Warriors and Survivors - 246

Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 246

I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have worked in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen. 

Arfa is six years old, an age that usually belongs to scraped knees, half finished coloring books, and loud disagreements over whose turn it is to sit by the window. Until recently, her world looked exactly like that. She lives in Sialkot with her parents and two younger brothers, in a home that was full in the ordinary way school bags by the door, small shoes scattered without pattern, and the soft noise of daily life continuing without much thought.

The first signs that something was wrong did not arrive all at once. They came quietly, in ways that were easy to explain away. Arfa began to feel tired more often. She would sit down during playtime, resting her head against her mother’s arm, asking to be carried even on short walks. There were fevers that came and went, not high enough to alarm, but frequent enough to leave her parents uneasy. Bruises appeared on her arms and legs, darker than expected, lingering longer than they should have. Her appetite faded, and the brightness that once followed her through the house dulled slightly, like a light turned down rather than off.

At first, everyone thought it was a phase. A seasonal illness. The strain of school. In families, especially those raising young children, reassurance often feels more practical than worry. But as days passed, Arfa’s fatigue deepened. She slept more and spoke less. When she complained of bone pain, especially in her legs, her mother felt a quiet fear that did not yet have words.

The hospital visit was meant to bring relief. Tests, the family believed, would give a simple explanation and a simple treatment. Instead, the diagnosis arrived with unfamiliar terms and measured voices: B-cell leukemia. For Arfa, the words meant nothing. She focused on the cold stethoscope and the nurse who smiled kindly. For her parents, those words split time into a before and an after.

Shock does not always look dramatic. In Arfa’s family, it looked like silence. Her father asked the doctor to repeat himself, not because he didn’t hear, but because hearing again felt like delaying the truth. Her mother nodded through explanations she barely absorbed, her thoughts fixed on one impossible question: how could something so serious be living inside a child who still asked for bedtime stories?

Telling the rest of the family was harder than hearing it the first time. Grandparents sat quietly, hands folded, as if movement might disturb the fragile balance of the moment. Arfa’s younger brothers sensed the change without understanding it. They noticed whispered conversations, the sudden seriousness of adults, the way their sister was watched more closely now. They asked why she was going to the hospital so often and why their parents looked quiet.

Grief entered the household not as loud crying, but as small losses accumulating day by day. The loss of routine. The loss of certainty. The loss of a future that had once seemed predictable. School mornings were replaced with hospital corridors. Playdates were postponed indefinitely. Conversations shifted from plans and celebrations to test results and treatment schedules.

Fear of the future settled in quietly. It appeared in the long pauses after doctors’ visits, in the careful budgeting of emotions as much as finances, and in the way Arfa’s parents began to measure time differently, not in months or years, but in cycles of treatment and next appointments. They feared pain they could not prevent, questions they could not yet answer, and outcomes they could not control.

And yet, life did not stop completely. Arfa still laughed at silly jokes. She still argued gently with her brothers over toys. Sometimes, in the middle of it all, she asked simple questions like when she could go back to school, whether her hair would grow again, if she could still wear her favorite dress. These moments did not erase the fear, but they softened it, reminding everyone that illness had entered her life, not replaced it.

Arfa’s story is not uncommon. It is a story of a family learning to live with uncertainty, of ordinary days reshaped by an unexpected diagnosis. It is about quiet resilience found in routine care, in holding hands during blood tests, and in believing gently, carefully that tomorrow is still worth imagining, even when it looks different than before.

Prayers for Arfa and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen

Warriors and Survivors - 245

 Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 245

I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have worked in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen. 

Waqar’s Story: A Childhood Measured in Transfusions, Not Time

Waqar is ten years old. When he laughs quietly, sometimes shyly, you might not guess what lies beneath the surface of that smile. You wouldn’t know, at first glance, that his life has been woven through hospital corridors, needles, and blood bags since infancy; that every two to three weeks he sits in a chair while nurses gently insert a needle into his veins to give him life-saving blood. His is not a story of heroic feats or dramatic rescues, but a deeply human one: the slow, heartfelt persistence of a child living with beta-thalassemia major: and a family trying to keep him alive.

