Editor’s Note: We’re honored to share the following article from our friends at the Courageous Parents Network. To see this article in its original format, please click here.

Parents will do almost anything to prevent their children from suffering. But what if all your efforts, plans, and prayers can’t prevent it? How does a parent attempt to come to terms with this? Could I find peace amid my child’s suffering?

On October 23, 2024, my son called me from the hospital in Boston and tried to break the news to me gently and in pieces. Even in his time of life-threatening illness and terror, he still thought about his mother with compassion, knowing what he was about to say would break my heart.

“Mom, it’s not good….”

“We have to be prepared for the worst…”

“There’s a massive tumor in my chest…”

“They’re doing tests…”

“Can you come?”

I lost composure, sobbed, and repeated over and over, “This isn’t fair, this isn’t right, you’ve had enough suffering.”

And then my mind searched for answers.

“Why is this happening?”

I was transported back to when my son was 10 years old and broke his femur. I remembered how we were at Children’s Hospital in D.C. in the middle of the night, with the ER doctor standing on the other side of his bed and saying that an oncologist would come in the morning to evaluate a cyst that was discovered on his femur.

The accident happened on the exact same date that two years earlier, at the tender age of eight, my son had endured the unimaginable – alone and helpless as his dad died from a heart attack in front of him.

Now on the phone with my son, both of us flooded with shock and fear, I tried to process what he had just relayed – cancer.

I talked to God and resurrected the same bargain as 18 years ago: if You take my son, You will lose me. If he lives, I will continue to work for Your good. If not, I’m done. You decide, as You always do.

I had not been able to protect my young child from suffering, and I wasn’t ready to accept more now. I repeated the same admonition to God: Don’t You dare add more suffering to my baby’s life.

The cyst on my 10-year old son’s femur was not cancerous. But this time, 18 years later, he did have cancer: Hodgkin’s Lymphoma Stage 4. Both our lives would be interrupted by this diagnosis and once again we would have to endure and grapple with suffering.

After the initial weeks of hospitalization and oncology appointments, I returned to my home in North Carolina to take our family dog, Vinny, to the vet because of a persistent limp. When the vet told me Vinny had cancer, it was almost unbelievable! Why would God add more suffering to our lives now? Why would God take so much from us? My son traveled home, so we could both be present for the euthanasia. We were only able to love Vinny together for a few more days before returning to Boston for chemotherapy.

In Boston, my son and I rented a 2-bedroom apartment so that I could be with him as much as possible during his 6 months of chemotherapy. He was stoic during the every-other-week infusions. There wasn’t much complaining or conversation, just quiet togetherness. All of his energy was put towards the fight for his life, and he quietly dealt with the debilitating side effects of chemotherapy. I could do little more than help in small ways, like walking to Market Basket and preparing healthy and palatable meals.

It seemed implausible, but the physical suffering of cancer and chemotherapy appeared manageable in comparison to the suffering my son endured as a result of his childhood trauma, until about a month after starting chemotherapy, when he contracted a rare pneumonia. This complication caused him more excruciating pain, weakness, and air hunger than he had experienced up to this point and meant a delay in his course of treatment. Pneumonia was scary enough, but having to postpone chemotherapy was equally terrifying. My son barely talked to me during my daily hospital visits, but I could feel his anger percolating, which reminded me of the ever-present shame associated with his post-traumatic stress from his youth. I wondered if he blamed himself for choosing to go on an outdoor outing with his friends during which he probably caught this pneumonia. I wondered if this was another instance amid a life-threatening event when he worried about his mom and felt guilty about my added stress.

Or maybe his anger was meant for me. For bringing him into a life that brought him so much pain and suffering. Just like when he was younger, I hated the impotence of not being able to ease his psychological and physical suffering. How could I go from being so powerful as an expectant mother who had the ability to create and sustain life, to a role as powerless as the mother of a child with cancer? My son was weak, sick and tormented, and I could do next to nothing.

Maybe it’s different for other parents, but for me, one of my life-long parenting lessons is this: I am powerless to take away my child’s suffering. I can only bear witness to it without looking away. I can only try to do better every day while simultaneously letting the results come as they would. I hated the helplessness I felt during his year-long ordeal with cancer as much as I did when he was younger. Peace is elusive.

But my son wasn’t a child anymore. He was a brilliant and capable young adult. It was such a gift that I could trust his medical knowledge and ability to take care of himself during his cancer journey. He navigated the medical system and insurance issues skillfully and consistently. In measurable ways, he had more success attending to his health than I ever did, and I hope there was some underlying healing in this for him. For example, through his contacts he was able to switch from one Boston medical institution to Dana Farber Cancer Institute where he was referred to an exceptional oncologist whose bedside manner equaled her medical expertise. I was thankful to observe my son’s development as an adult even under extreme circumstances: when the parent lets go, the child takes the baton.

I had always thought that if I was smart enough or tried hard enough, I could ensure that my son would be happy and healthy. His life was not supposed to be riddled with suffering, nor his body with cancer. I had treated my body as a temple while I was pregnant, nursed my baby for over a year, and made his food from organic ingredients. We had a running joke about his first birthday cake, which was made with tofu and no sugar. After preschool, we had our lunch on the floor in our living room under a tent made from sheets draped over chairs, a little cocoon where we could come together after our morning separation. After his afternoon nap, we went to the train station, because what could be better than watching the real-life incarnation of Thomas the Tank Engine that delivered his dad home after his workday?

I thought all of these nurturing things would matter and foster a happy, healthy child. When my husband was alive, we mused about all the wonderful things our son would experience and all the joy he brought to us. And while there were many beautiful love-filled moments, there was also more suffering than any child should have to endure. And it seemed like I could barely ease even a tiny bit of it for him.

There were times when I wondered if his cancer was my punishment for not being a good enough mother. For not being able to ease his suffering after his dad died. For adding to his suffering because of my profound grief.

But through grace, I have come to know that cancer is not my punishment. And cancer certainly isn’t my son’s punishment for anything.

He did not cause his traumas. And he is not to blame for his subsequent grief and suffering. I want my son to know – deep within the nucleus of every cell in his body – that he did not deserve to get cancer. I want my son to know that he is a good person and he deserves to live a healthy and happy life.

Courage, I’ve learned, doesn’t always lead to success. Sometimes it looks like showing up to another hospital room, bringing home groceries, taking care of a pet. I could not cure my son. I couldn’t undo the trauma he’d already experienced. But I could witness. I could keep loving him through every version of powerlessness a mother can feel.

If there is courage in this story, it’s not that I fixed anything – it’s that I didn’t give up, even without the promise of an ending that would bring me peace.