Like a moving-picture, the images fluttered in my head.  And my pen started to transcribe all that I was bottling inside my heart.

October 13, 1991

My Dearest Eli,

Yet again tonight I went to bed crying for you, Eli. Heart wrenching sobs escaped from me and in between them I relived your short life with such clarity.

I knew you were very special, Eli, from the day you were born. And now, with the first anniversary of your death upon us, I realize fully just how special you really were and still are. You affected so many people in your short life, Eli.

Even now, I have moments when it is hard to believe that you are really gone. Or are you? You’re in my heart now and forever Eli.

Will it ever get easier, Eli? Sometimes, I am very happy for you. Those times are when I know you are pain free and happy. Heaven must be such a wonderful place.

Then there are times when my heart aches and aches for you, honey. Those are the times when I relive moments of your childhood before the doctor diagnosed you with cancer, and also moments after being diagnosed.

I remember vividly the day you were brought home from the hospital after your birth. Your brother, Noah, only one year old, took to you instantly. Throughout your short life, the two of you were inseparable. Best playmates you two were. But you were the most daring, Eli. You had such a zest for life.

I remember the day you and Noah were on your hot wheels and racing around and in and out of the garage. Noah came running into the house to tell me you had a snake cornered in the garage. Upon investigation, there you were, laughing with delight, and riding your hot wheels in circles, closer and closer, to a coiled king size bull snake.

Sometimes when I wake in the morning Eli, I start to think about what I’m going to make my “boys” for breakfast. And then I remember.

And sometimes in the evening, when Noah is taking his bath, I remember how it always was two boys in the bathtub and not one.

My precious Eli, oh, how I miss you. I miss your sweet smile, shining blue eyes and pale blond hair.

You had to grow up so fast, Eli. It was such a shock to learn that you had cancer, one month before your fifth birthday. In a flash, I would have traded places with you.

You went from being a happy little boy into a world of doctors and nurses, needles and IV’s, catheters and spinal taps.

I was selfish, Eli. I loved you too much to let you die. And so you suffered. You went through head and neck, and open chest surgeries. How my heart ached for you, Eli, when, four hours after surgery on your lungs, I helped a nurse stand you up in bed. How you hated ICU.

Because I loved you too much to let you go, you suffered such horrible radiation burns on your sweet head and neck. The chemotherapy made you so very sick. Even under sedation, you were sick. But you knew the “good guys” were out to get the “bad guys”. At four years old, you knew you would die without treatment.

It hurt me so bad that you were unable to eat for seven and a half months. Your only nutrition was IV. You always ate so well before. You had always relished the sheer taste of food. It was unfair of me to bring food into your room in the hopes that you would eat something. Sometimes you tried. I remember when you woke during the night once and asked for watermelon. I drove half of Denver to get it for you. You only ate a couple of bites, but it was worth it.

I remember the long days and nights in the hospital those seven and a half months. I was able to take you home only four different weekends. I remember the isolation in times of high fever and the ice blankets, lots of oxygen and machines everywhere.

How I cried Eli, on the morning that we woke up and found all your hair lying in your bed and not on your head. You were too proud to wear a hat.

I also remember good times, like when the group came from the Denver baseball team and you received an autographed photo of George and a Royals’ baseball. Or I would be wheeling you around, outside the medical center, and you would point out cars and ask me if they were “race cars.” How we would talk about the race car we would have someday and how much it would be worth.

Having lived two hundred and thirty miles away, you were awestruck by the freeways in and out of Denver. You thought they looked like race tracks.

And how about the time I was able to take you to the Denver zoo? You did not mind that I had to push you, a boy at five years of age, in a stroller, up and down the hills. You were so weak. You did not care; you only wanted to see the animals.

And on good days, I also remember how you would hide under a gurney in the hall and wait for a person to be passing by, only to give them a good dose of water from your squirt gun. It did not matter to you whether or not you knew the person you squirted. Sometimes you would sneak around the nurses’ station and into the medication room, fully loaded with water, and let loose. No doctor, nurse, or visitor was safe from you.

Or how about the times an IV would complete and I would unhook you. You headed straight for your three-wheeler and down the hall you zipped. Everyone stayed out of your way and laughed. Such sport you had.

Other times, when you had to stay in bed, you made me chase down a VCR so you could watch Superman or Ghostbusters. You never tired of those two movies. You knew them by heart and delighted in telling anyone who would listen what would happen next.

I remember the times when you would have to undergo yet another series of X-rays, CT scans, or MRI and I would stay by your side throughout them, telling you stories and keeping you from moving.

I’m sorry, Eli, that I was not able to make you well. I think that you went through all that you did, those seven and a half months, simply because of how much I loved you and did not want to let you go.