What Is Beta-Thalassemia Major

Beta-thalassemia major is an inherited blood disorder that affects hemoglobin, the protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen to the body’s tissues. In children with this condition, the body cannot produce enough functional hemoglobin, leading to severe anemia, weakness, fatigue, and low energy. Without regular blood transfusions, the body literally starves for oxygen, and vital organs struggle to function. As Waqar’s parents describe it, “his body wears out faster than other kids’” because his blood can’t carry the life force his heart and brain need. Symptoms often include severe fatigue, jaundice (yellowing of skin), poor growth, and frequent infections. Over time, complications such as enlarged spleen, bone changes, and iron overload affecting the heart and liver can occur unless managed carefully. 

A Burden Felt Across Asia and Deeply in Pakistan

In Asia, especially the subcontinent, the Mediterranean, and the Middle East, inherited blood disorders like beta-thalassemia are significantly more common than in many Western countries. A large proportion of global births affected by this disorder occur in these regions. 

Pakistan, with a population exceeding 225 million people, carries the high burdens of beta-thalassemia. An estimated 5–7% of the population are carriers of the beta-thalassemia gene more than 10 million people and every year about 5,000 children are born with the major form of the disease that demands lifelong management.

Many families do not know their genetic carrier status until a child is diagnosed. Cultural factors such as consanguineous (cousin) marriages, limited awareness, and scarce access to screening and prenatal counseling further contribute to the number of affected births. 

Life With and Without Treatment

For children like Waqar, the engine that keeps their body working is regular blood transfusion often every few weeks. Each transfusion helps fill the gap that his bone marrow cannot, boosting hemoglobin levels enough to keep him active and out of acute crisis. Alongside transfusions, iron chelation therapy is given to prevent excess iron from building up in organs (a side-effect of receiving blood repeatedly).

But consistent access to safe blood and chelation medicine is not a given. In Pakistan and many parts of South Asia, families often travel long distances to find properly screened and compatible blood, sometimes waiting hours in overcrowded centers. The financial cost, roughly thousands of Pakistani rupees each month for medicine and supplies is beyond reach for many families struggling to make ends meet. 

If a child without treatment could survive infancy, the body’s chronic anemia would lead to failure of multiple organs, dangerously low oxygen delivery to the heart and brain, and early death often before adolescence. With treatment, children like Waqar can survive into adulthood, but the quality of life is shaped by how dependable and comprehensive their medical care is.

The Family Behind the Child

Waqar’s mother recalls when he was diagnosed around his first birthday: “I remember holding him, so small, and feeling like the world had shifted.” It was the beginning of an unchosen routine: doctors’ visits, blood tests, transfusions, and an ever-present worry over infections or complications.

Their days are calibrated by waiting room chairs, the lull of hospital fans, and budgets spent on medicine instead of school supplies. Siblings learn early not to complain about minor injuries because their brother’s bare veins are already familiar with needles. Financial strain, emotional exhaustion, and the constant fear of something going wrong are not abstract concerns they are daily realities.

In communities where stigma and misunderstanding about thalassemia persist, families also wrestle with social isolation and lack of understanding. Some parents hesitate to talk openly about the disease, worried it will affect their child’s future opportunities or social acceptance. 

A Quiet Call for Awareness

There are medical efforts to expand carrier screening, premarital counseling, and community awareness, but implementation is uneven and limited. Prevention strategies including genetic counseling and prenatal diagnosis can significantly reduce the number of children born with beta-thalassemia major, but these services are often confined to urban centers and are unaffordable or unknown to many families. 

What Waqar’s story highlights is not just the clinical profile of a genetic disease, but the lived experience of a child and his family navigating a chronic condition in a resource limited context. It is a story that invites both empathy and action reminding us that behind every statistic is a beating heart, a family budget, and dreams for a future beyond transfusion chairs.

In Waqar’s eyes, when he is not tired, when he plays tag with his cousins, when he insists on reading aloud at bedtime, there is a simple truth: he is a child first, deserving of care, hope, and the possibility that one day, treatment and prevention will be not a luxury but a right for every family facing thalassemia.

