The road from Ralph, Alabama, to New York City and then Houston, Texas, is more than a map of miles.
For 14-year-old Will Roberts, it’s a road of courage — a journey of faith, pain, and relentless hope.
Will is just a boy, but he’s also something more — a fighter, a believer, and an example of grace in the face of unimaginable trials.
Months ago, life changed for the Roberts family. It began with leg pain — the kind every growing kid might complain about after a long day outdoors. But soon, the pain became too much to ignore. The tests came next. Then the words no parent should ever have to hear:
bone cancer.
💔
Doctors at first tried to save his leg. But the cancer was aggressive, and the only chance of stopping it was a rare, complicated surgery. They amputated Will’s left leg and then performed what’s known as a
rotationplasty — removing the diseased portion of his leg, then reattaching his ankle and foot backward to his knee so it could function with a prosthetic.
It’s a procedure so extraordinary that most people can’t imagine it. But Will faced it like he’s faced everything — with quiet faith and a courage that humbles everyone around him.
After the surgery, recovery was long and painful. His body had been through trauma most adults couldn’t endure. There were tears, setbacks, sleepless nights. But every day, Will got a little stronger. He learned to balance again. He learned to laugh again. And soon, he began to dream again — of running, hunting, and just being a normal 14-year-old boy.
💛
This week, though, Will’s journey takes another difficult turn.
On Tuesday, he and his parents, Jason and Brittney, will be in New York City, where Will will finally be fitted for his new prosthetic leg — a symbol of progress, resilience, and faith in what’s possible.
But less than twenty-four hours later, their path leads them to Houston, Texas, where doctors will prepare for another major surgery — one that will test their strength all over again. The cancer, despite every effort, has returned. It has spread to Will’s
bladder and pelvis.
It’s a cruel twist for a boy who has already faced more than most do in a lifetime.
Still, he isn’t giving up.
And neither are his parents.
The goal now is clear: remove the cancer, and send it on its way — for good.
🌿
In the midst of the fear, there have been moments of grace. Just this past weekend, Will had a chance to go hunting in Mississippi — a dream he’s held onto through every surgery and hospital stay. Out in the woods, he wasn’t a cancer patient. He was just a boy again — laughing, alive, free.
And on that day, he met one of his heroes — NFL legend Brett Favre, who spent the day alongside him. Brett listened, laughed, and made Will feel like the world hadn’t forgotten him. “He treated Will like an old friend,” Brittney said softly. “He made him feel strong again.”
Moments like that matter.
Because when your days are filled with medical terms, test results, and fear, even one day of normalcy can give you the strength to keep fighting.
🙏
This week, as Will travels from hospital to hospital, his family carries more than luggage — they carry the weight of worry, the exhaustion of uncertainty, and the faith of a thousand prayers.
Their community in Alabama stands behind them. Churches have added Will’s name to prayer lists. Neighbors have organized fundraisers. Strangers have sent cards and letters, telling Will he’s not alone.
And through it all, Will keeps smiling. He keeps praying. He keeps saying the words that have carried him through every storm:
“God’s got this.”
💫
It’s hard not to cry when you see how much faith this young boy has. He’s lost his leg, faced the return of cancer, endured pain that most adults would crumble under — and yet he still finds ways to give thanks.
His mother once said, “Will praises God in the hospital just as loud as he does at church.”
That’s who he is.
He’s the boy who prays for other patients before his own surgery.
The boy who laughs with nurses when the medicine hurts.
The boy who believes that even when the darkness grows heavy, light always finds a way through.
🌤️
So as Will prepares for another week of tests, travel, and surgery, let us all take a moment to send him our strength. Let us whisper his name in our prayers, and ask for peace and healing — not just for Will, but for
Jason and Brittney, who carry the kind of courage only parents of sick children truly know.
Because no family should have to face this alone.
And they aren’t.
All across the country, people are praying for a miracle — and if anyone deserves one, it’s this young man from Alabama whose faith has never wavered.
💛
When this week ends, and the surgeries are behind him, there will be more healing ahead, more challenges, and hopefully more victories. But no matter what happens, one truth remains unshaken —
Will Roberts is a child of God, brave and beloved, walking a path lit by prayer.
May this week bring answers.
May it bring peace.
And may every step — whether on his own two feet or with his new prosthetic — carry him closer to the life he’s still fighting for.
Because Will isn’t just looking to survive.
He’s looking to live. 🌟
She Saved Another Baby Before She Became an Angel.
It began like any ordinary morning — a mother heading to work, a baby in safe hands, and the quiet hope of a normal day.
But by afternoon, everything that Wendi Oxner knew about love, safety, and motherhood would be shattered forever.
