Dejah, The Warrior

Posted on October 5, 2018 by Blog Woman!!!

This is a re-post for my dear friend, Glo, in tribute to the amazing life and soul of her baby, and their loved ones. It’s hard to believe it’s been 5 years. Already. I can’t say exactly how it feels for Gloria, Robert & Rayne, but I would like them to know we remember with them. We share in their heartrending memories and in support of their amazing capacity to move forward in strength, purpose and love for each other and for life. They couldn’t live a better legacy for their son and brother…

I hardly know this young boy who impacted my life and so many others so profoundly. What kid is all that interested in their mother’s friends anyway? And so, I came to know him mostly through her, our Glo.

She is that quintessential statement of strength and courage, which can almost sound like a cliché, but it isn’t when it’s applied to a parent facing one of our worst fears. Which is what happened to her and she, true to character, faced that nightmare fully and head-on.

He was only three years old when they were told he had cancer. It was horribly bad news. Most kids who get this kind of cancer have a pretty good outlook, but for some the challenge will push to the limit. This was to be the case for him.

I can’t imagine having to look at my baby’s sweet innocent face, and into his trusting eyes, knowing what they knew was to come for their son, and try to prepare for that. How unbearable could it have felt to know the awful truth of what was in store in some ways, and not have any idea or certainty about anything else?

The only thing that turned out to be absolutely certain is that this kid had something else too – a hell of a fighting spirit. Those innocent eyes masked a strength that could rival a grown man’s, and that was good because he used it fully. It was what carried him beyond the lines of expectation.

As it turned out, his backup arsenal was also beyond outstanding. His shield of steel was the love and faith of his mother, and his dad and sister were the center of his phalanx.

Phalanx is a perfect word for his story. I’d stumbled around for a while looking for a way to describe all the people who joined the power of this boy’s circle. My son said, “That sounds like you’re talking about a phalanx, mom”. I asked what that was exactly. After he explained, I thought yes, that’s exactly what they are.

A phalanx is defined as a compact or close-knit body of people, a formation of infantry carrying overlapping shields and long spears. Perfect. That’s what they were – overlapping shields of love and spears of hope. The rest of that foundation was formidably filled out by all the family and friends who rallied around them.

No matter their role as those weapons of love and hope, every one of them, including the calvary of determined medical personnel was there in common spirit. All were there to throw everything they could at that God-damned tumour.

They did it well for ten amazing years. It wasn’t a smooth trip for sure, but they fought those ups and downs with purpose. He and his family were also determined to instill something meaningful into what would seem to be a senseless, painful ordeal.

He moved to the center of an organized effort to finally stop cancer in children. He and his family charged alongside an organization called Kick For A Cure, whose role is to fund the research that will finally “kick cancer where it hurts”.

Part of the fight for a full life was trying to be just a boy who could play and learn like everyone else. Why should any child have to fight to be just a 5 year old or an 8 year old? The balancing act to just be and to be a helper in the bigger picture becomes another unexpected fact of life, a new normal.

The day came when balance was made impossible, and it became an effort to just hold on – to a few more hours spent wrapped in the bond of fighters who’ve survived together for so long. To a few more minutes of saying I love you, and for that one more heartbreaking second to look into each other’s eyes.

When children get so sick, when they die, we are all devastated. We cry and feel deeply because for those moments, born to us or not, they all become our babies.

Maybe we ask God or the Universe, why or how? Maybe one day we’ll have all the answers, but for now, at this moment, I need to believe that the Universe said these things to him:

Thank you, Dejah.

Thank you for enduring the pain of the fight for so long.

Thank you doing for so much work in such a short period of time to inform and teach about childhood cancer.

Thank you for all that you’ve given and taught to your mom, dad, and sister.

Thank you for all that you’ve given and shown to your family and friends.

Thank you for the sacrifice you gave to medicine that will one day make this illness less devastating for another child.

Thank you for the way you brought your community together over and over again, and got them all thinking about love, and for reminding them that, it is the only true purpose.

Your work is done Dejah, and it was done in superhero excellence.

You’re finally pain free; dance wildly in joy. You’ve earned it, kid.

You will always, always, be a kick ass hero.

Dejah Milne
February 4, 2000 – October 5, 2013

Photo by Cher Milne Gennaro‎, Memories with Dejah

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The story of how Dejah affected his community and the people around the world was captured during his beautiful service tribute and in how his story was shared around the globe.

Pick a Hero, Any Hero, Even if it Turns Out To Be You

Posted on January 4, 2016 by Blog Woman!!!

I thought I’d speak to another level of resolutions, as the idea of new beginnings for a new year gels for many. I’d originally posted this last spring, but I can’t help thinking the winds of change in progress means looking at the world and our place in it a little more – and that maybe helping people is in itself a full enough belief system…

It would be crushing to write another Dejah story. Despite the privilege of being able to write about it, I wish there’d never been a Dejah Milne story in the first place. At least not the way it had to be written because otherwise the right story would say that his mother, father, and sister are still able to hold him and hug him whenever they want.

They’d be able to laugh with him, instead of at videos of his silly fun from days not so long gone by. They would be able to hear his ‘I love you too’s with his voice. They’d get to be angry with him for messing up the house, or coming home too late, or maybe denting the car’s bumper. I know they’d rather that kind of everyday eye-rolling frustration instead of coping with the anguish of his absence now, because at age 13 years, he wasn’t able to overcome the tumour that he’d carried for 10 years.

I don’t want to write those stories if it can be helped at all. I don’t know anyone who does. The problem is, that the problems that end with those stories aren’t finished yet. There are so many issues that need someone to stand up for them and in support of the cavalcade of teams who work tirelessly to end them once, and honestly for all.