Prayers for Waqar and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen

Warriors and Survivors - 244

Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 244

I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have worked in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen. 

Zohran was seven, small for his age, with a quiet curiosity that often made him linger a little longer under the sun when other children had gone home. He lives in a tiny village, where the earth smells of wet clay after rain and the days are measured by the crowing of roosters and the rhythmic hum of the river nearby. His house is modest, rooms with cracked walls and open corridors. Life is simple, and yet it is full for Zohran, full of the small adventures that children of his age often take for granted.

Lately, however, things began to change. Zohran finds himself getting tired more easily. Walking to school felt like trudging through mud even when the path is dry. His small hands, once quick to chase kites and catch sparrows, now trembles when he tried to hold his pencils steady. His mother noticed the bruises that appeared on his skin for no reason she could understand, and the nights when he would cough quietly in the dark, trying not to wake anyone.

His father, a man of few words who spent his days in the fields, tries to remain hopeful. He would tell Zohran to eat more, to sleep more, to take care of himself. But he, too, carrying a quiet worry, the kind that grows heavy in the chest and sits there, wordless, waiting. They had heard whispers in the village about strange illnesses, about children falling ill for no reason, but the words never had names. They don’t know the language of disease; they only knew fear and confusion.

The day they brought Zohran to the hospital, he didn’t really understand why he had to leave the village, why the white walls and bright lights felt so different from the soft earth of home. He clutched his mother’s hand, his small fingers gripping tightly, and asked quietly if he had done something wrong. She smiled softly, trying to mask her own worry, and shook her head. “No, beta, nothing is your fault,” she whispered. But even as she said it, she could feel the unfamiliar weight of uncertainty pressing against her chest.

In the hospital, the words came slowly, in a language that felt strange and heavy. “B-cell leukemia,” the doctor said, as if that explained everything, but it did not. To Zohran, it sounded like a spell from one of his storybooks, something distant, not real. To his parents, it was a word that carried the weight of a future they could not predict. Chemotherapy, blood tests, transfusions,  all of it was a rhythm that they had to follow without truly understanding, a dance of hope and fear.

The treatment days were long and quiet. Zohran spent hours sitting by the window, watching the birds outside, wishing to be among them again. He missed the smell of wet clay, the laughter of the children running barefoot along the dusty lanes. His small body bore the weight of the medicine, his energy slowly ebbing away. Some days, he would sit with his mother as she combed his hair, her hands trembling, trying not to cry. Other days, he would ask his father to tell him stories of the village, of the river and the trees, anything that could take him back to a world that still felt safe.

His parents are facing their own battles. They never imagined they will have to navigate hospitals, treatments, and medical jargon. Money was scarce, every trip to the city felt like a risk to their fragile savings. The neighbors whispered, some with sympathy, some with fear, but in their hearts, Zohran’s parents carrying the heaviest burden. They have to stay strong for him, to smile even when their own hearts aching, to make decisions about a future they can not predict.

Even so, in the quiet corners of the hospital, there were moments of tenderness. Zohran’s laughter, soft and fleeting, could light up a room. His curiosity, though dampened by fatigue, still peeking out in small ways a question about the clouds, a fascination with the shapes of the trees outside, a wonder at the colors of his medicine. His parents learning to celebrate small victories: a day without fever, a smile after a difficult treatment, a moment when he reached out to hold their hands without fear.

In the evenings, they sit together, holding each other’s hands in the dim light, finding comfort not in understanding everything, but in being together. The world outside is uncertain, sometimes harsh, but in those quiet moments, there is a fragile, enduring hope. Zohran do not fully understand what is happening to him, and his parents do not fully know what the future hold. Yet, amidst the fear and exhaustion, there is love patience, steadfast, and quietly fierce binding them together like the roots of a tree that refuse to break even in the strongest wind.

And so, their days continues, one at a time, carrying the weight of uncertainty with gentle courage, finding small moments of joy and connection in a world that had suddenly become so much bigger and stranger than the one they knew before.

Prayers for Zohran and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen

Warriors and Survivors - 243

Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 243

I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have worked in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen. 

