(Touching story by Doris
Sanford)
I was deep in thought
at my office, preparing a lecture to be given that evening at
a college across town, when the phone rang. A woman I had
never met introduced herself and said that she was the mother
of a seven-year-old and that she was dying. She said that her
therapist had advised her that discussing her pending death
with her son would be too traumatic for him, but somehow that
didn't feel right to her.
Knowing that I worked
with grieving children, she asked my advice. I told her that
our heart is often smarter than our brain and that I thought
she knew what would be best for her son. I also invited her to
attend the lecture that night since I was speaking about how
children cope with death. She said she would be
there.
I wondered later if I
would recognize her at the lecture, but my question was
answered when I saw a frail woman being half carried into the
room by two adults. I talked about the fact that children
usually sense the truth long before they are told and that
they often wait until they feel adults are ready to talk about
it before sharing their concerns and questions. I said that
children usually can handle truth better than denial, even
though the denial is intended to protect them from pain. I
said that respecting children meant including them in the
family sadness, not shutting them
out.
She had heard enough.
At the break, she hobbled to the podium and through her tears
she said, "I knew it in my heart. I just knew I should tell
him." She said that she would tell him that
night.
The next morning I
received another phone call from her. She could hardly talk
but I managed to hear the story through her choked voice. She
awakened him when they got home the night before and quietly
said, "Derek, I have something to tell you." He quickly
interrupted her saying, "Oh, Mommy, is it now that you are
going to tell me that you are dying?" She held him close and
they both sobbed while she said,
"Yes."
After a few minutes
the little boy wanted down. He said that he had something for
her that he had been saving. In the back of one of his drawers
was a dirty pencil box. Inside the box was a letter written in
simple scrawl. It said, "Good-bye, Mom. I will always love
you."
How long he had been
waiting to hear the truth, I don't know. I do know that two
days later his Mom died. And in her casket was placed a dirty
pencil box and a letter
