Ronan. I am not content to go back to my old life, before you disappeared. The safe little life of an Arizona housewife. Thinking of going back to my life, before all of this, makes my skin crawl. Nothing will be the same again without you. That means everything has to change. I’m not sure what exactly that means yet but there now lives this fire in me that cannot be tamed. I died when you died. I say that all the time. I will never be the same person that I was, before all of this. I’m not sure I even liked that person. Well, I guess that’s not true. Sometimes I tend to be too hard on myself. I did like the person I was before all of this and I should stop and pat myself on my back every once in a while. I know I was a good person but being a good person will only get you so far in life. It can’t fucking cure cancer or save our troops. But I was doing a really good job at that life or so I thought because my life revolved around the love I had for our family and look at what that accomplished. I got 3 amazing little human being boys out of it. Including you. And you were totally the raddest kid that ever lived. At least in my eyes and that was enough for me. But looking back, I do see a person who had settled because everything was so safe and sound. Just the way I had always wanted my life to be. Coming from a childhood that was really unstable…. I swore to myself when I got married and had kids, I would never make them endure the things I had to. I met your daddy, had you boys and got very comfortable living inside of our little bubble. I just never thought the bubble would burst in the worst way possible. By one of my kids dying. I was the lucky one with an amazing husband and 3 beautiful boys. I so knew it was all too good to be true and it was only a matter of time before something happened. I just always imagined it would be something like getting breast cancer or your daddy getting prostate cancer because those are the things you hear about in the world. You don’t hear about babies being diagnosed with cancer. It’s the biggest dirty little secret out there. It’s a secret that nobody wants to talk about, even when it happens to them. It is the dirty little secret, that people just want to ignore. I hate to be the fucking cancer grim reappear here, but if I were reading this, and I had not lost a child from cancer….. I would be so fucking scared. I would be so scared that this could happen to me that I would have no choice but to take that fear and channel it into helping to be a part to change the face of this disease. Because as we know, kids can get cancer at any age of life…. even teenagers. I think about this all the time. What if I did not choose to speak up about this and Roforbid, Liam or Quinn ended up developing childhood cancer later in their life. And I had watched you die from it, but did nothing about it which in turn, resulted in the same awful treatment/statistics/outcome for Liam or Quinn. Could you even fucking imagine? That would be so unacceptable. All of this is unacceptable. You dying is fucking unacceptable. And not speaking up about this is totally unacceptable here to help be a change in this so that someday, this does not have to happen to another child and another family. I know I don’t have a choice unless I just choose to throw in the towel and slit my own writs. And trust me, I’ve come pretty close to the edge Ronan. I still think about it all the time. But what good would that do anyone? It wouldn’t. So, I’ll sit here and fight instead. I’ll continue to fight for you little man until you tell me, enough.
The more I’m learning about childhood cancer, the more pissed I am getting. Why is it, that our children are getting the short end of the stick? I know any parent out there would agree that if they had to choose between themselves getting cancer or their child getting cancer, they would choose themselves. And if you choose your child, then you should not be a fucking parent. Or if you can answer this question and you are not yet a parent, but want to be a parent someday…. and you choose your child getting cancer over you…. you need to reconsider having a child. So, if we are all in agreement that we would rather have this happen to us, then our child or future children, why in the world is pediatric cancer the LEAST FUCKING FUNDED??? Because of lack of awareness. Plain and simple. If people everywhere, were aware….. things would be so different.
It’s been a lot of work being here. Not emotionally, because emotionally I feel stronger then I have since losing you. It’s been a lot of cancer/foundation busy work. I’ve been working my ass off, leaving the apartment at 7 a.m. and not returning home until really late at night. I wish I could say I’ve been living the high life of an awesome 30somthing New Yorker. Hardly. I’ve been eating, drinking, and sleeping everything childhood cancer related. I met with Dr. Mosse yesterday. She was kind enough to let me eat up much of her afternoon. It was strange seeing her but in the best way possible. I don’t want to go into too much detail about what went on, but to me that woman walks on water. I could sit and give you the run down on our 3 hour conversation about cancer, but it was so much more then that. It was a conversation full of more then science and statistics and to me, that meant the world. I knew it from the first time I met her when I watched the way you easily slid into her arms when she went to pick you up and exam you on her table. The words I sent to Fernanda after meeting Dr. Mosse for the first time, in the middle of your treatment will haunt me for the rest of my life. Before we left CHOP, you were running ahead of me with your daddy. I sent Fernanda a text that simply said, “It’s her. She’s going to save my son.” But then you know, we got “sold,” on Sloan. Your daddy swears the outcome would have been the same no matter which way we went because your disease was that bad. All I know is if that is the case, I would have rather had you in Dr. Mosse’s care then Dr. Kushners. I will never forgive myself for not listening to what my HEART told me. I ignored it and that was so wrong of me. So Ro… what’s the lesson in all of this? I think it is this: Dr. Mosse couldn’t save you, but she is going to save other kids who are in your same position. And even if she can’t right now, because this disease is so hard to figure out, at least she will do everything she can and she will do it with compassion, grace and dignity. I will support her. She owns a piece of my heart. The tiny piece that I have left. I don’t want to say never…. but as of now, Sloan Kettering and Dr. Kushner will never get support from us. Unless he makes some serious changes. I straight told Dr. Mosse yesterday that if I ever saw Dr. Kushner again, that I would kick him in the balls. I know, so appropriate of me but I know she understands. I’ll bet she’s never had a parent tell her that before. I so love being such a rule breaker. The other lesson here, Ro. Is to always listen to your heart. I am a huge believer in this. Even if things don’t turn out as you’d hoped or planned, knowing that you stayed true to yourself is something that you can never regret.