Faisal’s Story: An Eight-Year-Old Boy Facing What He Cannot Understand

Eight-year-old Faisal had always lived a simple, predictable life in Sialkot. His days usually revolved around school, cricket in the narrow street outside his home, and teasing his younger brother while sharing small responsibilities with his older sister. Nothing in his routine could predict that life could shift so suddenly, or that a quiet diagnosis in a hospital room would change the entire map of his family’s future.

Just a month ago, his parents noticed he was more tired than usual. He came home from school complaining of headaches and wanting to sleep instead of playing. They assumed it was the usual childhood fatigue or maybe a seasonal infection. After all, children fall sick often, and it usually passes. But when the tiredness became more visible, and he started losing interest in the little joys he once chased so eagerly, they decided to take him for tests. That single decision, made with the calmness of routine concern, led them into a world they never imagined one where the word “leukemia” became part of their everyday vocabulary.

Faisal has T-cell leukemia. He doesn’t know what the word means. He only knows that his parents look different, worried in a way they try to hide but cannot. He knows he suddenly has to visit a bigger hospital, far from Sialkot, where doctors use long names for medicines and where nurses often say, “This might hurt a little,” before inserting needles that make him wince. For him, life has become a mixture of hospital corridors, waiting rooms, travel, and the strange quietness that follows him wherever he goes.

His parents, both working in a school back in Sialkot, carry a different kind of burden. They understand the word. They know T-cell leukemia is serious, unpredictable, and demanding medically, financially, and emotionally. For a middle class family, the diagnosis does not come alone; it brings expenses, travel, long waiting hours, and the uncomfortable fear of the unknown. Each trip to the city means time away from work, loss of income, and added transportation costs. Yet, there is no option. Treatment cannot wait.

At night, after Faisal is asleep, they talk softly, trying to make sense of decisions they never expected to face. Should they borrow money? Should one parent stop working temporarily? How will they divide attention among their three children? They are used to planning monthly budgets, not hospital stays. They are used to guiding students in classrooms, not managing medical files and treatment schedules. Still, they show up for him every day, learning to navigate this new life because there is no other choice.

Faisal’s siblings sense the change before anyone explains it to them. His older sister notices how their parents whisper in the kitchen. She sees her mother packing bags at odd hours and her father returning home later than usual. She doesn’t fully know what leukemia means, but she understands that something heavy has entered their home. At school, she tries to stay focused, but her mind drifts back to her brother. She wonders why he looks so tired now and why he doesn’t run to her when she comes back from school anymore.

His younger brother reacts differently. He asks questions many of them. “Why isn’t Faisal coming to play?” “Why does he go to the doctor so much?” “Is he okay now?” Adults try to keep answers simple, but children understand more from silence than words. He feels the emptiness in their small living room when Faisal stays in bed instead of playing with him. He feels the tension, even if he cannot label it.

For Faisal himself, the world has become confusing. He doesn’t know why strangers in white coats speak to him in gentle tones. He doesn’t know why everyone tells him to be “strong.” He only knows that he wants his normal days back his school bag, his cricket bat, the evening sunlight falling across the street where he used to chase his friends. He misses the certainty of routine. And though he cannot name it, he feels life slowing down around him, as if the world has become something he must now tolerate rather than explore.

The family, meanwhile, moves forward one day at a time. They do not speak in dramatic terms. They do not call themselves strong or brave. They are simply a middle-class household trying to keep life moving while absorbing a shock that has altered every corner of their reality. The illness brings fear, but also a sense of quiet adjustment. They ration their strength, reserving it for doctor visits, for difficult phone calls, for moments when they must appear calm in front of the children.

For them, hope is not loud. It is not made of big statements or grand promises. It shows itself gently in the way Faisal smiles on a good day, in the relief of a stable lab report, in the softness with which his mother wakes him for an appointment, or in the steady hand of his father guiding him through a hospital corridor.

This is not a story of dramatic courage. It is a story of a family learning to live beside uncertainty. A family who wakes up every morning wishing that things were different yet doing everything they can within the limits of their means. A child who cannot understand the disease shaping his days, and siblings who stand at the edges of it, trying to make sense of the new silence in their home.

