old…I cannot let him fight this battle alone, please give me the strength and show me the path I must take to navigate us through this. Abraham was willing to sacrifice his only child because You asked it of him…if You ask this of me, please just give me the strength to live through it myself and the wherewithal to keep the rest of my family intact." And…He did. When I offered all of this up in this manner was when shortly afterwards I received the phone call I have written about a few times now from my old friend telling me about my son's doctors. That was when I knew…I KNEW God was communicating with me and he was answering me. He told me LOUDLY that he will help me if I have complete faith. From that moment on, I had renewed strength. I had a laser focused path I was to take and how I was going to take it. My job was carved out for me for my next 15 months and that was to be 100% mother to my 2 kids and the best and patient partner to my husband as we travelled this road. ALL of my fears were squelched because the plan was shared with me. I now had the bluepraint for success. God took my hand & led me so I could take my child's hand and lead him. I felt so confident that God made me privy to our immidiate plan that I was actually happy. Everyday I was happy. Because I knew God was holding me up. It seemed evident that every time I felt myself losing strength…God would send a little sign to remind me, something that would shake me to say “Chin up girl…you must keep going for your family…I am here, see me?” When I allow myself to sit and think back over this incredible experience I was fortunate enough to have over the past 15 months, I sometimes just fall to my knees to thank God for all of His awesome blessings. My son started an INCREDIBLE turn around immediately at the onset of his chemo protocol. With a 10% chance of living he was deemed in complete remission before he had even reached his half way point in treatments. Something his doctors had never seen before.
Sadly, I have witnessed young children dying over this past year. Something I wish on no man BUT as sad as I am for the families who experience this…my heart leaps knowing this child of God has returned to Him and this is where we should all long to be. We Catholics know (or should know) that we should rejoice for the soul that gets to be in God’s presence. I’ve said it before and that is the only fear I have of passing myself is leaving my 2 little ones before they are old enough to understand that it won’t take very long before we are all together again in perfectness …that is if Mommy does her part & is prepared to meet God. This experience has taught me so many lessons. And my son will probably never know how much of a better person he has made me but…the biggest lesson of all was how UNREADY my soul was a year ago to meet God and how hard I must try for the rest of my life to prepare myself for that day. Now, so little is important to me other than this goal. No fears, no angers, no jealousy’s, no material wants or needs….just unbridled happiness for happiness sake is what this experience and brush with God has done for me. Now I see life as a series of happy events in which I attempt to make pleasing to God. I see God in so many places that I hadn’t since I was a child. The busyness of life shielded my eyes from seeing Him. When I take notice of God’s intervention in something simple, it at times conjures memories from childhood when I had such an intimate, uncomplicated relationship with God. It was when I knew God was communicating to me and leading me but with maturity and a muddled society came questions. That was when I dropped the “silly” notions of a God who personally entered my life and I THANK GOD he has showed me the error of my ways and has reverted me back to the truth. So I lead my life with confidence now. No fear of life, death or circumstances because I have seen God, first hand at work at the darkest moments of it and how He responds when we have complete faith. He removes all fear for us and absolutely guides us through it all. Happiness comes with the stability and strength that is gifted and fear has no place left here. If I feel fear creeping into the corners of my mind, I just pray and it leaves me.
Each day, I learn more about my faith and the more amazed I am how everything makes so much sense now. How we have always been gifted with the TRUTH and how so many of us choose not to see it. When I read the Bible now, I understand it more than I ever have and I thank God for that as well.
I saw this collection today and it is not just something I read…it is something I live now. I pray that everyone reading this can feel such calm by embracing these words and putting them into practice in their own lives.
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love and self-discipline” 2 Timothy 1:7
God bless good people.
As I stood listening to this PHENOMINAL story, my eyes watered up & I found myself holding back from crying. At that moment I really couldn’t explain WHY this was happening but it soon made sense. This Gospel was just more proof for me that our awesome God will intervene personally for us and all we need is faith.
My life has been so gifted by God giving me my son, his grave illness and miraculous recovery. To witness such events first hand has been quite overwhelming. I try hard to share these things because I know these gifts were not meant for just me. God wants me to write them down. He wants me to help others find this amazing place of peace, calm, stability and happiness. So, I think a lot about how best to express myself. The complexity is so far more than just explaining remarkable events as they unfold because I feel I can do that fairly easily…it is what occurs as a RESULT of being witness to such things that are life altering and I keep trying to put into words all that transpires so I might be able to help others to this wonderful place.
