Chevaughn Joseph

Pravir has al­ways been an ac­tive child. He was al­ways jump­ing and run­ning about wild and free, so when his left foot be­came swollen, his dad and I did not pay it any mind. One morn­ing though, I no­ticed a lump on his groin area. He was on­ly two years old so I didn’t make it in­to a big deal but jumped to my per­son­al con­clu­sion that it was a her­nia. We vis­it­ed Princes Town Health Cen­tre where they ad­vised that the lump had to be sur­gi­cal­ly re­moved at the San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal, as it was very large. A biop­sy and CT scan were done. The CT scan re­vealed a mass on Pravir’s kid­ney, which led to every­thing else that fol­lowed. He was di­ag­nosed with metasta­t­ic neu­rob­las­toma—Stage 4.

It took us a week be­fore we were ad­mit­ted to the JBF SU where we met with Dr Bod­kyn and the team to fig­ure out a pro­to­col for Pravir.

He start­ed chemother­a­py and af­ter four cy­cles he had surgery and soon af­ter start­ed ra­di­a­tion.

Every­thing was go­ing well un­til one day at home, Pravir start­ed uri­nat­ing blood. We were back at the hos­pi­tal again for an emer­gency scan which re­vealed the re­growth of the tu­mor on top and in­to the same kid­ney. We were told that it would be best for Pravir’s kid­ney to be re­moved to pre­vent fu­ture re­growth. The sec­ond surgery was done, fol­lowed by eight cy­cles of chemother­a­py.

I was five months preg­nant at the time and had no choice but to stay at Mt Hope with Pravir up un­til I was eight months preg­nant then my hus­band took over. While I was in labour, Pravir was ward­ed for chemo. It was a dif­fi­cult time but God, know­ing my sit­u­a­tion took care of us and I gave birth to my per­fect ba­by girl An­naya, who made my world bright again.

An­naya is grow­ing so quick­ly some­times it’s hard to be­lieve I’m miss­ing out on see­ing her grow but I know she is be­ing well tak­en care of by my fam­i­ly. I thank God for them. My moth­er and my sis­ter-in-law have al­ways been there through all of this and I can­not thank them enough for their tremen­dous sup­port.

Un­for­tu­nate­ly ear­li­er this year we struck a third ob­sta­cle…the tu­mor start­ed to grow again. This time how­ev­er, there is a mass in his chest. He is cur­rent­ly be­ing treat­ed with chemother­a­py so he can main­tain his well­ness.

This jour­ney is very frus­trat­ing. It’s like our progress is al­ways crushed when bad news strikes. As par­ents, we feel dis­cour­aged and of­ten bro­ken with our first-born’s med­ical sit­u­a­tion.

We know that we must keep the faith and be strong for Pravir. We al­ways try to re­mem­ber that a child feeds off of their par­ent’s emo­tions so this gives us the courage to stay pos­i­tive. We don’t have time to be weak. As a moth­er, I try my best not to cry around him but I’m on­ly hu­man.

I see mir­a­cles hap­pen every day and I’ve learned to let go of the things I can­not change and strength­en my faith in God. I know He has a plan so who am I to ques­tion any­thing?

As Hin­dus, our morn­ing tra­di­tion is to show­er, light our deya, and do aar­ti. We pray and light in­cense. Pravir knows the im­por­tance of poo­ja and prayer. He en­joys per­form­ing these rit­u­als.

Through all of this, Pravir has re­mained a strong child. He is still as ac­tive and play­ful as al­ways and loves his ba­by sis­ter. He knows that in or­der to get bet­ter he needs to go through the fre­quent hos­pi­tal vis­its. He makes us aware of any pain or dis­com­fort so that we can be ahead of his can­cer.

Through all of this, prayer and faith mat­ter the most. We know and un­der­stand that all that we are go­ing through is part of our life’s pur­pose. One day at a time is the best way to cope.

Pravir had a few things to say which will sure­ly make you smile:

Pravir :

My favourite food is Mac­a­roni and Cheese

My favourite car­toon is

Croc­o­diles

My favourite song is Gun­ga Ghana

My favourite colour is yel­low— like the T& TEC pow­er cord

I love play­ing with my ba­by

sis­ter

I wished for a ba­by sis­ter (this wish clear­ly came true)

When I grow up I want to be a T&TEC man

My fa­vorite per­son is…Dad­dy and Naya (ba­by sis­ter)

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