And somewhere within all of this between the long travels, the medical bills, the quiet fears, and the small glimmers of routine this family keeps moving, hoping for a future where Faisal can return to being just an eight-year-old boy again.

Prayers for Faisal and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen

Warriors and Survivors - 242

Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 242

I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have worked in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen. 

Ali’s Journey: A Young Boy Facing Leukemia

Ali, a lively boy from Sahiwal is seven years old, whose days used to be filled with the simple joys of childhood, running around in the courtyard. Playing cricket with neighborhood friends and sharing small adventures with his little sister. He loved school and enjoyed learning new things, though sometimes he would come home tired from long days of study and play. His laughter was frequent, his curiosity endless, and his parents often marveled at his energy and imagination.

All of this began to change quietly. Ali started feeling unusually tired, losing his appetite, and developing bruises on his arms and legs. Initially, his parents thought it was minor perhaps a fall while playing or just fatigue from school. But when the bruises became more noticeable and his fatigue worsened, they knew something was wrong. After consulting a local doctor, Ali was referred to Lahore for further evaluation. The diagnosis that followed was one no parent ever anticipates: acute leukemia.

The news hit Ali’s parents like a wave. His mother, who had spent her days caring for the family and managing the household, felt a deep sense of helplessness. His father, the family’s primary source of financial support, faced the sudden reality of balancing work, hospital trips, and the growing emotional burden. Overnight, their lives shifted from routine familiarity to hospital corridors, lab reports, and treatment schedules.

For Ali, the world became a series of hospital visits, blood tests, and unfamiliar procedures. Each day brought new challenges: injections, IV lines, and the occasional painful procedure. Despite this, he displayed a quiet resilience. Sometimes he would ask simple questions about the medications or tests, mixing curiosity with fear, but he always tried to remain brave for his parents. On the good days, he found small moments of joy.  He likes reading a story, playing a brief game, or enjoying his favorite snack brought brief respite from the hospital routine.

The family’s daily life has been restructured entirely around his care. His mother now spends long hours by his side, monitoring his medications, communicating with doctors, and comforting him through moments of fear or discomfort. His father makes frequent trips to Lahore, balancing his work with the constant worry about Ali’s condition. Nights are often long, filled with concern and uncertainty, but they try to hold on to moments of normalcy, reading stories together, talking about school, or sharing a small laugh when possible.

Ali’s diagnosis has also brought into focus the emotional toll on the wider family. His younger sister misses the carefree time she once had with her brother. Extended family and friends, while supportive, can only partially ease the anxiety and exhaustion that pervade the household. Financial concerns, travel challenges, and the long-term uncertainties of treatment weigh heavily on his parents’ minds.

Despite these hardships, Ali demonstrates a remarkable quiet strength. He has moments of playfulness, curiosity, and humor, and these remind his parents that he is still a child, not defined by his illness. It is in these small moments Ali’s shy smile after a painful injection, his curiosity about a storybook, or his laughter during a brief game that the family finds hope and resilience.

Ali’s story highlights the multifaceted impact of pediatric leukemia. It is a disease that affects not just the child but the entire family, bringing emotional, logistical, and financial challenges. It also underscores the importance of early detection, timely treatment, and the support networks that families need from medical teams to community resources.

This story serves as a reminder of the resilience of children and families navigating such illnesses and the urgent need for awareness and support. Every child like Ali deserves access to medical care, understanding, and a community that stands with them. Their journey is difficult, but it is also filled with moments that reveal strength, love, and quiet endurance qualities that are often unseen but deeply impactful.

Ali’s journey is just beginning, and while the road ahead is uncertain, the love and care surrounding him provide a foundation of hope. His story calls for empathy, awareness, and action from all of us to ensure that children with leukemia and their families do not walk this path alone.

Prayers for Ali and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen

Warriors and Survivors - 241

 Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 241

I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have worked in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen. 

Zainab’s Quiet Battle

Zainab is only nine, yet her world has recently shifted in ways she cannot fully name. A few weeks ago, her parents sat in a small hospital room and heard the words acute B-cell leukemia. They were told it’s a cancer of the blood and bone marrow, a condition where abnormal cells multiply faster than the body can manage. The explanation was brief, but for Zainab, it was more confusing than frightening. For her family, it felt like the ground had slipped.