After I got home from Philly, I met up with a lovely little blog reader of mine who actually volunteered at Sloan while you were being treated there, Ro. I never met her, but she remembered you and your daddy and the way you ran around the halls of Sloan with your gun like you owned the place. Rachel has been a huge lover of yours and so when she heard I was coming to NYC she told me she would love to meet up with me. She got in touch with me a few days ago and we decided to meet up last night even though I was beat from the day I had with Dr. Mosse. I am SO glad I didn’t just go home after getting off of the train. Rachel met me at Penn Station and we headed out to grab some food as I was starving from not having eaten all day. We got to know each other over sushi and I fell head over heels in love with this 21 year old student who goes to NYC. She wants to be a pediatric oncologist and has so much heart and passion. She is funny, quick witted, caring and she put my crazy skydiving ways to SHAME! Talk about being fearless. The girl cliff dives, for breakfast. We spent the next 4 hours or so, hanging out like and I felt like she was my long lost little sissy. Although at one point I was reminded of what a mom I am because I said to Rachel, “Text me when you get home, so I know you made it safely.” She laughed and said, “You are such a mom.” I smiled and said I knew. I can’t wait to see her again. I am so impressed with the drive and heart of this amazing girl. I know what I was up to when I was 21 and it wasn’t trying to save a bunch of babies with cancer. She reminds me of a mini Dr. Mosse. Rachel actually shadowed Dr. Mosse for 3 weeks and was able to back up every good thing I had to say about her. Another little piece of the puzzle that is falling into place, right baby. I don’t believe in much in life anymore but I do believe in signs. And I have been seeing so many of them. All from you.
Today, I went over to meet up with Scott from Solving Kids Cancer. I feel like I am on the right path as far as educating myself on anything and everything that is childhood cancer related. I’m doing the best I can with my grief brain that still exists. There are so many pieces of the puzzle to consider and I have to make sure I am stepping back and looking at the bigger picture here while examining all the small details as well. As I have said before, I am not here to raise 100K for childhood cancer I am here to raise 100 million dollars or more. And I will not be flying in a private plane with it. I am here to do some serious damage. The world of pediatric cancer is not Vegas people; but the world seems to think that it is acceptable to gamble with your child’s life like it is. So all these parents are forced to gamble and the sad truth is, everyone loses in one way or another. When your child dies, not only does a parent lose…. every single person around loses. The loss of a child is so much more heartbreaking then losing a parent, aunt, uncle, grandparent, and don’t even get me started on the dog or the cats of the fucking world. Losing a child is the deepest pain that one can ever experience. It goes against the nature of everything that we know to be true. Turns out life is one big fat fucking lie and everyone is eating it up like it is free ice cream day at Hagen Dauz. I’m so full of this “life,” bullshit that I will continue to throw up everywhere until people stop gorging themselves to death and decide to wake the fuck up and actually make a difference in this society and this world. Has anybody taken a look around lately? Does anybody care that there is a fucking war going on and it’s not just in Iraq. There is so much more to worry about in life then missing an episode of your favorite television show.
Oh and P.S. Dear Assholes of the world who continue to talk about my language on here. I feel like a broken record but shut the fuck up and go away. If you do not like my language, then stop reading what I am writing. Take your small mind, elsewhere. Go save the unicorns, leprechauns, and fairies of the world. Nobody is holding a gun to your head and making you read this. YOU OFFEND ME BY BEING OFFENDED! It’s not like I’m standing in your front yard, screaming obscenities at you. But if I knew where you lived, I would be. I would do all while I held up a huge poster of a picture I have a Ronan which shows how badly his little body was beaten up by childhood cancer. And if you were still offended by my fuck words, instead of the picture in front of your face, I would have to beat you down with my sign the way that childhood cancer, beat my little boy black and blue. So, in the words of some genius out there…. “Fuck you you fucking fuck!!!!!!” STUPID FUCKWADS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And really, to sit there and say that because I say the fuck world a lot, I don’t have morals. WOW! That might just be one of the most awesome things I’ve ever heard. Well, if living a life full of morals means living a life the way you do, by judging other people then I am glad I don’t have fucking morals. I hope you like how the shit that you eat for breakfast, tastes. I’m going to stick to my breakfast of champions. It’s called waking up everyday and not getting to cook eggies for my 3 year old son anymore because he is dead from cancer. So instead of not cooking eggies, I’ll just sit around and say the fuck word instead. All while I don’t drink, do drugs, or abuse my kids. All while I try to figure out how to make this world a better place by helping to fight for these cancer babies and their parents. So sorry that offends you, asswad. Sweet dreams to you though. I hope your dreams of little puppies, are nice.
xoxo
ROCKSTAR RONAN 