I have titled this post part one in hopes of it not taking all year to finish this story, though it is definitely worthy of that sort of time devotion.
As I have mentioned before, the older of my two boys is a Leukemia survivor. Wow, its hard to say and seeing it typed makes me hold my breath. Survivor. Shit.
In the beginning, like day two in the hospital, they sent us a social worker to manage all the needs our family may have while their medical professionals were caring for our angel. This wonderful person gave us list after list of support groups, sibling info, charity contacts, and such and it was so overwhelming that most of it got shoved to the back burner. Then as an add on she tells us that little dude qualified for a “wish” from the Make-A-Wish Foundation. I freaked! I lost it. All composure flew out the window. I started blubbering nonsense like “Is he going to die?! Is it worse than they are telling us?! Why didn’t a doctor drop this bomb?!”. After some patting and soothing voice talking to bring me back off the ledge it was explained to us that any child with a life threatening condition qualifies and we still had to apply to be accepted. Whew. After that it kind of got pushed aside with the other things. I had a super sick buddy and was still nursing a baby so whatever time I had to sleep I was surely not going to waste filling out papers.
The Make-A-Wish people are very persistent though. They asked if we wanted to hold off until he was a little older since he had just turned three. Of course we said yes. He was little, full of poison, with no energy, and came complete with tubes hanging out all over. If I would have asked him what he wished for most at that moment he would have said “to go to Maw Maw’s house” or a baloney sandwich or something.
Years go by and the point to this rambling is they finally caught up to us at a time when little man could fully understand. He was being granted one wish. Almost anything. A pool, a pony, brunch with Lady Gaga, really almost anything. At the same time the kids TV station Nickelodeon is blowing up the tube with ads for their new cruise line. He got together with the coordinators to which we were assigned (Love you Jeff and Cindy!) and he told them what he wanted. Beach vacation, with his family, on a boat in the middle of the sea, Nickelodeon… and the wheels were set in motion.
The parents are not supposed to interfere and that is why the coordinators help out the kids. This is their wish. After hearing what he wanted and doing a little research, I couldn’t help it. He had asked for a kid vacation in grown-up land. I asked if he would be happier doing something Disney, or something just for kids since there are tons of options. Nope. He would not be swayed. So they put his adventure together for him and we were lucky enough to get to go along.
Anyone who knows me, knows I am a freak about planning and all of this was taken care of for me. It was unnerving to say the least. I was super anxiety chick the entire time. Like six months! I know my kid best, I prefer to make the decisions but I had nothing to do with it. Let the process begin!
Our outstanding coordinators met with us several times and with the help of this giant organization spanning two states and countless volunteers they were set on making my guy’s wish come true. We were blessed by our local junior high school and their generous hearts, who did crazy amounts of fundraising all for my little guy. The kindness of strangers is staggering. These kids were given the incentive of making their principals camp out on the roof of the school if they met their goal of $5000 and they pulled together and passed it so far that we were told two wishes were granted with this money.
Do any of you know a middle-schooler?! They went so far beyond an act of selflessness. They had an assembly to celebrate, they wore tee shirts, chanted my dude’s name and then were surprised by meeting him. I cried all day. I sob as I type this. Unbelievable.
Make-A-Wish hammered out even the smallest details for us and the package was dropped off. Our two angels, one of them being a Wish family as well, came to us with the final arrangements and all we had left was to pack. Oh geez!
Away we go!!!
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