My friend once told me a heartbreaking story.

As is typical of mothers with school-aged children, she had befriended the mother of one of her son’s classmates, a frail and innocent young girl. During a chance sighting on the street, her family doctor had noticed her paleness and had suggested that her mother bring her in for testing. The day after the results were received, she was admitted to the hospital with leukaemia, but the family, at first, tried to remain optimistic with a 75% positive prognosis.

Little by little, her health and hope for recovery dwindled, like wisps of smoke disappearing into thin air. No one who had volunteered samples for a bone marrow transplant was compatible with her, and her condition had deteriorated so much that the doctors refused to register her on the international list for bone marrow donors.

With summer came the girl’s sixth birthday. She was all skin and bones and had to wear diapers for lack of control over her bodily functions. The night she died, she called her father to come to her. She asked him to take off her diapers and bring her to the toilet because she didn’t want “to be a baby anymore.” While she was sitting there, held up by her dad, she said, “Daddy, do you know how much I love you?” and clung to his neck for strength and comfort. She died right there in his arms.

My friend’s son, who was only five, didn’t want to believe that she had really died, because she was just a kid and kids weren’t supposed to die. He needed to hear it directly from his friend’s Mom, and so he climbed in her lap and asked, “Is it really true? Did she really die?” Through the tears, she answered that it was true.

After thinking for a minute, he said, “You know those bones that stuck out of her back?”

In a simple, down to earth way, her mother answered, “Well, you know she was really thin and weak at the end, and you could see her shoulder blades.”

“No,” he insisted, “you know those bones, those were her wings that were growing, because now she’s an angel.”

*****

You could save a life through bone marrow donation to leukemia victims. Read more about it here.