Gabe was many things: a loving son, a devoted brother, a Star Wars fan, a superhero. He was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma, a form of soft tissue cancer, in April of 2009 at just six years old.
The response from the community was overwhelming. Shirts and wristbands aiming to "Go Green for Gabe" were ubiquitous, a local student wrote a song, and the community rallied around Gabe and his family to help. Gabe fought cancer with courage, humor, and faith, but on August 12, 2010, he returned home to the Lord. As we did throughout his illness, we continue to "Rejoice always, pray continually, [and] give thanks in all circumstances!" (1 Thess. 5 : 16-18.)
Gabe was sweet. He was funny. He was immensely kind. He loved his family beyond words, and was always looking for ways to help them, his parents, and the world at large. That desire to help people was Gabe's gift, and in his memory, we're passing it on to the world.
Gabe's fight against cancer is still available to read on CaringBridge:
For those of you without a CaringBridge account, here is a reflection we’ve written on Gabe’s fight against cancer:
As many of you know, in April of 2009 our vibrant, beautiful, and gifted son, Gabriel Matthew Perkins, was diagnosed with an aggressive stage IV cancer, rhabdomyosarcoma, and we faced the biggest challenge of our lives and of our faith. Our six year old kindergartener had been showing signs for some time - tummy aches... “headaches”... fatigue... breathing issues... and even physical changes. It wasn’t until we were sitting in the hospital room speaking with the doctors that all those symptoms began to knit themselves together in my mind toward the “big picture”. Our son had cancer, and the prognosis at the time was bleak.
It was one late night in April while our son slept and machines whirred in that quiet hospital room that we made a decision to trust the Lord in our storm. We decided that although we did not have a choice when it came to our son’s illness, we DID have a choice in how we were going to handle it. At that moment, we decided to look to God in every decision, to trust Him in everything, and to bring Him glory through the most scary journey in our lives.
Those first days were beyond scary, as we watched helplessly while our son endured countless procedures and pokes, surgery recovery, tubes, scans... each time we began with prayer, and though he would still be nervous, we noticed that Gabe was much more calm afterward. When we were first discharged from the hospital, Gabe needed to have his PORT deaccessed - a terrifying and painful procedure as his incision area was still tender. After an hour of his nurse slowly and patiently working to remove the tape and the needle under Gabe’s watchful direction, the needle was finally removed. The car was packed and ready to go, and I wanted to walk out of that hospital and get home after our 10 day stay. But Gabe was not ready... he asked for a minute, I thought that minute was to collect himself after all the emotions he had just experienced. What I did not expect was for my small six year old to bow his head on his own and begin praising God and praying for covering and protection over our trip home. It was the first time I had heard him pray out loud, and it was a beautiful prayer. My heart spilled over with blessings as I watched my first born child come into his own faith.
As we began treatment, we had concerns beyond our son’s health. We knew Leslie was going to have to stay home so she could be available for Gabe’s care, but we were dependent on her income. Miraculously, we had already been rearranging some things in our lives to try and eliminate payments previous to Gabe’s diagnosis - we had refinanced our house and just closed on that the week before, as well as cutting out some luxuries and reducing payments to try and live on only one income for awhile. Of course, one income would not cover medical and travel expenses, but there was no question Leslie was going to take off the time we needed. We did not know how it was going to work, but we trusted that it just would. In early May, Leslie submitted her request form for a one year leave of absence from her job. On May 31st, some amazing friends held a pancake breakfast fund raiser. The line of people waiting for two pancakes and two strips of bacon wrapped around Wilson Middle School and was up to a three hour wait, yet people still came out to show support for our family. That one fundraiser, held two weeks after Leslie requested a leave of absence, yielded a record total of 41 thousand dollars - almost exactly one year’s worth of salary.
Throughout the fall of 2009, we faced a roller coaster of ups and downs - mainly downs. In August, scans showed that Gabe’s current treatment plan was not working. We changed to a more aggressive kind of chemo which required more and longer hospital stays. Gabe became sick and very tired with the treatments, and our family was separated for one week out of every three, plus usually a shorter stay due to fever sometime during his “recovery” weeks. In October, we met with the team and were told that Gabe’s cancer was likely terminal, as this treatment was not working as quickly as they would like and they didn’t think the tumors would shrink enough to try surgery. Meanwhile, I was watching my son grow each day in faith. He began every procedure with a prayer. Sometimes a new nurse who didn’t know Gabe would think it was a stall tactic (and maybe there was a part of that there), but as Gabe would begin to pray over the procedure, and over the doctors and nurses involved - that God would guide their hands and bless them - he never failed to bring a roomful of people to tears. He would say amazing things, like “Mommy, I’m not glad I got sick, but I am glad that I can teach people about Jesus”. Or speak out in a news interview how he looked to God for strength. Each day, it seemed, he touched someone with his child-like faith that was stronger than many adults.
