The scariest experience I’ve had

Two years ago, my then eight year old son was ill. We did not know what was wrong. He had stomachaches with the symptoms that go along with that illness. It started on a Friday night and finally by Sunday afternoon he had some other symptoms that worried us. So we took him to the emergency room.


They ran tests including ultrasound, blood work and CT scan of his abdomen. His blood work was abnormal and he was admitted to the hospital. At 2 am Monday morning, his Pediatrician called and told us they found a mass in his abdomen. My wife freaked out. Our doctor told us my son would need to be transferred to a children’s hospital. So at 6 am the doctor was in our room examining him again and asking us where we wanted to have him transferred. The decision was made to go to Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital in St. Louis. By 8 am, we were on the ambulance heading to St. Louis.

Once we got there, we spent another seven hours in their emergency room. We had so many medical students, residents, and physicians come and go we did not know what end was up. They kept thinking that he had sustained an injury to his abdomen. He kept saying no, just that it hurt and he could not pinpoint an area that did hurt.

Finally, he was admitted to the hospital. The next day they did an MRI and found what they felt was a softball sized tumor on his pancreas. I was terrified. My little boy was so small and all I could think of was that cancer is so rampant in my family; it could not get to my son so young. The doctor told us he would have to do exploratory surgery to know for sure. The surgery was scheduled for the next day. Let me tell you that was the most terrifying and sleepless night I have ever had. Then the day of the surgery came. My little guy was nervous and upset. My wife and I kept telling him everything will be okay. Jesus would be in the operating room with him. He believed us. I was very hard to reassure him when we were crumbling inside. Two hours later the doctor came out and told us the mass they thought was solid was really his under formed lymph nodes had collected lymphatic fluid which did not have anywhere to go. I felt like a million tons were lifted off my shoulders. We cried and thanked the surgeon for taking good care of our son.

Today, he is doing fine. He has been written about in medical journals. We thank God every day for the health of our sons, because we saw some children in that hospital who were in truth much, much sicker than my son.