When suffering comes, beating down the soul; when pain shows up as ruthless storm, destroying dreams and plans, we normally react very badly.

We let the revolt embrace ourselves and externalize in words and actions what is deep in our soul because we saw our dreams shattered.

Some of us tumble to the insane despair. We stop living, abandon our job, friends... We shelter ourselves in ourselves, secure in the knowledge that there is not, in the world, suffering that could be compared to what has destroyed the soul.

However, for some people, suffering acts differently. They seek solutions, not allowing themselves be considered beaten, while they have not exhausted all the possibilities.

Even if the problem is the illness, the abandonment, the unemployment, they continue moving forward.

And, in addition to not giving themselves up to despair, they find the strength to assist others who are in equal suffering.

In their pain, they become more sensitive to the pain of others, whetting the feelings of the soul and hear the hesitation of those who suffer as much or more than themselves.

So it was with the couple Beira, whose son, at the age of seventeen months, was diagnosed with a brain tumor. From that day forward there were surgeries and chemotherapy happening.

At the age of ten, Francesco went on to cycling in wheelchair, lost the speech and needed a tracheostomy to breathe.

The days, the weeks and the months succeeded each other between trips to the hospital and a few returns to home.

So his parents have decided to keep him at home, setting up there the whole apparatus of an Intensive Care Unity. They wanted him to have peace.

Francesco was involved by the love of his family: the two sisters, the father and the mother.

He left peacefully, on a Sunday, while his father and one of the sisters were holding each one of his hands. The heartbeats began to fall slowly, to cease.

Some tears fell from the eyes of the father but, looking at the serenity of his son's face, he prayed.

*   *   *

Death is always the representation of a separation, as brief as it is. Therefore, it is painful.

Doctors say that more difficult than that of an adult it is to accept the death of a child. It is a promise and the prospect of growing, developing, to become young and adult.

Well, the parents of Francesco, after his death and in his honor, transformed their pain in benefit.

By linking themselves to an NGO, which attends children who have cancer, they opted for founding a Hospice in São Paulo, a shelter of pediatric palliative care.

It will be the first one in the country, in this proposal of the medical area to alleviate the suffering and increase the quality of life of patients disillusioned.

Good part of the resources for this work were covered by the parents of Francesco who donated, after his death, the features of the savings of their son.

As the father said, it was a way to give meaning to the lived experience.

*   *   *

Yes, there are many ways of suffering. Well suffer is going through the painful experience and still find the strength to alleviate the pain of others.

Let us think about it.

Spiritist Moment Team, based on the report A mais difícil
decisão, by Maria Laura Neves, from the magazine Claudia,
publisher Abril.
October 6.2014.