Life rarely hands you a predictable roadmap. For me, the journey changed forever the day my oldest son was born. He was constantly sick as an infant and toddler, but for years, doctors brushed off my concerns, telling me it was just allergies and asthma.
It wasn’t until my youngest son was born that everything shifted. Cystic fibrosis (CF) had just been added to the newborn screening panel in California, and he was diagnosed as the 103rd baby in the state to be identified through the screening. Suddenly, the medical world had a name for what we were fighting. Because of his diagnosis, doctors recommended testing my other children. That’s when we learned our oldest son, who was now eight years old, also had cystic fibrosis.
Our world turned completely upside down. Managing two children with a complex, chronic illness means hospital visits, endless respiratory treatments, and constant vigilance. My middle son isn’t a carrier at all, while my youngest daughter carries her father’s CF gene. We weathered incredible storms, including the heartbreak of a marriage that didn’t survive the immense pressure.
At the time, specialists gave us grim statistics, telling us there was only a 2% chance my boys with cystic fibrosis would ever be able to have biological children. But life loves to defy the odds: today, I am a proud grandmother to a wonderful grandson.
As my children grew older and stepped into adulthood—my stepdaughter is now 30, my boys are 26, 23, and 19, and my youngest daughter is 14. I realized it was finally time to reclaim a dream of my own. Years of advocating for my sons in doctor’s offices and hospital rooms had quietly prepared me for a second act. With most of my children grown, I went back to school, pushed through the late nights and textbooks, and graduated with my BSN.
Today, I am working on getting my California RN license. Looking back, every hard day, every diagnosis, and every medical hurdle brought me right to where I am supposed to be: bringing my lived experience as a caregiver into a professional career dedicated to healing others.
By: Loretta Mendez Cabrales