Sometimes God's answer to a heartfelt prayer and fasting is, "No."
Just after I turned 15, Becky (who was born exactly 6 years and one month after me) started experiencing neurological symptoms. Mom was in nursing school at the time.
After several doctors and treatments and even scoldings to Becky that she just wasn't trying hard enough, something mom was learning clicked and she decided to take her to a neurologist. Ultrasound technology was relatively new at the time. We learned that Becky had a growth in her brain stem. She was immediately admitted to Primary Children's Medical Center where they performed a biopsy. The results came back that her tumor was benign, but because of its location, it was inoperable. Trying to remove it would stop her heart. The only treatment offered was radiation and medication.
Shortly after Becky returned home from the hospital I had an opportunity to sit alone with her in the living room. I asked her how she was and she told me as she broke down in tears, that she was afraid to die. What to say to my baby sister to help calm her fears as my mom had calmed mine from nightmares (see Lesson: Life is Fragile).
While I pondered what to say, I considered the things I had learned at church and from talks with my mom. Did I really believe them to be true? With faith I attempted to console Becky and myself telling her that it would be okay and when the time came Grandpa, Dalene, Christine and Dale would be there to meet her. (My mom's dad had died 4 years earlier.) I also thought of other grandparents and Aunt LaJune who died before we were born. But because Becky had never met them, I just told her that others who loved her would be there to greet her. It seemed to help.
Becky immediately began treatment. While she was having radiation, the tumor's growth slowed, but the problem was that she could only withstand so much radiation before it would cause worse results than the tumor was causing. She was given Decadron to reduce the brain inflammation. The problem was that the medication lowered her metabolism and increased her appetite so that she quickly put on 60 pounds of weight. For a small 9 year old girl, that was a lot of weight and she had the stretch marks to prove it. As the tumor grew, one side of her body became paralyzed. She gradually lost the ability to chew. It still makes me cry to remember one evening when I finished eating before the rest of the family and was asked to feed Becky. Because she could not chew, baby food was a convenient option. I remember trying to get the food into Becky's mouth while her jaw was so tight from lack of use and atrophy.
At church, in talks by Church leaders I had heard of miracles from priesthood blessings. I had childlike faith that if it was God's will, Becky could be healed. My parents took Becky to meet with my dad's brother, Uncle "Red" for a blessing just after her diagnosis.
Several months later, my Uncle Bob and his son, my cousin Mike were coming to give Becky a blessing at our home. I prepared myself for this blessing like I never had before. I fasted the night before the blessing and continued in fasting and prayer throughout the day until the time of the blessing came. My prayers to Heavenly Father were that Becky could be healed; that my mom, who had already lost two daughters and a husband and who had said that she could not handle losing another child and that God didn't give you more than you can handle, would not have to lose another child; that Becky would not have to suffer and that my dad, who had just started going to church after years of inactivity would receive a witness that miracles happened and that priesthood power was real. I'm sure he was bargaining with God. There was a lot riding on my prayers.
As the family gathered in the living room and Mike anointed Becky in preparation for Uncle Bob to seal the anointing and pronounce a blessing on her, I was overcome with tears. I stepped out of the room into the hall where I experienced an indescribable feeling. Words do not exist to describe what I felt, but I'll try. I was enveloped from head to toe in what I can best describe as love - a love that was other worldly and that I somehow knew it was the love of God. At the same time as I was infused with this feeling of heavenly love and compassion, I was given the knowledge that Becky would not be healed. I knew that the tumor would soon take her from us.
As an adult, I have come to know what a rare spiritual gift this experience was. For I have never forgotten it and dare not deny that it happened. For although I would trade the gift to have Becky back with us in a heartbeat, I gained the knowledge that God is real and loves me individually. I also know that because he is no respecter of persons, that he loves each of his children equally.
However, it took a while for me to make sense of what my mother had taught me: God does not give you more than you can handle. It took years for me to make sense of what appeared to be quite the discrepancy. If my mother couldn't handle losing another child and God doesn't give you more than you can handle - then how did my sister's impending death make any sense at all?
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