Lola Jayde Farr was 7 months old — soft curls, bright eyes, and the kind of smile that made the world pause for a moment.
She was Wendi’s miracle, born during the pandemic — a “Covid baby” who had filled a quiet home with laughter and light.
But in February 2022, that light was taken in the most horrific way imaginable.
That morning, Wendi left for work.
It was only her fifth day back on the job after staying home with Lola for months.
Her sister’s mother-in-law had offered to babysit at her sister’s home, where a family dog — a pit bull named Ace — lived.
Ace had been raised with children.
He was treated well, loved, trusted.
No one imagined danger.
But Wendi didn’t know that while she was at work, her sister’s mother-in-law left Lola and two other children in the care of her own 88-year-old mother.
And she didn’t know that Ace, kept in the backyard, would hear the sound of children playing in the front yard — and dig under the fence.
The attack was unprovoked.
No warning.
No chance to stop it.
The dog went straight for the baby.
“It was my fifth day at work,” Wendi later wrote.
“I dropped my healthy, happy baby off — and the next time I saw her, she was torn to pieces and barely hanging on.”
When the phone rang, Wendi’s world froze.
All she could hear were fragments — “attack,” “dog,” “hospital.”
She rushed out of work, her heart pounding with disbelief.
At the hospital, a nurse took her hand and said softly, “It’s very critical. We just got her pulse back.”
Lola had coded three times.
They were trying to keep her alive long enough to fly her to the children’s hospital.
“I lost it,” Wendi wrote.
“My whole world fell apart in that little conference room.”
When Lola arrived at Batson Children’s Hospital, her body told a story no mother should ever have to see.
Her face was unrecognizable.
Her ears were gone.
Her facial nerves severed.
Her brain was swelling.
The doctors did everything they could — but the damage was too much.
“Seeing what that pit bull did to my child made me sick,” Wendi said.
“I didn’t know the dangers. I wasn’t educated. I thought pit bulls were just like any other dog. I found out that day I was wrong.”
For days, Wendi sat by her baby’s bedside, holding her tiny hand, praying for a miracle that never came.
Lola’s heart stopped.
She was declared brain dead.
On February 6, 2022, Wendi said goodbye.
“I will never forget the way my baby’s wounds smelled when they let me hold her for the last time,” she later wrote.
“How heavy she felt in my arms because of all the built-up fluid. My mind is traumatized, and my heart is broken.”
But even in her grief, Wendi found a way to let Lola’s light live on.
While at the hospital, she heard about another baby — little Raelyn — who was dying of liver failure.
Doctors said the chances of a match were slim.
But Lola’s liver went to Raelyn.
And it worked.
Raelyn survived.
“Lola lives on through her,” Wendi said quietly.
Months passed, but the pain did not.
There were no headlines, no justice, no accountability.
Only silence — the same silence that had followed so many other dog maulings across the country.
“I didn’t know,” Wendi wrote. “I had never heard of attacks like this. Now I can’t unsee what happened to my baby.”
Every detail of that day haunts her — the phone call, the drive to the hospital, the smell of antiseptic and fear, the small pink blanket folded on the chair beside her.
She replays it again and again, wishing she could change just one decision, take one different turn, stay home that morning.
But she can’t.
To cope, she started writing — posts, letters, even a Reddit thread telling the world what really happened.
She joined online groups for parents who had lost children to animal attacks.
And recently, she started a GoFundMe page titled “Life After Lola.”
“Life has been so hard this past year,” she wrote. “The grief, the anxiety, the post-traumatic stress. We are trying to get back on our feet. We just need a little bit of help.”
No mother should ever have to write those words.
No parent should ever have to live with such images burned into memory.
But through all the pain, Wendi still speaks of her daughter with tenderness, not anger.
She calls her “my sweet girl,” “my little fighter,” “the light of my life.”
And when she talks about that final moment — holding Lola for the last time — her words come out soft, but steady:
“I told her, Mommy loves you. And I will never stop.”
Now, every February, Wendi lights a candle in Lola’s memory.
She looks at her daughter’s photos — her first smile, her tiny hands — and whispers the same words she did that day: “You are my heart.”
Lola’s story isn’t just about tragedy.
It’s about love that didn’t end, even when life did.
It’s about a mother’s courage to speak when silence would have been easier.
And it’s a reminder that behind every headline is a heartbeat — one that stopped too soon.
Somewhere, baby Raelyn laughs — the same liver beating strong inside her that once gave life to Lola.
And maybe, in that small miracle, Wendi finds a reason to keep going.
Because love, even broken and bruised, always finds a way to live again.
🕊️ Rest in peace, sweet Lola Jayde Farr.
You were loved beyond words.
