We made her a promise that if she listened to the nurses we’d give her anything she wanted at the end of this ordeal. She held us to that.
There are no words to fully express when you are given news such as this. You begin thinking about everything you have done…everything Rylie has ever done and try to make sense of why this is happening. I would lie awake next to her trying to memorize her breath. How do we prepare our child to not be afraid to die? Every waking moment I researched. I would leave no stone unturned. Cannabis was always at the end of my searches.
Strange things happen that shape our future and our family still wonders “why us” every day. Why were we given a second chance? While Rylie was in surgery to get her chemotherapy port, our doctor came out to where we were all huddled together, knelt down on one knee and said they had halted the port and that there was a slight chance her tumor could be benign. Being given this glimmer of hope…we gladly took it! Two weeks later we received the call that it was a rare aggressive disfiguring and destructive bone tumor that mimics cancer. Serious…but we could fight it! They would try to remove it, there was a high rate of recurrence, she would lose her teeth and major reconstructive surgery would follow. After hearing the details of the surgery, what I had learned about cannabis was still in my mind as a treatment for keeping her tumor from recurring, nerve damage, inflammation and pain. I could not deny giving Rylie the best outcome if it was a possibility. As Rylie was taken back into surgery we were beside ourselves…would she ever look normal again?
"You begin thinking about everything you have done…everything Rylie has ever done and try to make sense of why this is happening. I would lie awake next to her trying to memorize her breath. How do we prepare our child to not be afraid to die?"
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