Miracle House
Tara Avery
This is a story about a magical place I hope no one reading this ever has cause to discover.
Before I tell you about it, though, you’ll need a little context. I have to tell you about July 28th, and its sister, November 16th—two of the worst days of my life.
On July 28th, my then nine-and-a-half-month-old niece, Torie, got sick. Her parents took her to the hospital, where her symptoms were put down to a throat infection. Still, the hospital decided to keep her for observation. At about two thirty in the afternoon, she grew strangely unresponsive and we called the doctor back in to see her. By four o’clock, after an emergency MRI, we were waiting for an air ambulance to take her to Vancouver. She went from throat infection to massive brain tumor in an hour.
The (amazing) staff at Children’s Hospital was able to resect the tumor. She underwent three rounds of chemotherapy. Torie’s treatment was going well.
This brings us to November 16th.
I cannot imagine what it must have been like for my sister and her husband to hear the words, “There’s nothing more we can do.” I can only tell you when the phone rang and my mom said, “Your sister asked me to call you,” I thought, “Oh, this is why people always make sure you’re sitting down before they give you bad news,” because I felt the dark pull in around me, and if I’d been standing I would have fallen.
Torie’s latest MRI showed the cancer’s return.
Just like that, everything changed. Course of treatment for babies is limited at the best of times, and the smudge of cancer on her MRI effectively ended Torie’s. Dreams of full recovery were dashed, replaced by a feeble offer of palliative care.
But this isn’t a sad story. Or, rather, this is a story where sadness isn’t the dominant emotion, not yet. Hopefully not any time in the near future.
I arrived expecting the worst. A full day of travel, complete with nosy seat-neighbors, long layovers, a flight from New York to Vancouver via Dallas/Fort Worth (seriously, check it out on a map), and a steadily decreasing supply of tissues had left me shattered. The last thing I expected was the smile on my mother’s face. Her first words to me were something along the lines of, “Don’t be sad. It’s not sad, where we’re going.”
News to me! But then, I hadn’t experienced the magic of Canuck Place, yet.
Like the kind of place you hear about in fairy tales, Canuck Place is a palace, complete with turrets and stained-glass windows, surrounded by gardens. We arrived at the end of November, just as their world-class Christmas decorations were going up. If you didn’t know what you were looking for, you’d probably dismiss it as just another of the vast mansions so commonplace in Vancouver’s Shaughnessy neighborhood, but it is so much more than that.
Yes, it is a hospice. In November 1995, Canuck Place opened as the first free standing children’s hospice in all of North America.
Yes, it is full of sick children and their families. You might think it would be sad—the saddest place in the world. But it absolutely isn’t. From the moment you step inside, there is an aura of warmth and support and even joy. Beautiful, delicious meals are served twice a day, a reminder not only to eat, but of the importance of routine. At a time and in a place where you might expect mourning, sorrow, depression, Canuck Place is the opposite.
To quote from the Canuck Place website, “Whether a life is measured in days, weeks, or months, children deserve the opportunity to learn, develop and grow. Canuck Place encourages each child to ‘embrace life’ and believes in enhancing the quality of whatever time a child may have left by empowering them to live fully and joyfully.”
For us, Canuck Place provided a bubble of security, a safe space in which we were able to absorb the changes in our lives without having to answer the inevitable, painful questions so common on the outside. Days were broken into manageable chunks—Ellen at eleven, lunch at noon, walk in the afternoon with Torie, coffee and cookies (the cookie jar is never empty at Canuck Place!) at three, dinner at five. Canuck Place strives to provide a home-like environment, a bridge between hospital and home, where the child is given 24-hour care, but the parents are able to sleep through the night in a proper bed and eat proper food… and access counseling or support at any time they need it.
Because Torie was coming off the horror of chemotherapy, we watched her come to life again in Canuck Place. Her head grew fuzzy; her eyebrows—always so expressive—started to grow back. Rather than waiting for the worst, we began to appreciate every moment as a miracle, every accomplishment as a gift. All too often, we bustle through our lives, always reaching ahead, always planning for the future… always worrying about the future. At Canuck Place, I learned the importance of living each day as it happens, because there’s no point living in a sad place when the sadness hasn’t happened yet. There’s no point mourning a life that hasn’t ended, especially when the most adorable little girl in the world is right there in front of you, learning how to smile again.
I don’t know how things might have been different without the stepping stone of Canuck Place between hospital and home, but I know the gifts I was given: the gift of food to nourish me, the gift of silence to reflect, the gift of no one asking hard questions, the gift of a genuine smile instead of pity, the gift of seeing so many children happy and knowing Torie was one of them. Most of all, I’m glad I was given the gift of living in the moment. We are none of us guaranteed a certain number of days or weeks or years—make the most of the ones you have. Enjoy life. Embrace it.
Author's Note: Torie is still very much alive, and continuing to astonish everyone around her as she makes progress beyond what most expected of her. More than any other child I've ever met, her default mode is cheerful, and it is a joy and an honor to behold it.
Please visit the Canuck Place website at: www.canuckplace.org If you are able, donate. It's an extremely worthwhile cause.
To the staff, volunteers, cooks, nurses, doctors, caregivers and other families who helped (and continue to help) us: thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. There aren't enough words to thank you enough.