Every Little Bit

I don't send those annoying chain-letteresque emails or participate in the forwards that carry subject lines like:
Fw: Fw: Fw: Fw: Fw: REad THIS ITS Histerically hylarious, REALLY!!!!! Nor do I tag people for those monotonous lists on Facebook. I am much more likely to send an email that has a few quick lines about being bad about staying in touch yadda yadda yadda.

Pardon me as I jump around here, the other night I was doing some research for a meeting with a client in the health care industry. I was in the midst of some search or another on Twitter and I found someone locally discussing a cancer diagnosis, Hepatoblastoma to be precise. I followed the link and to my horror found that it was a little girl.

Charlotte.

Charlotte is not yet two, but to read about her on the blog her parents have, a universal parenting truth is evident. Two years is nothing, days within a lifetime really, and yet, in those first years our lives are changed so profoundly, that we live a lifetime in each day. We watch breathlessly as personalities unfold, as each dawn brings a new shimmer to a smile. Their hair grows, their teeth march proudly into their smiles, goofy one minute, breathtaking the next. They make new sounds, respond to us differently and then one day they plant that first deliberate kiss on you and you feel as if you might burst from the perfection of it.

Our nights, once carefree and with limitless possibilities, become sprints to meals and bath time, stories and cuddles. We wonder where the time goes even as we shake our heads at the thought that we had ever experienced joy before being parents. We live our children, dedicated to them, rooted in them and, for some, defined by them.

To say that reading about a diagnosis like this knocks the wind out of me doesn't begin to describe it. I wrote to Charlotte's dad that night and asked if I could try to help. I asked for permission to link to their site in the hope of sending people their way. I don't know what you can do to help from where you are, but I'd imagine that visiting their site and reading Charlotte's story, maybe even leaving a comment would be worth something.

This sweet family is facing the battle of a lifetime and the thought of them doing it alone tortures me. Please go and help create a circle around them. Every little bit adds up to something very big.