Remission

Remission (medical): A decrease in or disappearance of signs and symptoms of cancer, signifying a major improvement, but not always a complete cure, as the disease can recur.

In a letter dated December 1957 Lewis wrote: of Joy Davidman's miraculous remission:

My own news continues better than we ever dared to hope. The cancerous bones have rebuilt themselves in a way quite unusual and Joy can now walk: on a stick and with a limp, it is true, but it is a walk–and far less than a year ago it took three people to move her in bed and we often hurt her. He general health, and spirits, seem excellent. Of course the sword of Damocles hangs over us. Or should I say that circumstances have opened our eyes to see the sword which really hangs always over everyone.

The cure didn't last. She died three years later, a cherished three years together, but none the less three years of remission.

One of the first messages I received about T was in November 2016 and had this heading "Prayer works - keep praying" - T, who was nine at the time, had been admitted to hospital with a dangerously low red blood cells count, leukaemia was diagnosed...  Nine years later, and after so many treatments and hopes, the message I received yesterday read "we are devastated to have to send this message... Sadly, the disease in T's central nervous system overwhelmed his brain and he didn't wake after his procedure yesterday afternoon. We are heartbroken. We said goodbye to him this morning, with the sun shining on his face. It was peaceful and beautiful".

As in that most beautiful of books "I walked up the winding stair, and entered his room. A lovely figure, as white and almost as clear as alabaster, was lying on the bed. I saw at once how it was. They thought he was dead. I knew that he had gone to the back of the north wind".

In 2020 his parents had written: "A new cure for T's cancer (we have already exhausted the existing cures!) offers the only medical chance of life returning to normal for him. The virus isn't gone. His cancer is still there. As far we are concerned we're living with a fragile hope. Hope that we might beat the virus. Hope that God will heal T. Hope that his current treatment could put his cancer in stable remission for long enough so that other curative options might be discovered.  So we keep praying".

Remission. How I hate the word. The word that engenders, fuels, prolongs false hopes. Like playing with and savouring those iconic words "All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well" in full defiance of knowing that the reverse is true.

What am I to conclude? That prayer is, at best, wishful thinking? That I wasted my time hoping, and believing as best as I knew how, for "full and forever" healing? My insides are churning even as I write these words. I could revel, as many do, in vain platitudes but I hate such hypocrisy.  I rest my case.

Is it the end of a chapter? If so then I say that another chapter begins. My relationship with T's parents (who I have never met) is stronger for it. I might weep now but I will not forget the journey. I say that all the suffering was not in vain. Possibly even my own so weak faith in a loving God is strengthened rather than shipwrecked.

Why art thou cast down, O my soul? Hope thou in God (Psalm 42)