So during my parish priest’s homily yesterday he focused of the fact that we humans have a lot of fears. The most common of which is the fear of death. And I liked what he said about it, he said ‘God did not create fear…if we refer back to the creation story…all God made was good. Satan created fear to prey on the weakness of humans’ and I couldn’t agree with him more. We are so lucky to be Catholic but I think many of us FORGET what we are suppose to believe and have FAITH in. We believe that our physical death is merely a process that needs to take place so we can move onto our next and greater chapter. Why are we so fearful of it? We are fearful because Satan tells us to be so. He does this by making the unknown seem scary…our mind equates the unknown to darkness, loneliness, danger…remember the ONLY reason there even IS physical death is because of the sin of humans to begin with, but God never told us any of these frightening things about human death. Why don’t we have faith in God on this matter yet feed into Satan allowing his fear to take over? God told us that if we follow Him and have TRUE faith in Him there is NOTHING to be frightened of in death. Maybe we fear the possibility of hell? If that is the case...we can rectify that any time we choose through Confession and changing of ones behavior. None of us want to face any pain but to spend one moment of life worrying about a potential painful death is just wasted time. A HUGE lesson I had to learn quickly when my son got sick is that time is too short to waste one second on “what-ifs.” There were real time concerns to concentrate on and to spend a moment on worrying about “what if my son needs another operation, what if he gets left back in school, and the worst of them what if my son’s cancer comes back…” was/is fruitless and a waste. I have learned that I cannot waste any time or energy on POTENTIAL bad scenarios. Real ones need all my attention and efforts. I think of all the worries I had about my kids PRE-stage 4 cancer hitting one of them & I have to laugh at how ridiculous they seem. I'd be lying to say that there aren't moments of weakness I experience but I don’t allow them to stir up debilitating fears because that is EXACTLY what fears main objective is…to stop us from proceeding. I recall all the things I did not attempt in life because of fear of my inadequacies. HA! I was so silly and foolish looking back now. I think about all the limitations I put on myself, all the missed opportunities and dreams that went untouched. Fears like that are all gone now thank God. Fear of failure is so far down on the list of concerns...I view everything with the mindframe of "what is the worst that can happen..." I tell dear friends that I am no longer the person to come to if they need someone commiserate with because the only advice I’m gonna give them is “Ah…no worries, this too shall pass.” Because...it WILL so why spend time stressing over it?
When you are literally holding the hand of your own child who is very close to death and you have come to accept that death for this child is a very real probability and you have allowed God into this dark and threatening place with you…things happen. If you ask Him, He will gift you with inspired thoughts. Thoughts that bring stability to your overwrought mind that; “All will be well if you give over all suffering Him.” You think to yourself…well OK…how does one actually DO this? Well, I can recall the day I sat beside my son, who was doped with morphine as I held his little hand and my heart and mind cried out to God and said “This is too much for me God. No human can withstand this…please, please take this pain & worry away from me. I have to be strong for my 5 year old…I cannot let him fight this battle alone, please give me the strength and show me the path I must take to navigate us through this. Abraham was willing to sacrifice his only child because You asked it of him…if You ask this of me, please just give me the strength to live through it myself and the wherewithal to keep the rest of my family intact." And…He did. When I offered all of this up in this manner was when shortly afterwards I received the phone call I have written about a few times now from my old friend telling me about my son's doctors. That was when I knew…I KNEW God was communicating with me and he was answering me. He told me LOUDLY that he will help me if I have complete faith. From that moment on, I had renewed strength. I had a laser focused path I was to take and how I was going to take it. My job was carved out for me for my next 15 months and that was to be 100% mother to my 2 kids and the best and patient partner to my husband as we travelled this road. ALL of my fears were squelched because the plan was shared with me. I now had the bluepraint for success. God took my hand & led me so I could take my child's hand and lead him. I felt so confident that God made me privy to our immidiate plan that I was actually happy. Everyday I was happy. Because I knew God was holding me up. It seemed evident that every time I felt myself losing strength…God would send a little sign to remind me, something that would shake me to say “Chin up girl…you must keep going for your family…I am here, see me?” When I allow myself to sit and think back over this incredible experience I was fortunate enough to have over the past 15 months, I sometimes just fall to my knees to thank God for all of His awesome blessings. My son started an INCREDIBLE turn around immediately at the onset of his chemo protocol. With a 10% chance of living he was deemed in complete remission before he had even reached his half way point in treatments. Something his doctors had never seen before.
