Tonight's picture was taken in September of 2008. Mattie was a month into treatment and as you can see he was visited by his "girlfriend" Charlotte. Mattie and Charlotte were watching a Scooby Doo video and kneeling by Mattie's side was Tricia. As our faithful readers know, Tricia was one of Mattie's favorite nurses. He told her he loved her and he knew she really had his best interest at heart. Mattie read people very well! Tricia was ALWAYS there for Peter and me and she holds a special place in our hearts as not only as an outstanding nurse but an incredible and compassionate person. To me this photo was a composition of Mattie sandwiched between two people who cared about him, and as Peter always said, "to know Mattie was to love him." INDEED!!!
Quote of the day: ...if anything matters then everything matters. Because you are important, everything you do is important. Every time you forgive, the universe changes; every time you reach out and touch a heart or a life, the world changes; with every kindness and service, seen or unseen, my purposes are accomplished and nothing will be the same again. ~ Wm. Paul Young
Peter and I were contacted by a PhD student clear across the world from us! This individual is studying in Australia. He sent us a message because he is working in a bio lab, exploring the genetic causes for osteosarcoma. As he told me, his lab has identified genes that increase the risk of developing osteosarcoma, and specifically is trying to understand how the loss of these genes affect bone biology and lead to tumor development. Mind you his research is being conducted on mice, not humans. Nonetheless, progress has to be made somewhere.
This PhD candidate attends the St. Vincent’s Institute of Medical Research (www.svi.edu.au) and is presenting in a Three Minute Thesis Competition, which is organized by the University of Melbourne on August 26. To learn more about this competition, go to: http://gradresearch.unimelb.edu.au/3MT/. The reason why this researcher was contacting me, was that he learned about Mattie through the Internet and wanted to get our permission to use his story and a photo of him in his presentation. I guess chatting about mice to an audience of humans doesn't make the same kind of impact as showing a photo of a beautiful boy struck down by a disease he is trying to research. I totally understood his point, in which he has THREE minutes to summarize his research and the disease to an audience filled with NON-scientists. I told him this was one tall order, nonetheless an important one. The goal is to bring awareness to the community at large about a rare disease. Needless to say Peter and I gave him permission to use Mattie's photo and I am encouraging him to share his video with us and to write an article for our Foundation newsletter. We shall see what becomes of this.
I know the readership of Mattie's blog is not contained to just the USA. I have received emails from people in the UK, Thailand, Australia, and even India! If Mattie knew the impact his face and story had on people, I am not sure he would believe it. But as Mattie's mom, I know he was a force when he was alive and he continues to be a force in spirit!
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