A Setback?
7 Sources Of Power!
‘Where is your husband?’ The head nurse came into the room. I stood by our son. His second birthday that day. My husband had just left to get some cake. As a bold of lightning she went after him.
The pediatrician didn’t have good news. Leukemia.
Well, what do you do? I can only tell you from my own experience. You never know how you will react when you get news like that. Because that reaction comes directly out of your system, you don’t think about it.
After the first words of the doctor, the tears came. Lot’s of them. We where completely caught off guard. Of course we had taken into account the possibility that our son could be seriously ill, but this…
After this first, short conversation with the doctor we went back to the ward. To our son. My tears where gone. After all I had to take care of him now. The head nurse had arranged for our son to come back the next day. To the department of oncology. That day we were allowed to take him home to celebrate his birthday.
After this day our lives completely got upside down. Besides the care for our son we had to take care of our three businesses. Fortunately the treatment well. Three months on the oncology ward and then two years chemo ‘from home’. It was a tough period, in which we achieved so much: the strength to persevere, the ability to keep things in perspective, learning how to deal with strong emotions, to really exist in the moment, to keep confident and to cooperate.
During all the treatments our son was so strong. He was always cheerful, no matter how awful the drugs were or how sick he was. Nowadays, children with cancer get the ‘Kanjerketting’ for all their treatments. For every shot, every dose of medicine and every treatment the child gets a nice bead. A wonderful initiative by ‘Vereniging Ouders, Kinderen en Kanker’ [VOKK]. If our son had such a chain, it would have been veeeeery long! We are so proud of him! Through him we had the strength to stay positive.
Until the age of seven he has had intensive health checks regularly. After that he was checked for late effects until the age of 13. When his doctor retired, we finally said goodbye to his entire medical history and this fase in our lives. Now he is a healthy adolescent, age 17.
During the time that our son was so ill, there were seven sources of power for me. I like to share them with you…
#1
Don’t blame anyone
That makes no sense at all. Because you can’t change anything about the situation. And for that matter: don’t get distracted by the people surrounding you. People with lots of different opinions. It helped us a lot to use all our energy in a positive and constructive way.
#2
Listen to your feelings
If you think something isn’t right, say it. Ask, tell the doctors what you feel and be persistent. An additional verification or an extra explanation never hurts. Not only in all the tests, but also in the treatments and medicines we repeatedly intervened, asked questions and insisted on extra research. Because our feelings told us so.
#3
Accept the situation
This is very difficult, but it is the only thing that can be done. And by accepting the situation you do not say that it is ‘good’. But you can look the situation right in the face. And go for the healing of your child. How difficult it was for us to deal with… it was like it was and nothing else.
#4
Keep confident
Rely on a good outcome, especially when it comes to your child. Children are good at picking up signals. So if you are constantly worried, your child feels your worries. And that does no good to the healing of your child.
#5
Take good care of yourself
Talk to someone. Write everything down. Your emotional process is important. I myself kept a diary which has helped me tremendously. Even when everything was over.
#6
Together you are strong
In such a stressful period your relationship is under tremendous pressure. Keep talking to each other. Communicate and work together. Also keep looking for ways to release the tension. Every day we told each other a good joke…
#7
Celebrate each step
Praise your child. Every time. To be positively engaged works, especially for yourself. We celebrated with streamers, fun activities or a little something extra. Children in this situation get a lot of strength out of fixed habits and positive attention. You can make a small contribution to this by supporting ‘Kanjerketting’. Please visit www.kanjerketting.nl
A stressful period such as a seriously ill child has a lot of impact on your life. If you go through such a tough period right now, I wish you much strength. I hope my tips will give you extra power!
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Helmy Kleinlugtenbeld
Life Coach, trainer, organizer, coordinator, entrepreneur and mother of two. Born ‘at the billiards’ as they say. From childhood I experienced the challenges entrepreneurs face. With the NAC model of Tony Robbins I’ll teach you to look through a different lens, explore possibilities and focus. Let’s connect on Facebook, Twitter , LinkedIn and positiefzakendoen.nl
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