Celebrating Everyday Women - Rebecca

"I'm going to do what I can do within my means to make it the best childhood that he can have for those two years."

This is the mission and purpose that drives Rebecca to go to extraordinary lengths to create the best experience for her son, Damien, who was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia at just 23 months old.

Rebecca explained that as parents they made the conscious decision to be honest with Damien, in words that he can possibly understand. If it was going to be painful, there was no sugarcoating, but they also strove to empower him, for example by letting him take his own temperature, or giving him the choice to decide whether he preferred to have his blood pressure taken by the arm or the leg. These small acts give him some control of the situation around him.

"I think beauty to me is about being authentic, and being real means having flaws as well. It means having times when you are really low, you feel vulnerable, you feel lost, defeated, and at the same time, you are able to see the strength in yourself." It is this authenticity that she extends to Damien, while still finding opportunities to celebrate. Because he was homebound, she would decorate the house for festivities and bring sand to the balcony for him to play with. "I think literally, we were just each other's worlds."

What helped Rebecca along in this journey was to focus on the small wins. "So take it one day at a time and with every day through treatment, be truly present for your child because I think that's all the child needs... Just focus on the present when there's a small win, say your child's appetite was good or he got through treatment without crying. That's good, you know." But the biggest win for her is still being Damien's mother.

"This parenthood was not what we had planned for, but I think we didn't get anything less. In fact, we got a lot more because through this journey, we hoped more, we loved him more, we also grew together even more, and I think for that, we wouldn't have exchanged it for anything else in the world. So we're just thankful that we were chosen to be his parents."