Some of the worst words a parent can hear is, “Your child has cancer.” It puts you into a spiraling roller coaster of fear and sorrow. Thoughts race back and forth, “Will my child die?” “What are we going to do?” “This can’t be happening!”, to name a very few. These are all natural human things for parents (or anyone) to experience when something so devastating occurs. What I intend to do by sharing this, is to provide a few insights on what to do as a parent of a child who was recently diagnosed with cancer or other life-threatening disease. These are tidbits of wisdom I learned while walking the darkest path of my life. I hope that by sharing this it gives someone, even just one person, hope, joy and light. I hope it helps to ease the burden. It’s most important to remember there is Someone with you in your family’s walk in darkness – a Light that can never be extinguished – that Someone is our Savior, Messiah Yeshua Jesus!
NUMBER 1
God. Yeshua. God. The Word. God. Pray. God. Worship. God. Praise. God. Thankfulness. God.
Do your best to stay centered on God. He is your firm foundation. He is the rock on which you stand. He is with you and will provide all that you need, as long as you let Him. Give Jesus your emotions, your fears, your tears, give Him your everything. He can handle it! Leave it all in His more than capable hands. Fill your heart, mind, spirit, hospital room, your home, where ever you are, and with all that you are, FILL it ALL with Jesus and The Word of God.
- PRAY. Prayer works! My son is a living testimony of God answering prayers! Enlist your family, friends, coworkers, churches, even strangers to pray for your warrior and family. Get those who aren’t believers to pray (maybe through witnessing you, they will come to believe). Our local radio station, KBSJ, has a prayer app and I requested prayers and got tons of support from people I didn’t know. I requested prayers on our church’s, Woodlands Church, iPhone app. My family and friends had their churches and prayer groups praying for our son. I am grateful for every. single. prayer. Do whatever you can to get to your petition to the Lord. He will hear your cries and prayers.
- Leave bibles open in your home, hospital room, infusion room, bedrooms, etc. I left mine open on a verse I read over Hendrix everyday. Let The Word freely flow throughout your entire environment.
- Have worship music on. Sing your praises and thankfulness to our Father! During my worship in song, I heard our Father say to me “I will” when I had my hands up, tears flowing, while listening and singing to the Lord. “Please heal my son!”, my heart was exclaiming. I know it was from the Lord directly. It was an experience I’ve never had before and man, did it make a forever impact on me and my relationship with Abba. I’ve held onto that promise and He delivered!
- Pray and read the Bible over your child. Place your hands on them and declare healing and give thanks for the Lord healing them in advance. Replace your child’s name in Bible verses where you read they or them. Claim and decree the Lord’s promises over him/her! Call upon the name above all other names! I will talk more about this in a separate post.
- Journal your prayers. This helped me immensely! Worries? Write them down. Fears? Write them down too. Prayers to cover your child? Those too. Anything to get you out of your head and into the light of Christ.
- Play scripture podcasts, YouTube videos, use apps like Abide
- Dive deeper into scripture
- Meditate on scripture
- Wait expectantly for the Lord
- Give up all unrighteousness. Repent!
NUMBER 2
LOVE!
Fill your baby with LOVE! Love on them and fill them with God’s love. Affirm their identity in Christ. Read them verses with their name to personalize it, like I said above. Re-affirm that there is nothing they did to cause this. Let them know they are safe and cherished. Laugh with them, play games, take away their worries with your presence.
NUMBER 3
Change your lifestyle and nutrition!
I cannot stress this enough. Whatever treatment plan you and their doctor choose to take, it is so important to change what could have caused this in the first place and influence your surroundings to be as healthy as possible. While chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation have its place of helping and medicating, they are extremely toxic to the body. I made sure that I could assist Hendrix’s healing with holistic care along with his cancer treatment. This deserves an entire blog post itself! I changed everything I that could control for my family and we implemented these changes for everyone! Even had my parents and in-laws on board with these changes as much as they could. We switched our diet to whole food plant based, supplemented with minerals and vitamins, supported healthy detox from toxicity, and much, MUCH more. I was already what you could call a “crunchy” momma with organic foods and natural products but I enforced this even more! I took every toxic item out of our house that I could. It was a process, but is so doable. You are the keeper of your home and THIS you CAN control. I can’t wait to share how I did this with you. I could go on and on and on 😊
NUMBER 4
Educate yourself!
Do not just take what the oncology doctor and team tells you. Read books, articles, watch videos on ways to heal cancer and to promote cancer killing techniques! Research natural ways of healing from cancer or how to supplement your mainstream treatment with holistic functional methods. While there is not tons of information related directly to pediatric cancer, you can translate it to be applicable to your situation.
NUMBER 5
ENJOY LIFE!
Nothing opens your eyes like a cancer diagnosis. Let this be an opportunity to better your family and self. Let this be a good thing (can you imagine that! Letting a cancer diagnosis for your child be good??) I KNOW this sounds insane but wait! This is your child’s and your chance to change for the better! Be the people you’ve been destined to be by our God. If you’re like me, these are things you should have been doing all along or always wanting to do but never having the courage. Do the things! See the things! While I know cancer and the treatment can be limiting, there is so much life that can be lived through that time. Get all the hugs! Document every moment, good and bad. Cherish the smiles. Laugh, and a lot! Laughter is soothing to the soul. Get outside! Let them feel the sunshine. Let them laugh and play without a care like children should. Let them feel sand and earth beneath their feet (this is fun AND restorative 😊). Serve others. Help others. Bring joy. Live simply.
I hope these steps help you to cope with your child’s situation. The days ahead will be long and tough, but the Lord will sustain you. He will provide. Open your self and your family’s situation up to Him. He is so worthy of your praise. Trust in Him. I pray the Lord blesses and keeps you; may His face shine upon you and your family all the days of your lives.
Thank you for following us on our journey of Chasing the Light of the Son.
You are loved!