Beginning a New Chapter

Tonight, along with several hundred family and friends, we celebrated Gage’s crossing the finish line of 3+ years of treatment for leukemia. It was an incredible evening, and I’m sure I’ll post pictures later. For now, I wanted to post Blake’s words that he shared with all in attendance and a new website for supporting our endeavors at Children’s: www.childrens.com/TeamHolmes.  Thanks for walking this road with us…

Blake’s words…

On October 30, 2000, I became a daddy for the first time.  Avery was born, and I considered myself the most blessed man in the world.

Avery’s birth began a new chapter in my and Rebecca’s life.  It was a chapter filled with the normal ups and downs of parenthood.  Learning how to adjust to less sleep, changing diapers and the realization that there is no greater responsibility than being a parent.  I remember the simple days of pushing her on the swing, going on walks together and reading to her at night.

As great as this time was, something my father-in-law said the day Avery was born always stuck out to me.  He simply said, “Now that you are a parent, you will know what it means to feel vulnerable.”  At first, his comment struck me as odd.  Several years later, I would feel the impact of his words in a way that I never thought possible.

Fast-forward two years.  Rebecca and I moved back to Dallas, and the Lord blessed us with our second child, a little boy we named Gage.  Just two short years later, Ellie was born.  How could a man be any more blessed?  I was now the proud daddy of three adorable and healthy children.

My children’s health was something I always took for granted.  Sure, they experienced a few bumps and bruises along the way, but nothing too serious.

All of that changed on June 21, 2007.  On that day, I received a phone call from Gage’s pediatrician.  His words are permanently seared in my memory: “Blake, I have the results of Gage’s blood test . . . He has leukemia.”  “Leukemia?” I asked.  “Yes, Blake.  Cancer . . . ” he responded.  My world immediately stood still, and fear gripped my heart.

This began a new chapter in my family’s life.  Very quickly, we were introduced to a world we had never given any serious thought to, the Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders at Children’s Medical Center, Dallas.  Soon, abbreviations like ALL, ANC, 6MP, Dex and LP became a regular part of our vocabulary.  Whether we liked it or not, we were no longer immune to the far-reaching tentacles of cancer.  It wasn’t “someone else’s child” who was sick.  It was my own. And, 3 months into Gage’s treatment, our daughter Wesley was born.  Avery would later make the comment: “God gave us Wesley to cheer us up.”

I remember thinking to myself, how could I have lived in Dallas my whole life and yet been so oblivious to the needs of so many children battling for their lives in the fight against cancer?  Believe it or not, one in four new childhood cancer cases in Texas is treated at Children’s.  Furthermore, more than 90 children undergo treatment for cancer and blood disorders every day at Children’s.

I often compare Children’s Medical Center to the fire department.  You hardly even think about the fire department until it is your family that is in need of help.  Then, when it is your house on fire, you expect the men to be well trained and to have the most up-to-date equipment at their disposal.  When my house “caught fire” with Gage’s diagnosis on June 21, 2007, I was grateful to find Children’s Medical Center just a few miles away from my home.

What I have learned over the past 3 plus years is that, thanks to previous generations of generous donors, Children’s Medical Center is filled with some of the best trained medical staff this world has to offer.  Yet, its facility is maxed out.  Tragically, the number of cancer patients needing care exceeds the space they have to care for children in the best possible manner.

Tonight, we are here first and foremost to celebrate.  To celebrate the closing of a chapter for my family now that Gage is no longer under going the daily grind of chemotherapy.  We are also here to celebrate the love and faithfulness of our friends.  Your support, encouragement, and most of all, your prayers, have sustained us in ways I cannot possibly begin to explain.  And, finally, we are here to ask for your support in an effort to offer hope and a helping hand to families battling childhood cancer.

Over the past three years, you have joined with us to raise over $300,000 for Children’s.  With your help, families like ours have been touched by your generosity through the funding of a full time Child Life Specialist, the clown program and mobile game carts.  These endeavors have all contributed to the emotional and relational needs of patients by providing a “human touch” to a long and grueling protocol of needles and medications.  While you are here this evening, I encourage you to learn more about what we have done by watching the video playing on the screens.

This year, we have the opportunity to do more.  We are asking for your help to raise an additional $100,000 in an effort to expand the Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders.  With your help, the hospital will be able to increase the number of inpatient rooms, relocate the outpatient clinic and complete the construction of a full-service pharmacy for children battling cancer.

Tonight’s event has been completely underwritten by family and close friends so that every dollar you contribute will go directly to the hospital.  Moreover, through the Mabee Foundation challenge grant, a percentage of your contribution will be matched.

Would you please consider making a donation before you leave tonight?  We have made this easy for you to do.  Please take one of the cards in front of you, fill it out and turn it in to any one of the volunteers you see wearing a Children’s Medical Center T-shirt. Or you may visit www.childrens.com/TeamHolmes to make a donation.

What does the next chapter look like for Gage and our family?  Thankfully, he will no longer receive chemotherapy and endure its painful side effects as he has done every day for the past 3 plus years.  Soon, he will enter into Children’s “After the Cancer Experience” Program.  While in this program, he will be closely monitored.  God willing, the cancer will not return.  Two years from now, should he remain cancer free, the doctors will then declare him cured.  As always, we covet your prayers as we enter into this new chapter of our lives.

I hope and pray that your family will never need to enter into the world of pediatric cancer, but if you do, you will be grateful that people chose to give generously so that Dallas could be home to one of the finest pediatric cancer centers in the world.

Today, on several doors outside of patients’ rooms at Children’s you will find plaques with a reference to Habakkuk 3:14-15.  It reads: “Though the fig tree should not blossom, and there be no fruit on the vines, though the yield of the olive should fail, and the fields produce no food, though the flock should be cut off from the fold, and there be no cattle in the stalls, Yet I will exult in the Lord, I will rejoice in the God of my salvation.  The Lord God is my strength, and He has made my feet like hind’s feet, and makes me walk on my high places.”

Thank you for the many ways you have reminded us of this truth, for making an effort to be with us tonight, and for your generous support.