Prayer For A Little Fighter

As a parent, nothing concerns me more than the health of my children. I pray to God everyday for them to be healthy. And when they are not, when they are down with fever, when I have to take them see the pediatrician, I get scared.

Today I heard that a friend’s child’s illness is confirmed to be leukemia, and he will have to undergo chemotherapy. He’s not even two years old yet. The news just rocked me to my core. This child arises each day facing a mountain of challenges I have heretofore been unable or unwilling to comprehend. Every day is grueling. For his parents, too. Not hopeless, not devoid of joy or happiness, but excruciating.

When our Nuha was admitted to the hospital for pneumonia when she was 2, it occurred to me that there can be no greater pain than the diagnosis that your child is unwell. I have never known fear like I did at that moment. I have never been so close to the idea that perfection is so fragile, that my love, no matter how fierce, isn’t enough to protect her entirely. Every time she coughed, every time she had difficulty breathing, I was wrecked. My love for my daughter defies definition. And during those moments, that love heaved and strained as if it were reaching out of my chest all the way past the doctor, the nurses, the nebulizer machine, to hug and heal her tiny lungs.

But what I went through is nothing compared to what the parents of this little boy are going through right this very moment.

My mind and heart are with Ali and his parents today.

Ya Allah, Give this little boy strength. Remove from him that which troubles him, And cure him of his illness. There is no power, nor strength save Allah, the highest, the great.