There are moments in life that do not arrive with a crash or a scream. They come quietly, almost politely, yet leave devastation in their wake. This was one of those moments.
It began with a screen. A PET scan glowing back with answers no parent ever wants to see. Not possibilities. Not “let’s wait and monitor.” But certainty—cold, clinical, and unforgiving. Cancer had spread. And in that instant, the world shifted on its axis.
It wasn’t dramatic. There were no tears at first. Just the slow, suffocating sensation of air leaving the room, as if a door had been left open somewhere and no one noticed until it was too late. She stared at the image, trying to make sense of colors that should not have been there. Bright spots burning where darkness was supposed to exist. Proof that the enemy was no longer hiding.
Cancer, when it spreads, does not announce itself loudly. It does something far more cruel. It speaks in silence so heavy it bends reality. It leaves parents standing in place, bodies frozen, minds racing ahead to places they never wanted to go.
She had always known this moment was possible. Every parent walking alongside a sick child carries that knowledge like a shadow. But awareness offers no protection when the truth finally arrives. The doctor spoke softly, carefully choosing each word, as though gentleness alone could blunt the impact. It didn’t. The meaning crashed through her chest, leaving behind numbness that crawled into her arms and settled behind her eyes.
This was worse. Much worse.
Her heart pounded, wild and erratic, as if trying to escape her body altogether. And as always, her thoughts went straight to Will.
Will—the child who never seemed to stop moving. A boy whose laughter filled rooms, whose presence shifted energy without effort. Gravity had never fully convinced him of its authority. He climbed, ran, explored, and lived with a kind of joyful defiance that felt contagious. Stillness was foreign to him. Limitation was a concept he refused to accept.
And now, inside that vibrant body, something dark and monstrous was quietly growing.
Yet even in that moment—standing face to face with evidence she could not deny—she clung to one truth with everything she had left: God was still bigger.
Bigger than scans. Bigger than statistics. Bigger than the fear tightening around her ribs. Faith did not erase the pain, nor did it pretend the situation was anything other than terrifying. But it gave the pain somewhere to go. Somewhere it could exist without consuming her entirely.
So they waited again.
Waiting had become second nature. Waiting rooms. Waiting for results. Waiting for phone calls that could redefine life in a single sentence. This time, they were waiting for an MRI.
The concern was Will’s back pain. Doctors needed to know if a tumor was pressing toward his spinal cord. Two words—spinal cord—that carried unbearable weight. Paralysis. Loss of mobility. Permanent change. Decisions no parent should ever have to consider, let alone make.
She sat there physically present but mentally suspended in a space between hope and terror. Fear wrapped itself in numbness until the two became indistinguishable. This was not a fear that could be articulated. It lived deep in the chest, not on the tongue.
So she prayed.
Not politely. Not carefully.
She prayed like someone with nothing left to lose. She prayed for miracles—the kind that rewrite biology, that defy scans and statistics, that leave doctors shaking their heads in disbelief. She prayed with boldness, asking mountains to move.
But there was another prayer too. One just as fierce.
If the miracle did not come in the way she hoped, she prayed for days. Sweet days.
Days measured not by quantity, but by quality. Days filled with laughter that echoed. Days of movement, of climbing, of being fully and unmistakably Will. Days where moments mattered because they were lived boldly, not cautiously. She prayed that the light her child carried would continue to spill into the lives of everyone around him, even on days when his body hurt, even when exhaustion tried to dim his smile.
The hardest part was never the machines, the hospital rooms, or the medical language. It was the contradiction.
Looking at a child so alive, so joyful, so utterly himself—and knowing something invisible was working against him. Something she could not fight with her hands. Something she could not see when she kissed his forehead or watched him play.
It was knowing that the quality of these days could change without warning. That joy had become fragile. That tomorrow was uncertain in ways no parent should ever have to understand.
That knowledge broke her in quiet pieces.
And yet, she watched him again.
She watched him climb. Watched him smile. Watched him walk—really walk—after moments when even that felt uncertain. Gratitude surged through her like oxygen returning to starved lungs. She thanked God for restored mobility. For time. For memories that no scan could erase. For allowing Will to live in a body that still chose to fight, even when the images suggested otherwise.
This was not denial.
This was defiance.
A refusal to let fear dictate how today would be lived.
They did not know what tomorrow would bring. But they knew who held it. And until God said no, they would live wide open. They would love fiercely. They would gather gratitude like treasure, breath by breath. Every inhale acknowledged. Every moment counted.
She asked others to pray too. For peace when the noise became unbearable. For strength when her knees threatened to buckle. For good news. For an MRI that would spare them from choices that should never exist. For gentle, beautiful days ahead.
She did not claim to be fearless.
She simply chose to move forward anyway.
Even today.
Especially today.