Alan's Angels

Welcome to my website in memory and honor of my stepbrother, Alan Winegarden, 1/20/80-10/25/04.

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Only A Moment

How quietly he tiptoed into our world
Softly, only a moment he stayed
But what an imprint his footprints
Have left upon our hearts.

~Author Unknown

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Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some people move our souls to dance. They awaken us to a new understanding with the passing whisper of their wisdom. Some people make the sky more beautiful to gaze upon. They stay in our lives for awhile, leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never, ever the same.

~Flavia Weedn

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The Rose Still Blooms

A rose once grew where all could see,
sheltered beside a garden wall,
And, as the days passed swiftly by,
it spread its branches,
straight and tall,
One Day, a beam of light shone through
a crevice that had opened wide--
The rose bent gently toward its warmth
then passed beyond to the other side.

Now you who deeply feel its loss,
be comforted--the rose blooms there.
Its beauty even greater now,
nurtured by God’s own loving care.

Many people enter our lives for just a little while--
others pause and plant flowers in our hearts
that continue to bloom forever.

Each day adds a flower to the beautiful bouquet of warm
and special memories we gathered along the way.
If a bud burst into bloom every time I thought of you,
All the earth would be a glorious garden.

~Catherine Atkinson

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I created this page as a tribute to Alan's courageous fight against rhabdomyosarcoma. At the age of 23, Alan was diagnosed with this rare childhood cancer (alveolar type, stage 3, pelvic region). The tumor was very big and apparently the biggest one Sloan Kettering has ever seen. Alan had eight rounds of chemo, surgery, radiation, and then experimental chemo. He fought a great fight for 21 months. Alan taught me more in those months than I have learned in my entire life. He never complained and took each day with what it had to offer. We are now Alan's Angels and hope to make him proud of us. I am keeping this page to honor and remember Alan. I thank all those who have been so supportive throughout this journey and now that my journey continues without Alan. Thank you for visiting. I will try to update the journal periodically to let you know what is going on in my fight to raise childhood cancer awareness and to eradicate this horrible disease.

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Donate money to alveolar rhabdomyosarcoma reserch at UPenn by visiting this website. September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Visit Candlelighters, Childhood Cancer Foundation to purchase gold ribbon pins.

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Journal

Tuesday, November 18, 2008 7:57 PM CST

Just had to share this poem:

I HOPE...

I hope you never have to hear the words, "Your child has cancer."

I hope you never have to hear, "The prognosis is not good."

I hope you never have to prepare to undergo radiation or chemotherapy,
have a port surgically inserted into their chest, be connected to IV poles.

I hope you never have your child look at you with fear in their eyes and
say, "Don't worry Mommy, everything will be okay" or "Mommy am I going
to die?"

I hope you never have to hold your child as they vomit green bile.

I hope you never have to feed them ice chips for lunch.

I hope you never have to watch the "cure" you pray for slowly take away
their identity, as they lose their hair,
become skeletal, swell up from steroids, develop severe acne, become
barely or unable to walk or move, and look at you with hope in their
eyes and say,
"It's going to be okay, Mommy."

I hope that you never have to stay in the hospital for weeks, months, or
years at a time, where there is no privacy, sleeping on a slab, with
your face to the wall, where you cry in muffled silence.

I hope you never have to see a mother, alone, huddled, in a dark
hospital corridor...crying quietly, after just being told, "There is
nothing more we can do."

I hope you never have to watch a family wander aimlessly, minutes after
their child's body has been removed.

I hope you never have to use every bit of energy you have left, with all
of this going on around you to remain positive, and the feelings of
guilt, sorrow, hope and fear, overwhelm you.

I hope you never have to see a child's head bolted to the table as they
receive radiation.

I hope you never have to take your child home (grateful but so afraid)
in a wheelchair because the chemo and radiation has damaged their
muscles, 35 pounds lighter, pale, bald, and scarred.

And they look at you with faith in their eyes and say, "It's going to be
okay Mommy."

I hope you never have to face the few friends that have stuck beside you
and hear them say, "Thank God that is over with,"...because you know it
never will be.

Your life becomes a whirl of doctors, blood tests and MRI's and you try
to get your life back to "normal".

While living in mind-numbing fear that any one of those tests could
result in hearing the dreaded words...

"The cancer has returned" or "The tumor is growing."

And your friends become even fewer.

I hope you never have to experience any of these things...Because...only
then...

Will you understand...

(author unknown)

Hospital Information:

At Peace in Heaven

Links:

E-mail Author: randigoblue@comcast.net

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