I remember the times that I would feel down and you would come up to me. You would put your arms around me and say, “I’m sorry, Mom.”

I remember when we were together, waiting in the OR before your lung surgery. You were feeling well and you looked at me and said, “I want to go to Heaven, Mom.” I went speechless. And then I told you that sometimes we don’t get what we want and that you might have to come back to me. 

And yet, I remember so well how after your last chemo, you picked up yet another “bug” and ended up on a respirator; just how much you fought for life as we know it, those last fifteen days.

Most of all, Eli, I remember how I cradled you in my arms, and whispered into your ear that soon you would not have to have any more pain and it would be okay, as your heart stopped for the third and last time, and you died in my arms.

Thank you, Eli, for going through what you did because I loved you and did not want to let you go.

I’ll always love you Eli.

Mama

I had so much to say.  I didn’t think that I was prolific, and yet, when it came to you, Eli, I wrote down pages.  The pages were bleeding, not with blood, but with the ink that were blotched with my tears.  I had no courage before today to write down these words because doing so would make it so real that you were not really coming back to me.

As I read the letter once again, I broke into sobs.  Up until now, I still couldn’t let you go, Eli.  What every parent said was true—that it was so wrong to have to bury your child.  I never really understood the depth of those words before, until my turn came to bury you.  It was so wrong to have to see you go away, Eli.  But like the angel that I knew you were, you flew.  Far away, another angel awaited you as I was sure that your brother Joshua would be delighted to finally meet you.  And this time around, with two angels watching over my shoulders, the burden of losing two of my children may somehow be more tolerable.

But who was I kidding?  No amount of words would comfort me now.  Not yet, because I was still grieving.  Another year would pass by, and another, and another—and maybe then, I would get accustomed to having only one son here on earth with me instead of three.

I love you, Eli, I whispered repeatedly.  I love you.  Always and forever, Mama

Source: What Would You Say ~ Your Response

How do you respond when your 5 year old asks you to let him go to heaven?
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I want to believe that I was once an angel, too; a gift that my mother had held in her strong arms.  I looked down on my own arms and they were normal, the usual two long pale stretches of muscles and bones God had blessed me with.  But in these arms, I held my angels also, and for that I sent Him my gratitude.

But before I met any of my beautiful angels, when I was the one flying, hovering on earth all innocent and full of hopes and dreams like an angel, I became aware that there were bad things in the world.  In fifth grade a tumor was found under my left nipple, the good thing was that it was benign.  My wings were clipped a few inches, but with a great zest for life I still fluttered around.  In eighth grade, another tumor which turned out to be nothing to worry about was found in my upper left arm.  Though it was removed, the incident broke my wings this time.  I became more aware of life, seeing it unfold before my young eyes.

I had become accustomed to drives to hospitals, to visits to doctors, and to them saying that everything’s going to be all right.  In the end though, good news weren’t always to be had.  And cancer, no matter how much I battled against it, would come and go in my life to torment me about how beautiful life could be.

Little girls have the wings of angels, and so do little boys.  But as they grow, challenges would be hurled at them like a shuttlecock in a game of badminton.  Like the sport, if they are faced against veteran players, the shuttlecock shooting toward them rapidly; and more often than not, the feathered, conical birdie would land on the wooden badminton court.

My mother Ethel perhaps underwent a lot of stress and pressures too when I was growing up because instead of remembering her affection toward me, all that flashed in my memory were the strong unyielding hands that dragged me by my hair across our house. During those times, I would scream, curse and beg her to release me.  But when her hands loosened on my hair, her feet would find their way to my stomach.  More often than not, they would land at my head, too, and I would howl in agony.  For how could a mother act with such hatred toward her daughter?

I really have no idea why she was never affectionate towards me or any of my siblings. I suppose she may have grown up without hugs or family affections herself in Oklahoma. Loving warmth was never learned; as a child I would try to pull in my siblings next to me in photos.

When I see families who truly love and care for each other it is a most beautiful thing. I had that with my father but sadly not with my mother or siblings. Most all my siblings were estranged from her. On Matt’s side though, I do have some of his siblings who consider me their sister and I feel the same way. To have a man who truly loves you is most precious. I am thankful that Matt is in my life, I am thankful to have had my boys on Earth for the time the Lord let me have them, I am thankful Matt’s sister, Jolana, has shown me what being sisters really means, I am just thankful.

