Have you ever had one of those days where everything seems to be going so good, and then suddenly your world turns upside down? You wonder why it’s happening to you and you think, This is just a bad dream. I’m going to wake up any second and find out that it’s just a dream.

I had a day like that about a month ago. I found out my grandma has cancer and I couldn’t believe it was true. My dad, after weeks of her complaining of back pain, finally convinced her to go to the emergency room. The doctor ran tests on her. When my dad looked at the results, he thought he knew what they said, but hoped he was wrong. The doctor asked my grandpa and dad to leave the room while he talked to my grandma. He called them back in a few minutes later and confirmed my dad’s fears: his mom had cancer.

The kind of cancer my grandma has is lymphoma—cancer of the lymph nodes. She has large-cell, non-Hodgkin’s cancer. Non-Hodgkin’s is harder to treat than Hodgkin’s. Luckily, the doctors say she has a good chance of full recovery.

My grandma has tried to be really strong for the rest of us. I was at her house cleaning a few weeks ago, and she had received cards from kids at my school. I was dusting the dining room when I heard her crying. When I finished that room, I moved to the living room where she was sitting. She was reading a card from one of the fourth graders. I went and sat by her as she read it out loud. It said the student was praying for my grandma, day and night. She told my grandma that their faith could help each other, and that my grandma meant a lot to her. That card really touched us. My grandma started crying harder and kept saying, “I’m going to get through this! God has gotten me this far, and I’m going to beat it.”

God has really been with my family a lot this past month. All I can say is that if we didn’t have God in the center of our homes and lives, we would have a lot harder time getting through this. Of course, we still get scared, and my grandma has bad days. We just try to remember that with God all things are possible. That promise helps us to get through this time. It gives us hope every day.

I wanted to write this story because I felt someone would read it who is going through the same thing. I’ve also learned some important lessons this month. Your life can turn upside down in a matter of minutes. You can’t take anything for granted—especially life.

Morgan Rowden is 14 years old and just graduated from the eighth grade at the Owosso Seventh-day Adventist School in Michigan. She will receive a $100 scholarship because her story was selected for publication.