Rebecca Vroom

Mid-January in British Columbia was customarily damp and cold in 1997.  In the early hours of a Saturday in January, the oldest seven children of the Vroom family were scattered in friends’ homes for a rare sleepover. The house was quiet, as Arnold and Susan anticipated yet another life to add to their busy home. At 8 AM, Susan gave birth to her fifth daughter: Rebecca Faith Vroom.

Rebecca was the youngest girl in a house full of opinionated older siblings, and she was happy to live in quiet obscurity. She thrived in the shadows of the large personalities in our home. In fact, there was little she hated more than attention. William and Benjamin could reduce her to tears at the dinner table by merely asking her about her day.

Rebecca found a natural best friend in Rachel, her older sister by 19 months. The two of them were inseparable, and they were a perfect compliment to each other. Rachel’s personality was bubbly and imaginative, overflowing in her ready wit and quick tongue, while Rebecca kept her thoughts to herself and was immensely practical. In their play, she was happy to follow where Rachel’s imagination led.

When Rachel moved from the play-room to the school-room at the age of four, Rebecca was not content to be left behind. With many tears, she entreated Mom to allow her to learn to read. She was only two, but she was eager to show her abilities. Mom used to read children’s stories to her two little girls, and one of their favorites was about a little French orphan, Madeleine. Unbeknownst to Mom, Rebecca committed Madeleine’s adventures to memory and could recite the story verbatim. She had also memorized where the pages had to be turned, and so would “read” to herself, to the amazement of family and friends. We often boasted jokingly about our “child-prodigy.”

Rebecca’s early aspirations to read were not confined to memorizing children’s stories. She proved a quick learner, and by the time she was four she would perch upon Dad’s knee at the dinner table and take turns reading Scripture with him during family devotions. Rachel would join her on Dad’s other knee, and so together the two of them learned to read from the words of Scripture.

Besides her talent for reading, Rebecca was devoted to the piano. While she had many musical siblings, she surpassed most of them in her love for music. Nobody ever had to remind Rebecca to practice, and she could be heard playing routinely throughout the day. When the cancer came and the Make-A-Wish Foundation offered her an opportunity for a gift, Rebecca did not care for a car or a trip. She wanted a piano.

But when Rebecca was 13, her love for piano was suddenly hampered by a pain plaguing her right arm. For months we thought it was tennis elbow, aggravated by constant piano practice. But when the nagging pain grew worse, we went to the doctor. The tests slowly unraveled the stark and terrible truth. Our little sister had cancer.

Someone in our home said last week, “Cancer is an introvert’s worst nightmare,” to which another quickly replied, “It’s everyone’s worst nightmare.” We laughed, but it is true. Our quiet, unassuming sister, who loathed attention from others, suddenly had a glaring spotlight upon her. She could no longer quietly live her life in the shadows of other personalities. Every day carried with it endless inquiries as to how she felt and whether she was ok. Visitors streamed through our home to see her and encourage her. Rebecca shrank from the attention at first, but then blossomed.

For years, it was a running joke in our home that if you wanted to find out how Rebecca was doing, you asked Rachel. But when the cancer struck, we discovered that our little sister indeed had her own voice. Her personality began to emerge, and with cancer as her burden, our quiet girl became a young woman. She had a matter-of-fact outlook on life that required few words, and a sarcastic wit that only emerged occasionally. Through the long days and nights in the hospital, endless needles, and poking and prodding doctors, Rebecca displayed a radical patience and a calm. In moments, she struggled with the lot that the Lord had given her, but she persisted in spite of this struggle. She rarely admitted to pain or depression, and did not want anyone’s pity for her burden.

Rebecca’s teenage years were marked by her long battles with cancer, but they were also filled with much joy. She was able to be the maid-of-honor at Rachel’s wedding last summer, and watched her best friend and sister marry the love of her life. Rebecca wanted to travel, and was able to take a month last summer to travel with Betty-Ann, her older sister. We have many delightful memories with Rebecca. She loved her brothers and sisters and many nieces and nephews. In the end, when it became evident that the Lord would take her, she confessed sadness that she would miss the birth of Rachel’s first child. She spoke of the sadness of leaving her brothers and sisters behind.

Rebecca will be desperately missed by us. We grieve her loss, but we know that her suffering is over. In the end, her bodily suffering was great, but even when her body was eaten with cancer, she was able to tell of the peace that she had in Christ. She fell asleep as a woman with a hope. When we prayed over Rebecca over the course of the last year, we asked that God would either heal her or heal her, whether on earth or in heaven. Rebecca’s story is not a story of a lost battle. She was faithful to the end. She ran the race that the Lord set before her with tremendous courage. Our quiet little sister is with Jesus, and though we grieve, we know that we shall see her again.