OK when we first got this assignment, I had a totally different topic picked out that I was going to talk about. I never really felt like that topic was something that I wanted to write about but I could not think of anything else, so I just keep praying and putting off writing it. Then today when I got home from work my dad told me that Nathaniel’s Care Page had been up-dated. Now you are all probally wondering who Nathaniel is so I will re-cap.
Nathaniel Steven Wildeboer is my cousin Angela and her husband Steve’s son. Nathaniel is 19 months old now, when he was 15 months old he was diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor. It is an extremely rare kind. Out of all the different kinds of brain tumors, only two percent of people will receive this kind. There is not a whole lot that the doctors can do. Because Nathaniel is so young they cannot do chemo radiation, which is the only kind that really has a chance of stopping this disease. They were able to give him chemo in a different form and after many surgeries (to drain the tumor and place a shunt in his brain) things were starting to look up. They were even able to go home last month for about 2 weeks. When they were home, Nathaniel got a fever and ended up hospitalized with a dangerous respiratory illness that he did not recover in time with for them to go ahead with the second round of chemo. He is currently in the Children’s Stollery Hospital in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. In the last few weeks Nathaniel has not been doing well. They have him on a constant morphine drip because of all the pain. The doctors were guessing that the shunt that they placed in his brain to drain the fluid was not working and they also thought that the tumor had grown in size and was placing pressure on his brain. Nathaniel was constantly throwing up and there was nothing that my cousin could do to cheer him up. They were finally able to go today to get a MRI and the results were not good. They found that the shunt is clogged and that he quite possibly has another tumor on his brain and he has something pooling on his spine. They are going to have to do a more detailed MRI to determine the exact cause.
The reason that I am talking about this is because during the four months I have never had to put so much trust in God. I am learning that through God is the only way that Nathaniel is going to beat this cancer. His parents have said right form the beginning of this procedure that as soon as things look like they are not in Nathaniel’s favor they are going to quite. (This is because the chemo is such a harsh treatment, he gets all sores in his mouth and digestive track, the chemo has wicked side effects.) Angela and Steve now have to decide how much they want to put their son through. They can decide to put him through round after round of chemo, but chemo is all ready proving that it does help a little but not enough to keep the cancer under control. They also have to decide if they are giving up too early. When Nathaniel was first diagnosed they were told that he had a year to live. One in ten children live form this kind of brain tumor and the hospital that he is at now has never had one survive from it.
I have never prayed so much in the last months. I pray that God will strength the family, perform a miracle in the life of Nathaniel, comfort Nathaniel’s older brother who does not see a lot of his family and baby brother, and I pray that God will be with Ang and Steve and comfort them and give them what they need to get through this. I am learning the hard way that all my trust needs to be placed in Him and He is the only one. I have leaned that the doctors are smart but I have to believe in God and that He is in control not the doctors. I have to trust that God knows what is best and that He will never give us more than we can bear.
