What do you say?

What do you say to your daughter who has just been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis?

‘Everything’s going to be all right?’

Probably not. Because the thing is, it won’t. It will be what it will be.

Over the last few weeks she has dealt with an episode of paralysis, blood tests, scans, pokes and prods and through it all, uncertainty.

And of course, expressions of hope and love from folks who mean well but don’t get it. Because they can’t.

I can’t know what it’s like to be a twenty-seven year old woman absorbing this diagnosis because I’ve never been a twenty-seven year old woman absorbing this diagnosis.

Believe me, being the father of the twenty-seven year old woman sucks enough.

MS is a bully that we can’t have kicked out of school. It is a condition of life that will now become part of my daughter’s normal.

She has us on her side. Mary and me and her sister and a large family. We will never step away from her, never abandon her, will always be with her.

Still, the fight is hers. And for this reason I am thankful today that she is who she is.

Angela will find her new way of being. She will adjust, she will fight, she will persevere.

Because she is Angela. It’s a hard thing but my daughter has dealt with hard things before.

I am, of course, frightened on her behalf.

I’m also proud beyond belief. Because she’s Angela.

What do you say? You say, ‘I love you and I’m here, no matter what.’