Hi! This is Tristan. Hey....and while I have your attention a minute...I'd like to tell you about him...and why he am so very special to me and his father.

Tristan is now a normal 17 year old boy...ALL boy...lol...who likes bowling, swimming, track and cross country, and many other things. He has always been an "A" student and is VERY self-motivated (almost too much sometimes...lol). He loves to read (could read at 4), but his first love is math (he knew his times tables and could do long division in kindergarten....no...I'm not kidding....lol). This year he started his 11th grade at St. Thomas Academy, and is doing great! He continues to excel in school and is many grades ahead as far as ability (ok....enough bragging).

Yes...he is a very special guy...in more ways than one. Let me tell you how much more a blessing he is to me....

When I found out I was pregnant...in April of 88....little did I know what was going to happen. He was an unplanned pregnancy for myself and my husband. An ultrasound done to check on the progress of the pregnancy showed doctors there was a large cyst growing very near my unborn child...it was only after surgery to remove the cyst a few months later....that they told me it was ovarian cancer.

Before I was assigned an oncologist...my doctor at the time prepared me for the probable result...I would most likely need to have a hysterectomy RIGHT away (which meant aborting the pregnancy) and begin aggressive chemotherapy. The cancer was quite advanced (stage 3 out of 4). This seemed overwhelming to me, newly married and at the age of 24.

Let me say that I have one very clear memory around that time. I remember laying in my hospital bed...after having received the news from my doctor...sort of in shock. Then suddenly....for the first time in the pregnancy....I felt my baby move inside of me. That instant...I experienced both joy and sadness. Joy for that life inside of me!!!....moving!!!....very much alive!!!...BUT.....a split second later...a deep sadness because this child would probably not be able to be born...to see his mother....to be held by her...fed...clothed...or loved.

It was then that I prayed the only sincere prayer I remember praying up to that point in my life. I cried out to God....right then and there in that hospital bed. Oddly enough, I don't remember asking Him to spare my life...but I do remember asking Him...if there was ANY way my child's life could be spared...could he please make that happen.

A few days later, after that prayer....they assigned me an oncologist who came to talk to me. To my surprise...he informed me that he felt it WAS possible to both begin chemotherapy AND maintain the pregnancy...perhaps without harm coming to either mother or baby!!! It's that longshot that I chose to take....and today...16 years later, I am healed from the cancer and my son is happy and healthy. You see, my son was that unplanned blessing that enabled the doctors to discover my cancer in time to be treated. Without my baby's existence....chances are...I would not be speaking to you now...via cyberspace, or any other way for that matter.

Many doctors, although saying the "choice was mine", felt it would have probably would have been best to abort the baby. I felt, it was God, who gave me a gift in a dual form...the gift of a precious baby, and the gift of a chance of life. I couldn't believe for one minute that God would bring this gift of a child to me, then take him away, or take his mother's life away, once he was born. I remember clutching onto his picture during the surgeries I had after his birth...during each chemotherapy session that left me so weak and sick. I believed God had answered my prayer, that my son could live, and that He would heal me to be a mother to my miracle child. He did.

You can see why Tris is so very special to me....I love you Tristan.