Sadly, I have witnessed young children dying over this past year. Something I wish on no man BUT as sad as I am for the families who experience this…my heart leaps knowing this child of God has returned to Him and this is where we should all long to be. We Catholics know (or should know) that we should rejoice for the soul that gets to be in God’s presence. I’ve said it before and that is the only fear I have of passing myself is leaving my 2 little ones before they are old enough to understand that it won’t take very long before we are all together again in perfectness …that is if Mommy does her part & is prepared to meet God. This experience has taught me so many lessons. And my son will probably never know how much of a better person he has made me but…the biggest lesson of all was how UNREADY my soul was a year ago to meet God and how hard I must try for the rest of my life to prepare myself for that day. Now, so little is important to me other than this goal. No fears, no angers, no jealousy’s, no material wants or needs….just unbridled happiness for happiness sake is what this experience and brush with God has done for me. Now I see life as a series of happy events in which I attempt to make pleasing to God. I see God in so many places that I hadn’t since I was a child. The busyness of life shielded my eyes from seeing Him. When I take notice of God’s intervention in something simple, it at times conjures memories from childhood when I had such an intimate, uncomplicated relationship with God. It was when I knew God was communicating to me and leading me but with maturity and a muddled society came questions. That was when I dropped the “silly” notions of a God who personally entered my life and I THANK GOD he has showed me the error of my ways and has reverted me back to the truth. So I lead my life with confidence now. No fear of life, death or circumstances because I have seen God, first hand at work at the darkest moments of it and how He responds when we have complete faith. He removes all fear for us and absolutely guides us through it all. Happiness comes with the stability and strength that is gifted and fear has no place left here. If I feel fear creeping into the corners of my mind, I just pray and it leaves me.
Each day, I learn more about my faith and the more amazed I am how everything makes so much sense now. How we have always been gifted with the TRUTH and how so many of us choose not to see it. When I read the Bible now, I understand it more than I ever have and I thank God for that as well.
I saw this collection today and it is not just something I read…it is something I live now. I pray that everyone reading this can feel such calm by embracing these words and putting them into practice in their own lives.
F.E.A.R.= False Evidence Appearing Real.
"Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go." Joshua 1:9
"Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you." 1 Peter 5:7-10
"Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go." Joshua 1:9
"Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you." 1 Peter 5:7-10
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love and self-discipline” 2 Timothy 1:7
“Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all
fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and it shows that we have
not fully experienced His perfect love.” 1 John 4:18
God bless good people.
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Yes! Holy Father!
Thank you Catholic Fellowship for such a wonderful quote & picture of our Holy Father!
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
NICE?
Wanna know who is NICE? Satan as he lulls us into complacency....check out Voris...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NxrIjE-WNVA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NxrIjE-WNVA
Been Away...
So sorry dear friends. I have been entrenched with the final mile of my son's current journey to finish up his cancer treatments. He has been receiving daily radiation treatments that have us out of the house each morning early and sometimes keeps us at the hospital for the better part of the day so we have been all consumed with doctor schedules for the past month. Our wills have had to be tested right up until the bitter end of this experience BUT we ARE at the end after 14 long months. My son (& quite frankly my whole family) start our newest chapter sometime next week.
So, I was catching up with my old friend Michael Voris at Real Catholic TV & thought it was worthy of sharing...of course like so much of what he says is...enjoy & please always say a pray for our beloved Pope & his constant fight aginst the wolves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=x-LqsCE4zQ8&noredirect=1
So, I was catching up with my old friend Michael Voris at Real Catholic TV & thought it was worthy of sharing...of course like so much of what he says is...enjoy & please always say a pray for our beloved Pope & his constant fight aginst the wolves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=x-LqsCE4zQ8&noredirect=1
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)