Recently, as I put the littlest boys into bed, Chase stripped his shirt as he often does, referring to his white chest as his “rockin’ body’. As he passed across the room towards his bed, Karsten came to stand in front of him, stopping him, and asking with quiet interest, “Hey, Chase, what are those lines?” His small, chubby hand raised energetically to point at the slashes of central line scars that cover Chase’s upper chest on both sides.
For one small second, I held my breath. I wanted to jump in and explain. I wanted to “make it better” and take it away as I watched Chase begin to recoil. He hates questions about his physical appearance. And some days, I hate that all the kids know these strange and awful cancer-y things. But then, Chase stood up a little straighter, pressing out of his curve and removed the hand he’d used to quickly cover the scars, bringing his chest into the light.
“Karsten, do you know what these are?
Karsten shook his head and waited patiently as Chase puffed himself up with the self-importance of a sibling about to teach a great lesson.
“These are from my needles and surgeries.”
“Surgeries?”
“Yes. They’re from my cancer and my chemo. Do you know what chemo is?”
“Yes! He’s in the closet!” Karsten ran to the closet and scooped up Chemo Duck, bringing him back and placing him in Chase’s outstretched arms. “Here, Chase. Here’s Chemo. He’s probably a duck.” To Karsten, who was only 8 months old on the fateful day in 2012, “chemo” is just the name of a stuffed animal, not a torturous experience. I waited. Knowing what to say next was best left to Chase. Sometimes the simple dialogue between brothers is a thousand times more useful than maternal wisdom could ever be.
He nodded gravely. “Thanks, Karsten, but there was more chemo. From the doctors. And now look…” he flexed his arm in the air, looking up at it proudly. “Look at my muscles. Chemo gave me good muscles.”
At which point, I felt the need to interject and redirect. Some days memory doesn’t come easily for him. “Chase, the chemo killed your cancer cells.”
He nodded as if he’d known all along. “Yep. And my hair too. But now it’s coming back. See, Karsten?”
He flexed again as Karsten watched the whole show in somewhat awed silence. And then Chase stopped and looked at me.
“Hey, Mom? The doctors didn’t make me. I forget…who made me?”
I ruffled his whispy-soft head. “God did, my sweet boy.”
He nodded yet again. “Oh, that’s right. Good. I’m glad.”
Karsten jumped up and down at my side. “Me too! Me too!”
And then the moment of deep attention was lost and the boys went back to getting ready for bed and intermittently wrestling, for that is what most small boys love to do.
But I saw this amazing moment unfold before my eyes. Our history and our scars can hurt, can be shameful, stressful, and sad, but in the rehearsing of them, the telling of them to others, the owning of them, they point us to God in such unique ways.
Rejoice in your scars . . . moment by moment.