Before all this, she was an active child who loved drawing houses with long winding roads and bright yellow suns. She had a habit of humming while coloring, something that filled the home with a soft, cheerful presence. Now, the humming has quieted. Not gone, but quieter, almost as if she’s saving her energy for something much bigger.

Zainab doesn’t fully grasp what leukemia means. She knows it has something to do with her blood, something about cells not behaving the way they should. What she understands most is the visible change: trips to the hospital, long hours in waiting rooms, adults speaking in careful tones, and the sting of needles she has grown to expect rather than fear. She asks simple questions How long will I have to stay here? Will my hair grow back soon? Can I still go to school? and her parents try to answer without showing the heaviness they carry.

Her mother has started noticing the small details she once took for granted, the way Zainab adjusts her scarf when she feels cold, the way she holds her father’s hand a little tighter during appointments, the fatigue that settles into her shoulders even after a short walk. Children aren’t supposed to be this weary. Yet Zainab moves through each day with a sort of innocent acceptance, not because she is brave in the way adults often describe children with illness, but because she simply doesn’t know a different way to be.

Her father struggles in silence. He spends evenings reading about treatment options, outcomes, and survival rates, trying to prepare himself for conversations he wishes he never had to learn. Every sentence is a reminder that no doctor can promise a smooth path or a guaranteed cure. He hides his worry behind gentle smiles, but Zainab notices his tired eyes. She doesn’t ask about them, instead, she rests her head on his arm whenever he seems too quiet, offering the only comfort she knows.

The family’s daily life has reorganized itself around hospital schedules. Meals are quicker, nights are longer and plans now come with disclaimers, if Zainab feels well enough. Her siblings, though young, sense the change. They draw pictures for her and leave them on her bedside table. Some mornings she looks at them and smiles, other mornings she turns away, overwhelmed by a sadness she can’t yet explain.

One of the hardest realities for her parents is the uncertainty. Leukemia treatment is long, and while medicine has come far, no one pretends it is simple or predictable. They’ve been told there will be good days and difficult ones, days when she wants to talk and days when she won’t say much at all. Accepting that lack of control is a slow, painful process. It’s a strange kind of grief, mourning the ease of a past life while trying to be hopeful about the future.

What stands out most in Zainab’s story is not heroism but the quietness of her experience. She doesn’t describe her feelings in grand words, she expresses them in small gestures, a hesitant smile, a longer pause before answering, a sudden wish to sit close to her mother for no clear reason. These moments reveal the weight she carries, even if she cannot articulate it.

Illness, especially one as serious as cancer, reshapes more than the patient’s life. It changes the atmosphere of a home, altering routines, emotions, and expectations. Zainab’s family has learned that fear and love often sit side by side, and that supporting a child through such an illness means navigating both constantly.

Yet within all this, there are still moments of warmth. Zainab still asks for her favorite strawberry milk. She still doodles small hearts on paper when she feels up to it. She still laughs softly when her younger brother mispronounces long words. These tiny fragments of normal life become treasures, reminders that even in the presence of uncertainty, there are pieces of her childhood that continue to shine through.

Zainab’s journey is not a story of dramatic triumph, nor is it one of defeat. It is the story of a child learning to exist within the boundaries of a difficult diagnosis, and a family learning how to hold her through it. It is a quiet, tender struggle one marked by love, worry, and the hope that tomorrow will be a little gentler than today.

Prayers for Zainab and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen

Warriors and Survivors - 240

Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 240

I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have worked in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen. 

Anam’s Story: A Small Girl Carrying a Heavy Illness

Anam is only five, but she has already learned more about hospitals, needles, and waiting rooms than most adults ever will. She was diagnosed with thalassemia major when she was four, a diagnosis her parents had never heard before, yet it changed the rhythm of their home overnight.

Thalassemia major is not just a condition that limits hemoglobin. It reshapes childhood. It replaces school mornings with hospital visits, replaces playtime with transfusion schedules, and turns a young girl’s life into a cycle of blood bags, iron chelation medicines, and constant monitoring. For Anam, this has become a normal routine, even though it is anything but normal.