These are the teams of people who have been called, or sometimes brutally and harshly forced, at a spirit level, to take charge in the parts of life that are painful, agonizing, hideous, and terrifying. That’s heroics.

They are thrown toward the front lines to take on the darkness for us. They stand and push as far as they can to get answers to the challenges that debilitate or outright steal loved ones from us. They strive to make our world better, easier, more livable.

They need little from anyone else when it’s all put into perspective. They’ve already taken on the heavy end of the fight. They’re slogging, sweating, bleeding, and crying so that the rest of us get to hang back and throw out what we are able, when we can even as, just like us, they still have to navigate the trials of everyday life.

They ask for our help, but not for things like go earn a science degree or a doctorate, or to put our lives on the line, or to organize any kind of effort beyond our ability.

Those calls are usually only pleas to be heard, for us to see what is happening, and they ask us to spend the least of what we wish to. Then they call us ‘their heroes’ for giving that bit.

Let’s get real please; they aren’t really asking for our heroics. They are asking us to share only a little of our resources to sustain their herculean efforts for our sake.

It doesn’t matter how we acknowledge that they’ve been heard. Spend your hour of time. Send your $2, $20, or your $20,000,000 if you can. Send your willingness to walk, run, dance, fast, drive, stand, or create, but whatever you do, please do not ignore these direct calls to your own soul. This is the least we can do, literally.

Look, whatever we choose to support today is directly connected to whatever is to be resolved tomorrow and in the issues in the days after that. Start by choosing one, any one cause that made you turn your face toward it for even a minute. We can all help another mother, father, son, brother, daughter and sister not have to spend another day in fear and grief. That’s kind of heroic, right?

Dejah is Soaring

Posted on November 3, 2013 by Blog Woman!!!

The bagpipes were playing and the Red Serge of two RCMP officers were present when we arrived for the service.

Hundreds of us gathered to say goodbye for now to Dejah; our hearts heavy as we looked at each other knowing this made it more real. It was time to acknowledge that one of our babies had moved on. He came to us through Glo and Bob, but we all saw how he was family to many more, some he hadn’t even met, but to whom he became beloved nonetheless. Such was, or rather, is, his beautiful spirit.

The air was a mix of warm expectancy and wistful anticipation, the kind where we needed to say to ourselves – hold it together here. Just hold it together at least until you can take a seat. We pinned on little yellow ribbons in support of beating childhood cancer as we lined up to sign the guest book on our way in.

There was so much love gathered today through Dejah that at times it was overwhelming. They were not tears of grief, it was the fullness of hearts spilling over. All got lifted up with all the messages of love spoken by those who took turns to share their feelings and experiences with him. His sister Rayne couldn’t have had a better letter of sibling love to share with us. His Uncle Dwayne spoke to that part of us that loves with a parental heart. Family friends shared how their lives have been impacted by him and his family.

We watched a video that displayed how much life that young spirit lived in between the bouts of inconvenience caused by cancer invasions. It was astonishing to realize how much life he packed into the short thirteen years he was to be here. It seems miraculous actually. Through those pictures we saw how much he loved to laugh, and he showed what really living was about, even with insurmountable challenges.

One of his best friends, Tre, stood up and told us, in the way only a kid can, what it was to be Dejah’s friend. He told how Dejah was a video game king that regularly brought his opponents to their knees. Tre made us laugh as he admitted he was one of those friends who felt like crying when Dejah wanted to play a video game because he knew he was going to get wiped out within minutes. He reminded us of what it means to be a kid when he described how they would put Dejah into a baby cart at the grocery store and run until it fell over, and then they would fall over laughing. We were overcome by Tre’s beautiful recounting of his friendship, and from the wisdom, far beyond his years, that he gained from it.

Dejah was the typical hockey-obsessed Canadian kid – one happy to throw a dig at his soccer loving friend, Nuvin, in good-humored contempt. This is especially funny because Dejah was the inspiration for the start of a fantastic organization, started by that friend, called Kick for a Cure. They work to raise awareness and funding for research of childhood cancer treatments – mainly through annual soccer tournaments.

He was an inclusive caring boy who lit up the hearts of so many with a remarkably warm smile. That was an often mentioned point. He laughed, and loved, and played the hell out of life.

He showed, even today, that to really live is about grabbing the moment we have, this one right here and now, and making it as worthwhile as we can.

Grab the opportunity to smile and laugh at anything you can. Do whatever it takes, even something as crazy as recording yourself elaborately eating your last bite of a sandwich. Just. Do. It. You have no idea how funny that will be some day.

It wasn’t an easy life for Dejah, and just like the rest of us, he had some days that made it too hard to smile. His lesson isn’t that life will always be easy, it’s make the most of it when you can. Strive to make the most out of what you do have, while you have it.

All too soon, the celebration was nearing the end. We were all given tree saplings to plant in his honor and then we were given blue helium-filled balloons. It was time to symbolically release our fears and pain and send out instead, our love for Dejah and for each other.

We cheered as the balloons rose and we watched as they drifted up into the sky, up and up, and then somebody realized a distinctive shape to them. Look, Caroline said, they’ve gone into the shape of a heart, and they had. Somehow that didn’t really seem all that surprising. It was just another addition to the moments that display the power of Dejah’s spirit.

An earlier post I wrote about Dejah has, so far, been read over 1,100 times on seven continents. Those are the reads that I can track, the ones that I can’t probably drive that number into the thousands.

It’s astounding to realize that a seemingly average young boy from Eagle Ridge in Coquitlam has touched so many people around the world. It boggles my mind to try to comprehend that his spirit has literally surrounded the planet.

Glo and Bob, that spirit that was to be such a gift to so many came through you, and you nurtured it until it became whole in its perfection, until it was time to be released. You are to know that you did well. You did very, very well.