Another note from my sister, in thanks for all of your comments here…

Thank you all for all the love and support; and thank you to my beautiful big sister.

We are at BC Children’s Hospital this week getting further prognoses for Tanner, a measure of the time we have left…

It is funny… I thought a lot today, as we met doctor after doctor, did test after test… though for me it was exhausting, Tanner was upbeat and inquisitive the whole time… He asked EVERY technician conducting the tests, is it good or bad? He was unabashed in his questions – he asked “why are you covering my testicles with lead?” The blushing technician explained why and Tanner’s response was immediate: “it doesn’t matter because I’m not going to have kids“… I am almost peed my pants laughing, which might seem (to someone who doesn’t know him or us) as slightly off-color… but he said it with humor and honesty and it immediately put the technician at ease. You see, everyone that sees him there knows his prognosis and they try to, understandably, tread softly. Tanner has the gift to engage, he is relentless in his curiosity and if you have met him, you know that he asks very direct and honest questions… about life, about death and about how many trains and planes you actually know the name of… (you would be surprised how many there are.)

And so another life lesson for me has been reaffirmed: be honest, be curious, seek to understand, just like when we were kids… Laugh, and I mean like really laugh… from your belly like a child does… until your sides hurt.

Still, amidst those moments of giggles today,  I did experience the grief of knowing again, knowing that he’s going to die, and it felt like vertigo. I am afraid I will be changed in that moment, when it comes, that I will be changed… that I will not be same.  I will have to find that place where he will only exist in my heart and soul… someone compared it to listening for the ocean in a conch shell. I can hear that ocean clearly; for now, I stand right beside it and I just breathe it in.  Then I hugged him even harder.

Really big hugs back to all of you too