Peas have vitamin C, E and zinc content.  Because of that, I can say that they were indeed nutritious; and for that reason, I shouldn’t have felt mother was punishing me for giving me peas.  But when peas were being served to me most of the time, and I was forced to finish what she packed me for lunch, which was more than any five year old could eat I knew that what she was doing was not a manifestation of her love.  She forced fed me, mostly with peas to the point that there were instances I threw up.  I kept on begging her to make me peanut butter sandwiches instead, which I would have gladly eaten, but she never did.  My food was not open for discussion.  I never had the option aside from peas.

At school, when I was beyond her peripheral vision, mother would tell my teachers and friends to make sure that I ate the lunch she packed me.  Because the food she forced me to eat at the school lunches such as cooked spinach, cheese, foods that made me very sick to my stomach and caused me to throw up. I had to stay in the lunchroom for hours.  I would sit alone in the lunchroom, feeling horrible and bad about myself.  Was I being a disobedient child?

At such an early age, I missed classes because of the horrid reason that I had to consume food that my mother dictated I have. When finally I finished my lunch—either by downing the food or by dumping the remainder of my meal in the trash bins, I would stand up, clean up the table I used, and alternately walk and run to head back to my classroom.  It was a long journey because lunches were in the old junior high basement in Golden, Colorado, where I went to school and a good two blocks separate it from the grade school building.

In the 60’s, there were only a few channels on the television.  The unavailability of shows made me interested in other modes of media such as books and Magazines.  One day, as I was browsing McCall’s magazine, I came across an article that featured scrawny, malnourished kids.  I stared at their pitiful bodies that were mostly bones covered with a thin coating of skin, and told myself that maybe; my mother didn’t want me to be like these children. But when day after day, she would serve me repeatedly with the food that I hated in large servings; I realized that it was the opposite.  Mother wanted to punish me.  She literally spoon-fed me. If ever there was a reason for that, I never knew what it was.

In high school, I would invite some of my friends over to my house and they would stare at me and my mother with horrified expressions as soon as mother began to be shrouded with her usual coat of hostility toward me.  Sometimes, it was just a wrong word I said or a smile that she believed was not right to be worn at a particular moment, and she would without hesitation grab me by my hair and start dragging me in the house, unmindful that my friends were gathered around watching us.

When tears start to roll down my face, my friends would stand one by one as though they knew that the tears were the cue for them to leave.  They did leave me. I watched sadly as their backs turned on me; and prayed that the following day in school I would receive comfort from them.  And always, my friend’s eyes would acknowledge me with understanding and they would talk to me as though they had not experienced mother’s tumultuous outbreak.  They knew that the incident was not something I wanted discussed.  The friendly smiles on their faces and the gentle pats of their comforting hands were all I needed.

My mother scared our neighbors as well. On many occasions, they heard her wrath usually towards my step-father Paul or I, and this I never understood why we were the “chosen ones” for her wrath during my teenage years. Later in life, after most of my siblings were estranged from her, she chose to pick on my mentally ill younger sister, Ella. Even on the phone in another state, I could hear her in the background, mentally and emotionally abusing Ella. I saw her more than once drag Ella around by the hair, and I never was able to rescue Ella. My little sister ended up with my mother’s wrath until my mother died. Even on the phone, in a different state, hearing my mother yell and scream and abuse my sister, it brought back all that she had done to me in years past, and the fact that even in her early 80’s she remained very abusive and that was why I kept a “Protection From Abuse” court order on her, so she could not contact me, email me, write me letters, or go through Ella to get to me.

I had three step-brothers, Levi, Isaac and Wyatt Hunter. My mother treated them better as they were larger stronger men and she did not beat on them. However, she also did not really want them in the home she now shared with my step-father Paul Hunter. My mother and Paul really weren’t together very long and the very day Levi turned age 18 years she banged on his bedroom door and ordered him to “pack up and leave”! Levi was forced to leave then and there. Isaac already was living out in the country with another family per his choice and that left only Wyatt at home. Wyatt eventually left as well and he moved in with his mother.

Later in life, after most of my siblings were estranged from her, she chose to pick on my mentally ill younger sister, Ella.  Even on the phone in another state, I could hear her in the background, mentally and emotionally abusing Ella.  I saw her more than once drag Ella around by the hair, and I never was able to rescue Ella.  My little sister ended up with my mother’s wrath until my mother died. Even on the phone, in a different state, hearing my mother yell and scream and abuse my sister, it brought back all that she had done to me in years past, and the fact that even in her early 80’s she remained very abusive and that was why I kept a “Protection From Abuse” court order on her, so she could not contact me, email me, write me letters, or go through Ella to get to me.

As I grew more mature, I became stronger and more open-minded and there were even moments when I felt like I could handle any challenge that might come my way.  And maybe in a way, I did.  Because after the devastation that came with each blow, I stood up more limber and supple, ready to bend and play along the hurdles of life.