This will be the final post on our family blog. Its purposes have been served, both the initial purpose of documenting our children's early years, and its more recent purpose of providing updates about Anna for those who cared about her.
I will continue to write because I understand how important that is for me personally. However, those writings will no longer be found on this blog.
Since Anna's passing, we have learned that she did not have bacterial sepsis or influenza. Although we may never have any definitive medical explanations for what happened, we (parents, not doctors ... yet) suspect that Anna's death was directly related to her experiences with cancer. Her death was not caused by the original medulloblastoma; instead we suspect that her death was caused by the toxicity of the treatments she received.
Thank
you to everyone who has come along side our family during the last five
years, in whatever capacity that might have been. Thank you, in
advance, to those of you who will continue to come along side us during
the next stage of our life's journey. There will be difficult times
ahead of us.
Included below is a service folder from Anna's memorial service along with the message Matt and I chose to read at the service, for the benefit of those who were not able to attend Anna's service in person.
Oh, Anna. Dear,
sweet, Anna. We will miss you so
much. We already do.
In the darkest moments of 2014 when Anna was in the
hospital, what made us most sad as Anna’s parents was that Kate and Ethan would
not have enough lasting memories of their sister. They were both too young to have had Anna’s
life imprinted onto them. Although we
are sad and will miss Anna dearly, we are no longer concerned in that way for
Kate and for Ethan. We can see clearly
how her life influenced both of them.
Here is what we will remember about our Anna.
Her determination.
Oh, man. When Anna was a toddler,
we deliberately chose the word “determined” to describe the strength of her
will. It sounded more positive than
“strong-willed”. Anna was never exactly
an easy child to parent, but she was always an easy child to love. These last five years, Anna used her
intelligence and her determination to achieve many goals that we honestly
didn’t think were possible. We like to
think that given enough time and the proper supports, Anna could move a
mountain … if she wanted to.
We’ll remember her ability to “assume the best” of someone
else, regardless of how awkward a situation might be. We remember times in public places when a
child would abruptly ask her, “What’s wrong with your legs?” While that child’s mortified parents looked
on, Anna would provide a matter-of-fact and age appropriate explanation about
why she was using a wheelchair or a walker.
We’ll remember her empathy.
From before Anna even had any words of her own to say, we knew that she
could FEEL the emotions of those around her.
There were times in our home when it was harder to deal with Anna’s
reaction if Mom or Kate or Ethan were upset or hurt. She could feel their hurt, too. More recently Anna had started thinking about
how she would spend her future. She had
no fear in telling others that she wanted to help kids who were sick because
she knew how it felt to be sick and in the hospital.
Her love of people. I
believe the technical term that followed Anna in her file at the therapy clinic
was “socially motivated”. No matter how
difficult a morning we might have had at our house … no matter how grumpy or
angry Anna might have been on the way in to school, or church, or therapy, her
attitude always turned around when she entered one of these buildings and was
greeted with a friendly, “Hi, Anna!” I
remember one specific day in December when she was having a particularly hard
time in the morning on the way to school.
When I asked her at the end of the day how her transition to school
went, she told me that she was pretty sure her friend Jacob helped turn her day
around when he greeted her in the hallway that morning.
Her joy. I can still
hear Anna’s voice in my head saying, “That was fun.” It didn’t matter how big or small the
experience was, she was able to find joy in almost any situation. A few years ago, when our family watched the
movie Inside Out, I talked with our girls afterwards about some of the lessons
of the movie … because, you know, I’m a teacher. When I asked them why they thought the main
character’s name was Joy and not Happy, Anna said it was because you don’t have
to be happy to find joy. That joy is
something that you can have in any circumstance.
We’ll remember her self-lessness. The word “joy” describes so much about Anna,
whether it was her ability to find joy in the midst of life’s struggles, or
whether it was living her life by the acronym JOY … Jesus first, others next,
yourself last. She was always willing to
give away her money or her possessions, if it meant someone else would benefit
from them. Unless the recipient was one
of her siblings. Then Anna was a little
less reliable about giving away her “stuff”, but she still often did.
We’ll miss her sense of humor. This kid.
Whether it was knock, knock jokes, the “guy with no arms and no legs”
jokes, or corny puns, she loved laughing with us. Telling longer stories was difficult for her
since her experiences with cancer, but we could always count on Anna to pipe up
with a well-timed, witty remark. A great
example of this was on Christmas of 2014.
At that time, much of daily living was still a struggle for Anna. She was wearing diapers at night because she
still couldn’t walk. She woke me up early Christmas morning as she often did,
by calling out, “Daaaaad!” I stumbled
in, and with a big, smirky grin on her face, she said, “Hey, Dad. You’re Christmas present is in my
diaper.” And apparently this wasn’t only
reserved for us at home. At the visitation on Friday night, we heard a number
of stories of Anna’s witty banter with teachers and friends in the hall, as
well as stories about getting called out for laughing when Anna made a quiet
side comment. There are going to be blank spaces in our family conversations in
the future when we are all waiting for Anna’s puns.
Her kindness. When Anna was in 1st grade, before she was diagnosed with brain cancer, she and I would often walk the ½ mile or so from her school to Kate’s preschool. While I pushed Ethan in the stroller, she bounced, skipped, ran, and did all of the things a typical 1st grader would do. I remember one day in particular when she was telling me about a girl in her class named Kacie. She said that even though Kacie was still learning how to talk, she was really glad that Kacie was in her class … that she was going to keep saying hi to Kacie because even though Kacie didn’t say hi back yet, Anna knew that some day she would.
Her love. Her
forgiving, unconditional love. When
there were arguments and yelling, because there were, because Anna was human
and we all yell and scream sometimes, she was always the first one ready to
apologize and ask for forgiveness. Even
if the others involved weren’t yet ready.
She was also incredibly free with her forgiveness. She never held grudges … once she was done
screaming about something.
We’ll remember her faith.
The confidence and clarity of Anna's faith was unique for a child her
age, or for a person of most any age, for that matter. For a child with significant memory deficits,
she often surprised us during morning devotions with what she remembered of the
Bible. Hers was not a naive faith,
however; she pondered many age-appropriate thoughts and asked good
questions. Still, she had an uncanny
ability to reduce some of the more difficult faith questions to a succinct
explanation.
And she was always so certain ... about Jesus and his
love. She knew that there was nothing
that she could ever do that would make Jesus love her any more and she knew
that there was nothing that she could ever do that would make Jesus love her
any less.
One of the other difficult parts of life in 2014 was the
uncertainty. We never knew what the next
day or week or month or year was going to bring. And that was really, really hard. Now, we know.
We know with certainty that Anna is in heaven.
A few of Anna’s teachers used the phrase “Thank you for
sharing your children with me”. That
idea really struck me the first time I heard it. It was a very difficult and conscious decision
on our part as Anna’s parents to share her with the rest of the world these
last five years, but we are glad that we did.
There would not been as many happy memories, laughter, and smiles in our
family in the last five years without the help and support of everyone around
us.
Often after our family devotions in the morning we would
pray that God keep our children safe in their bodies, in their minds, and in
their hearts. We would pray that his
love would shine through their lives to the people around them. Our hope is that this prayer was answered and
that God’s love will continue to shine through Anna’s life and memory to the
people around her so that their faith in Him can be strengthened.
Music has always been an important part of our family's life. This song and video has special meaning to us now.
Thank you.
No comments:
Post a Comment