We Don't Get To Choose

Over the course of the past two days, I've taken a number of phone calls from my mom, read a couple of e-mails, and started following my cousin's new blog. All of these things have to do with one thing: my cousin's oldest boy, William. After a couple of visits to the doctor, having a CT scan done, and being checked into the hospital, he has been diagnosed with cancer. He has a massive tumor in his abdomen that is in, around, or otherwise adversely affecting one or both of kidneys, liver, the renal vessels, and his aorta. It's too large to operate on so after a biopsy in the next few days to determine just what kind of cancer they're dealing with (all they know right now is that it is fast growing and very aggressive), he'll be starting chemotherapy on Friday. The hope is that the chemo will shrink the tumor and that eventually, they'll be able to operate and remove most - if not all - of the tumor. It's going to be a long, hard, and painful road for this eight-and-a-half-year-old boy and his family.

William with his younger brother Clark about a year ago.

In the course of our various phone calls, my mom and I were talking about how hard things happen to all of us and how we don't get to choose what happens. In addition to what William is going to be going through, there are so many hardships that my family, extended family, and friends have gone through in the past 2-3 years. To name a few...:

• A cousin on my dad's side and the eldest son of a cousin on my mom's side both passed away unexpectedly within a few months of each other.
• Max's aunt suffered a brain hemorrhage and while she survived, she has lost some of her vision and it's unknown whether or not she'll get it back.
• My brother lost his job unexpectedly and is in the process of trying to sell their house while moving his family to another state.
• Shortly after the father of some good friends went through a battle with cancer, their mother had a hip replacement (or two).
• Max underwent two hand surgeries and a hip resurfacing (and is probably getting hip #2 resurfaced soon).
• A friend's husband passed away from a heart attack or cardiac arrest.
• Just when they thought that he was in remission, another friend's husband lost a long, hard 12-month battle against ALL (acute lymphoblastic leukemia).
• Yet another friend's husband (only in his early 30's) went through cardiac arrest and miraculously survived after being given a 3-5% chance of survival.
• A girl who attends church with my parents in California fainted one day at school and has never gotten any memory back from before it happened back and her personality has totally changed.
• Shortly after losing his son and father-in-law, my uncle lost his job when the company he worked for went under.
• As for me, only a couple of months after our daughter was born, I was diagnosed with NFII, went through back and brain surgeries (to remove 2 of my 5 benign tumors), and found out that I passed the blasted NFII gene onto my daughter.
• In addition to all of these things, I've known so many other people who have had a parent or grandparent pass away, have had unexpected medical problems, have lost his/her job, have suffered miscarriages, have lost their homes, or who have gone through any number of other trials.

No one on the list above got to choose. Neither William nor his parents got to do so. No one does. As my mom said earlier today, it's not a multiple choice deal where we are presented with a list of options and get to pick one. And even if it was and we did get to choose, we'd probably be hoping that one of the options would be "none of the above". But that's not the case and no matter how hard we wish, hope, beg, and pray...we don't get to choose.

We may not get to pick our trials and tribulations or those of the people that we love. However, we do get to choose one thing: how we react when hardships do come and what we do when they happen (to us or other people). Thank the heavens above in William's case that he has two amazing parents, four younger brothers, an enormous extended family, and countless other people pulling for him and praying for him every step of the way. We all have a choice.