Quite quickly, we, his parents, are told that Yanis’ recovery will depend 25% on treatment and 50% on psychology. So we know what we have to do. For Kaïs, a man full of humor, anger is at its height. He loses his zest for life. For Fadila, it’s an inner scream, the cry of a wounded animal against so much injustice. Admittedly, there were warning signs: “I have a stomach ache”, “I’m tired”… Yanis complained long before the good exams informed us: “Mass of 15 cm on the left side , a tumor”. In other words, cancer, called neuroblastoma.
It is a cancer often detected late because of the not very clear symptoms. This tumor was discovered at stage 4, the chances of recovery for Yanis were 1 in 4. Our grief was total, but we had to hold back our tears, at least for Yanis, Naël and Lina. Be strong. Perhaps the family tradition has played a role: with us, we are fighters, we do not give up.
An exceptional medical team
The care team, out of the ordinary, helped us a lot. And Yanis with it, asking the worrying questions for us. He wanted to protect us from grief, promising us for example that he would not lose his hair and that he would kill this ball of doom. But when his hair started to fall out from the chemo, we realized that, yes, he was strong, but it was up to us to take the shocks and soften them for him. Kaïs offered to shave his own as well, but Yanis refused. He was the good soldier. The chemo gave positive results and caused the tumor to shrink, allowing the operation. So when the surgeon explained to us that she had left tumors, not being able to remove everything at once, we were laminated. And yet, it was she who knew, who knew, and who saved him. She had preferred to interrupt the very long operation and end the battle with chemo …
People accompanied us, and not only the exceptional medical and psychological team, but also our superiors of the in-laws of the Police, and then this association “ISIS”, which allowed our son to go to see a match of football or to go to the mountains. He climbed a symbolic summit close to Mont-Blanc, he was able to navigate as in his dreams on the ocean. Rêve d’enfance, another association, allowed Yanis to go to Corsica. In his hospital, actor Bernard Giraudeau, also hospitalized, told beautiful stories to children. He spent time on their floor to entertain them, to act on them. He even gave Yanis a Harry Potter CD. It is this humanity that Yanis’ illness has made us discover. This immense humanity among all, without racism, without difference.
Also think of our other children
However, we should not forget our other children. And sometimes to stop imposing on them visits to the “hospital for children without hair” for their only outings. Sometimes it is they who must have asked us something else, because we were exclusively focused on Yanis. Two years living in fear, sometimes happy with its joys, with parentheses in the treatments, but always so frightened.
When Yanis was finally “cured”, strangely enough, the worries did not stop there: at first we felt helpless because we no longer had the doctors on hand. The check-ups were close together, but making the decision on our own to give our son a Doliprane was almost impossible, as the side effects of the treatments persist. Always this paralysis linked to a fear of doing wrong! Between two checks, the anguish was terrible, and worse when the checks became less frequent. Being in remission is difficult, it means being able to relapse, and for those around you, the disease is such an ordeal that it leaves its mark in the form of perpetual fear.
An adult in the making
Post-traumatic stress constantly rekindles fears and doubts. It is therefore necessary to be accompanied by a shrink, it is necessary! Yanis, who was not afraid of death in the hospital, was afraid afterwards. Death became more frightening looking at it from a little further. Today, what Yanis wants above all else is to look like his parents. And if he sulks a little more, he says that it is not because he is in pain or fear, it is above all because he is 20 years old: the age of the adult in the making that will continue to upset his parents.
Yanis, who graduated with honors and is now studying history, looks at his experience without really turning the page. He feels like he’s grown numb, facing his illness like a Warrior since he was a child.