Tell Me About Cancer

"Mom, you need to tell me what's cancer."

This from my curious 9 year old who is hearing a lot lately about the c-word.

What am I supposed to say?

Frankly, I hate cancer.  It makes people sick and steals away life.  What more is there to say?

But discussions from friends about a little boy in her school who recently died of cancer...

And discussions of another student who is losing hair because of chemo treatments...

And discussions at home about my aunt who is too, too young to die but has aggressive tumors threatening her life...

To a 9 year old who has never heard the word before, it's all very confusing.

And to a 40-something year old who has experienced it too much, it's also very confusing.

And sad.

It drives me to say in frustrated tears to my husband, "I don't want to know anyone else who is going to die."


Which I know is impossible because we're all going to die.

But instead of pointing that out he says, "You look like you could use a hug."

And he holds me while the tears come pouring out then takes the kids shopping with him so I can spend some uninterrupted time on the phone with other family members who also really, really hate cancer.

But my 9 year old wants to know about this word that makes moms cry and makes adults and other children at school speak in sad, hushed tones.

I don't want to tell her, because even after all the loss in our lives there is a natural maternal instinct to protect her from anything frightening and sad.

Things like cancer that I don't know how to explain to a little girl who already knows too much about loss, and people dying and being hurt.

So I tell her a little about cancer, but mostly I tell her that people with cancer can get better, but sometimes they don't.

She'll know that all too soon anyway.