Her parents describe the first months after diagnosis as a blur. They were told she would need lifetime blood transfusions every few weeks. They were told about iron overload, medicines to control it, strict monitoring, risks of infections, and the emotional toll of constant hospital care. They tried to absorb it all while watching their child sit quietly, holding her father’s hand, not understanding why the world around her had suddenly changed.

In many low - and middle-income countries, thalassemia is common due to high carrier rates, sometimes affecting 5% to 10% of the population. In some regions of South Asia, the Middle East, and parts of Africa, thousands of children like Anam rely on regular blood transfusions simply to stay alive. In developed world, carrier screening programs, better diagnostics, and more consistent health systems have lowered the number of new severe cases. Even then, children still face the long-term burden of treatment, but they often have more stable access to blood banks, chelation therapy, and follow up care. The contrast is stark, and families in developing regions feel that gap deeply.

For Anam’s parents, the biggest struggle has been securing regular transfusions on time. Each visit comes with the same fears: Will we find a matching unit today? Will the hospital have enough blood stock? Will the medicines be available this month? They have learned that caring for a child with thalassemia requires not just resilience but also a kind of quiet courage and patience, one that must be renewed with every hospital trip.

Some weeks, her father takes time off work and loses part of his day’s earnings. Other times, her mother makes long phone calls to blood banks and local volunteers the night before a scheduled transfusion, trying to arrange a donor just in case the hospital supply runs low. There were times when they waited for hours in overcrowded clinics, Anam resting her head on her mother’s lap, tired not only from low hemoglobin but from the long journey itself.

Chelation therapy, essential to control iron overload adds another layer of challenge. These medications can be expensive, require long term use, and sometimes cause side effects that are difficult for a small child to tolerate. Anam’s parents juggle these decisions carefully, often asking other families for advice and adjusting doses under medical guidance. Small details, finding pharmacies that stock the medication, keeping her on schedule, convincing her to take each dose, become part of their daily life.

Still, they say Anam rarely complains. She winces during IV insertions, grips her mother’s kurta tightly, and sometimes cries from the discomfort, but once the transfusion begins, she settles. She listens to stories, watches cartoons on her father’s phone, or simply sleeps. A few hours later, her cheeks look a little brighter. Her parents always notice that small change, it is the sign they hold onto.

Across many countries, organizations and public sector programs try to support children like Anam. Regional thalassemia foundations help coordinate donors and provide counseling. Some governments supply free or subsidized chelation therapy. Public hospitals set up dedicated transfusion centers, and local nonprofits organize blood drives. These efforts do not erase the illness, but they ease parts of the journey. Anam’s family has benefited from volunteer led blood donation groups more than once, and they say those moments feel like a gift from strangers.

But despite all support, the emotional weight remains. Childhood illness does not only affect the patient it reshapes entire families. Anam’s parents plan their weeks around transfusions. They track her lab values, budget for her hospital visit, and try to maintain a sense of normalcy at home. They do everything quietly, without dramatizing their struggles, because they want Anam to feel like she is still just a little girl.

And she is. She loves coloring books, her pink slippers, and the swing in the small park near their house. On days when her hemoglobin is higher, she plays a little longer and laughs more freely. Her parents say those are the moments that keep them moving forward.

Anam’s life is not defined by thalassemia, but by the strength she shows while living with it. And her story is one of thousands of children whose childhoods are shaped by a condition they did nothing to deserve, yet they face it with a quiet patience and bravery that humbles everyone around them.

Anam’s life is shaped by thalassemia, but it is not limited by it. What stands out most is not the illness itself, but the way she carries it without bitterness, without asking why, simply moving through each hospital visit with the kind of resilience children rarely get credit for. Her parents often say they learn strength from her. On good days, when she runs a little faster or laughs a little louder, they feel as if the whole world has eased for a moment. Those small, ordinary moments are what keep them going. They hold onto them quietly, hoping for more days when Anam can just be a child, free from hospitals, needles, and the weight she never chose to carry.

Prayers for Anam and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen