I Was Diagnosed With An Incurable Cancer. How Do I Decide Whether Or Not To Have Children?
Until the winter of my 27th year, I was positive that my future would include being a parent.
As a young child, I loved playing with dolls and would take care in naming them. It felt important, a practice in recognizing the identity and agency of something I was in charge of. I would dress them cautiously, my hand cupped behind their heads as I snapped the buttons on their onesies, just as I had seen my mom do with my two younger brothers.
As I grew older, my interest in dolls ended; however, my passion for children did not. I babysat kids in my neighborhood during my early teens, nannied consistently for families in college, and after graduating, began pursuing a career in behavioral health, focusing on developmental trauma and foster care. I wanted to help children cope with the hardships of life, especially those who had experienced early abuse and neglect. I believe in the powerful resilience of children and place a high value on the importance of raising children in a way that makes our world better.
While working in pediatric mental health, I continued to quietly dream of my own someday-family. The specific way my family would look was still up in the air — I had mixed feelings about whether I wanted to have children biologically, adopt or foster; however, I had little doubt I would be a mother in some way when I was ready.
I was certain it was what I wanted, my intention set, my decision firm.
Then, in January of 2019, at the age of 27, I was diagnosed with brain cancer. The diagnosis followed a six-hour brain surgery and four-day ICU stay. I had previously been assured the tumor that they removed from my right parietal lobe was most likely a low-grade glioma and that after the surgery, I’d be able to return to my life.
Instead, a few days after leaving the hospital, I returned to a sterile exam room where a kind, somber doctor told me how the pathology report indicated that the tumor was cancerous: an anaplastic astrocytoma, grade 3 out of...
