Mattie Miracle 15th Anniversary Video

Mattie Miracle Cancer Foundation Promotional Video

Thank you for keeping Mattie's memory alive!

Dear Mattie Blog Readers,

It means a great deal to us that you take the time to write to us and to share your thoughts, feelings, and reflections on Mattie's battle and death. Your messages are very meaningful to us and help support us through very challenging times. To you we are forever grateful. As my readers know, I promised to write the blog for a year after Mattie's death, which would mean that I could technically stop writing on September 9, 2010. However, at the moment, I feel like our journey with grief still needs to be processed and fortunately I have a willing support network still committed to reading. Therefore, the blog continues on. If I should find the need to stop writing, I assure you I will give you advanced notice. In the mean time, thank you for reading, thank you for having the courage to share this journey with us, and most importantly thank you for keeping Mattie's memory alive.


As Mattie would say, Ooga Booga (meaning, I LOVE YOU)! Vicki and Peter



The Mattie Miracle Cancer Foundation celebrates its 7th anniversary!

The Mattie Miracle Cancer Foundation was created in the honor of Mattie.

We are a 501(c)(3) Public Charity. We are dedicated to increasing childhood cancer awareness, education, advocacy, research and psychosocial support services to children, their families and medical personnel. Children and their families will be supported throughout the cancer treatment journey, to ensure access to quality psychosocial and mental health care, and to enable children to cope with cancer so they can lead happy and productive lives. Please visit the website at: www.mattiemiracle.com and take some time to explore the site.

We have only gotten this far because of people like yourself, who have supported us through thick and thin. So thank you for your continued support and caring, and remember:

.... Let's Make the Miracle Happen and Stomp Out Childhood Cancer!

A Remembrance Video of Mattie

October 22, 2010

Friday, October 22, 2010

Friday, October 22, 2010

Tonight's picture was taken in October of 2007, at one of the Fall festivals held at a local farm. Honestly I can't recall which farm, but I can assure you each weekend in the Fall, we visited a different farm, so that Mattie could get pumpkins, run around, and have fun on slides. In this particular picture, take notice of the structure Peter and Mattie were walking through. Mattie and I got a kick out of the fact that there was a fake rib cage coming out of the ground. I had them walk through the bones, as I snapped a picture! This picture still makes me laugh. We had visited many Fall festivals, but never saw a sight like this. I think it was an entertaining way to get people to form a line, as they waited to go down a long slide. A slide Mattie also enjoyed!  As my readers know, Mattie was an only child. I am sure this sounds ridiculous to those parents raising more than one child, but I assure you raising an only child has its own complexities and challenges. I am sure on the surface it would appear that there is less to balance and juggle. Perhaps, but keep in mind that there are no built in play networks and therefore as a parent you really do have to serve very intense and focused roles. For all intensive purposes, Peter and I were Mattie's playmates, and for those of you who knew Mattie, then you know he could play, play, and then play some more. He had an abundance of energy and even when he was well, he wanted my undivided attention. While raising Mattie there were days I was simply exhausted, pondered whether I was doing a good job, and wondered how I could balance things better. However, based upon our circumstances, I am happy that I spent ALL the time I did with Mattie. Our intense connection was clearly established for a reason, since we had to fit a lifetime together in only SEVEN short years. 

Quote of the day: There are many tears in the heart that never reach the eyes. ~ unknown

Tonight's quote is quite profound. Grief is not necessarily something you see! Crying doesn't always occur. Do not misinterpret the lack of tears, in a griever, with feeling better, moving on (a terminology I ABSOLUTELY despise, it is on par with the NEW NORMAL!), or forgetting about the departed loved one. I certainly can't speak for every person dealing with grief. I can only shed light on my own perspective, and that is, I carry my grief very close to the heart. I feel it, it has affected how I see things, how I take in my world around me, and how I feel about the future and life in general. My hunch is those who interact with me are most likely unable to tell the profound change I feel internally, unless I tell you about it. Grief is almost like a state of mind, a state that alters one's chemistry. Therefore I look at this quote in this way...... I carry grief with me each and every day. In the times when grief does make it to my eyes, then for me this means I am on overload. As if the grief has swelled up inside of me, and in that moment the only way to prevent internal drowning is to cry.

