magic and miracles

I've said it before, Kristina Braverman, from the show Parenthood is living my life.  Last night's episode about split me wide open.  Kristina, who is battling breast cancer,  is about 10 days past her last infusion and she starts to have a cough.  But she so desperately wants the kids to have the "best Christmas ever," she valiantly pushes on- dismissing her husband's inquiry if she is okay.

What's not said, what can only be inferred, is that she wonders if this could be her last Christmas?

It's the middle of the night, Christmas Eve day, when she awakens with a raging fever.  Her immune system has no ability to fight off the infection and she has gone septic in a matter of hours.  I was literally squirming the entire time I watched.

And then Adam her husband, while watching her try to fight in the ICU, decides to watch "the video" she has left for her kids... you know, the one she has made, "in case something happens to her." My heart shatters as she voices the words that have played out in my head.  I could have written those words myself.  My own version, written a short time ago, here.

In case you missed it... but please know its pretty emotionally charged.



How do you gain perspective when cancer and Christmas intersect?  I've been wondering myself, as I prepare for infusion, on Christmas Eve.  It seems, nothing is sacred when it comes to cancer and treatment.

But its Kristina's father-in-law, Zeke, played by Craig Nelson who hammers home the message of hope.  He is trying to explain to his skeptical grand kids why he still believes in Santa Claus.  He tells a story of "running into him, and seeing with his own eyes."  "I still believe," he says, "Santa is real and Christmas is magic.  Christmas brings miracles. If you keep looking, keep watching, you will see."

With the strength of conviction in his voice and his abiding faith in the seen and unseen, I breathed a little easier.  Kristina would recover.  Christmas would be joy filled.

And me?

I will keep looking, keep watching and I know that I will see, too.