In November, we received the seemingly amazing news that the tumors had shrunk enough that the surgeon was optimistic, but when they opened him up, they found not merely 4-5 large tumors in the abdomen, but live disease everywhere. At that point, the surgeon told us, he didn’t want to put Gabe through the hardship of recovery if there was nothing in place to keep the cancer at bay. Again, we were given a talk of palliative care - and making the most out of the time we had left with our son. We prayed for guidance, and of course, a miracle, and came across an experimental stem cell transplant that was showing some success in Europe in sarcomas. This would require us transferring to the only hospital performing this in the United States, in Madison, Wisconsin. Many obstacles needed to be passed before we could be accepted into the study, and our prayer was that God open the doors that needed to open and to shut the doors that were meant to shut. To guide us in every decision and lead us where we needed to go. Miraculously, despite the odds, every door opened leading us to Wisconsin. Even the insurance, which was expected to take up to three weeks for approval, which would have made things difficult with the treatment, called after one day - in perfect time to prep Gabe for a stem cell harvest that needed to happen. We took our cue and followed where God led us, hoping and praying this meant cure for our boy. Now, our surgeon happily performed a 12 hour, grueling surgery that removed 98% of the cancer in Gabe’s body, and for the first time in 11 months, Gabe was nearly cancer free. He was so happy, he wrote a poem - not crediting the surgeon and his efforts, but saying “God did it, I don’t know how”.
The spring and summer of 2010 in Madison were also full of ups and downs. Gabe sailed through the transplant, feeling better than we all expected. We loved and made the most of every moment we were together. Gabe continued to evangelize to the nurses in doctors in Madison and they soon came to love him as in Iowa. Gabe was finally discharged to the Ronald McDonald house there and loved his renewed freedoms! But he developed Graft vs. Host disease, where his new cells began attacking not just the cancer in his body, but also his healthy cells. But even as he began a decline in his health, his faith continued to increase. He once had a dream that thrilled him: he said he dreamed of his favorite “good guy” characters from Star Wars, charging on horses in Heaven with their lightsabers, with Jesus leading the charge against cancer and the enemy. He said he was riding right next to Jesus and charging with him. It gave me goosepimples to hear my son speak of charging right next to Jesus! He also was quiet at some point, and finally said, “Mommy, I don’t know why the devil gives people cancer... if they get better here on earth, God wins, but if they die and go to heaven, God wins too... so either way, the devil loses.”
Gabriel Matthew Perkins won his battle in heaven on August 12th, 2010, surrounded by his family after getting to come back home to Iowa City for a brief time. His last week was filled with visits by loved ones and we were able to answer his questions about heaven as best we could and tell him how proud we were of him and how loved he was. Then we began our true challenge: to live out our faith after Gabe’s death. Caleb, the oldest son of Christian recording artist Stephen Curtis Chapman, shared this vision in the wake of the tragic death of the youngest member of their family, Maria. God knows us from our beginning to our end. He has already seen the steps that we have not even taken yet, and He has already woven the tapestry of our human story, past, present, & future. The only thing is this: from our current vantage point, we only see beautiful blurred colors but nothing much else is in focus because we are too close, still being within the tapestry. It is only when our Savior pulls us away from this life and we stand with Him in Heaven that we have the entire view of this masterpiece in perfect focus. We will finally be able to see where our individual stories fit into the much grander design.
It was not easy to comprehend that our prayers of healing were unanswered - until we accepted that they WERE answered, just not the way we thought. It wasn’t until we looked back on our journey that we discovered we traveled on a walkway that the Lord had built for us to follow. Oftentimes we were blind, but as long as we kept on the pathway, we ended up where God meant for us to be. We realized that every occurrence in our life is a stone placed upon our path, leading us to our final destination. They may seem random or without meaning in isolation - like the symptoms Gabe showed - but put together, they make a big picture that we will someday be able to see with the help of God. And we are thankful to God for giving us a pathway to walk and a guide to lead us - even when we are walking it blindly.