Over the course of this last year, I have had many people talk to me about my openness to share my grief experience on the blog. Naturally as I tell you on occasion, I share about 75 to 80 percent of how I am feeling and doing on the blog. Other aspects that I view as too personal or inappropriate, I refrain from writing about. I find that those going through the grief process like the blog because I am candid and by airing certain feelings and thoughts this normalizes the process for you. You feel less alone, knowing that someone else out there understands and feels the same way at times. However, for those who read the blog, who haven't experienced a significant loss in your lives yet, I find you simply thank me. You thank me for helping you understand loss, and for arming you with certain words to help and support friends and family members who have suffered a loss. In a way, helping someone grieve is like learning a new language or being introduced to a new culture. Naturally just like ANY culture, there are individual nuisances, and so understanding these subtleties is crucial. Case in point, even though Peter and I lost Mattie, we do not grieve in the same way.

This afternoon, I went out to lunch with my parents. We went to a restaurant I hadn't been to in a long while. In fact, I reflected with my parents about the time I went to this restaurant with several of my friends from college. My college roommate, Leslie, was going to be married, and I was her maid of honor. To celebrate her engagement, I had Leslie and all of her bridesmaids come to California and stay at my parent's house. We had a fun week of touring around and eating in some wonderful restaurants. In fact, that is a week I won't forget. We all seemed happy back then and life seemed simpler. Eating at this restaurant reminded me of that captured moment in time. In fact, I even remember the beautiful roses on our table that night. They caught my attention because we were the only table in the restaurant to have such a display.

I have started the packing process and will return to Washington, DC tomorrow. I arrive after 10pm, so it will be a full day of travel for me. As some of you know, I really do not like flying, and as my colleague and friend, Susan, has said to me on numerous occasions, I just need to visualize angels flying underneath the wings of my plane. In essence they are carrying the plane on their wings. Some times the plane gets too heavy, so angels need to take shifts, and as they transfer the plane from one group of wings to another, I may feel turbulence. It is a wonderful visualization!

Peter wrote to me tonight and alerted me to the fact that there is a full moon out. Which of course reminds us of Mattie. In his message he wanted me to know that Mattie was most likely going to be flying with me tomorrow in spirit. Or as Peter tells me, Mattie is never too far away from me in any given day. Well specifically Peter would say, "The Momma Lover is NEVER too far away from the Momma." My mom saw the moon through the window tonight and called me over. We both went outside and I snapped a picture of Mattie Moon in Los Angeles!

I received a lovely message this morning from Karen's mom. As many of you know, Karen is my lifetime friend, and we met each other when we were in sixth grade. Like Karen, her mom, Naomi, reads the blog each and everyday. Her note to me was very touching, and just when I think perhaps what I am writing is NO longer of interest or value, I get a message like this that gets me to stop, reflect, and to accept the  beauty within the message and my role in the lives of others. Thanks Mrs. Fischer! Naomi wrote, "As you know I follow your blog daily and am always moved, impressed and enriched by what you have to say. In it you reveal how you and Peter are making your life without Mattie worthwhile and important-- not only to yourselves but to everyone who knows you and especially to the children and their families who are struggling against cancer. You have both grown stronger and more dedicated and it seems to me more connected. I know you both are in extreme pain, but it is amazing how you rise above it! I am truly grateful that you share your experiences with us. I loved the tours of the Caribbean and Sedona you took us on-- but the photos and notes of the paintings from the Simon Museum were so fabulous, they spurred me to write. It seems that you cannot help but share your insights and appreciation of the world around you. It is a valuable gift you give your faithful blog readers. Most important, I believe you gave this same gift to Mattie. Over time, in your loving daily pictures of him we see the variety of experiences he had in his short life (way more than most of our children had), a wealth of interesting and enjoyable activities and sights. Picture after picture shows you all at every kind of farm, park, beach, museum-- in Florida, California, Maryland, Massachusetts-- looking at flowers, birds, shells, planes. And what enthralled you, I am sure, was enthusiastically imparted to him with much love and caring. You enriched him as you enrich us all. And I fervently hope you and Peter are aware of how much this helped develop Mattie into such an interesting, interested and creative kid. In between these lines please read that I hope that you keep the blog going for as long as you can. It is a powerful document and documentary...and I want to read how you will take on the medical profession."

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