A prayer for Gloria | "I want my miracle. I want my family"

Alone with his daughter, Doug Strauss turns to Gloria for guidance.

"Do you want to go to heaven?" he asks the 11-year-old.

Gloria shakes her head no.

Dad looks at his little girl. She has a ventilator's tube down her throat. She often tries to grab it, forcing the nurses to restrain her.

He needs to know more about her wishes, so they talk through the night. Because of the ventilator, Gloria can only mouth words. They recite their family prayer, which concludes with singing everyone's names. Dad bellows while Gloria listens.

"God bless Mommy and Daddy," Doug sings. "God bless Alissa, Gloria, Maria, Joseph, Anthony, Samuel and Viiiinn-cennnnnt."

Gloria looks at Dad and makes her most definitive statement in weeks.

"I want my miracle," she says softly. "I want my family."

A day later, the ventilator is removed. Gloria has been breathing close to normal since last Friday. She has been transferred out of intensive care.

Her parents hope to take her home to Federal Way soon. After nearly three weeks at Children's Hospital & Regional Medical Center, Gloria is poised to do what seemed improbable — leave, alive.

"Just watching her do this is telling us that God is still using her," says Gloria's mother, Kristen.

The past 20 days tested those beliefs. The Strausses have always trusted that God would heal Gloria. Four years ago, she was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, a ceaseless childhood cancer. After seven rounds of chemotherapy, three experimental drugs and a stem-cell transplant, Gloria learned in April that the disease had spread throughout her body, and doctors believed she was weeks from death.

So the Strausses abandoned cancer medicine and opted only to treat Gloria's pain. On Aug. 11, after experiencing seizures and overwhelming aches, Gloria was admitted to the hospital, put into a medically induced coma and attached to a ventilator.

"That little girl is such a fighter," said Gloria's grandmother, Diane Strauss, minutes after visiting Gloria and stroking her hair. "You can never count her out."

Gloria has survived her biggest scare, but with cancer invading her brain and putting pressure on her left lung, she cannot escape this predicament.

Without a miracle, the neuroblastoma will keep coming in waves, true to its reputation. Over the past few months, Gloria's suffering has intensified each time the cancer has caused new problems. It is already influencing so many of Gloria's important organs: liver, lymph nodes, bones, bone marrow, brain and left lung. Her improvement may only be a reprieve.

"It's like God has given us another chance to breathe," Kristen says. "We know it's still very, very serious, though."

Gloria blows a kiss to her younger sister, Maria. The 9-year-old's eyes widen.

The Strauss family, displaced and disjointed during Gloria's hospital stay, is trying to reunite. Every family member has felt the strain of this month. Doug and Kristen say their six other children have handled the turbulence well, but they know the kids need attention, too.

"They've carried heavy crosses," Doug says. "Now that we've got a chance to heal, let's heal."

Doug spent time with Maria at a hotel near the hospital last week. Maria played a song — Hannah Montana's "Make Some Noise" — for Dad. The lyrics made Doug realize his youngest daughter was lonely. He asked her to replay the song.

"Let me hold you," Dad said.

After listening to several more songs together, Doug ended the night by putting Santana's "Maria Maria" in the CD player. Dad and daughter danced until the music stopped.

Such simple moments trigger the healing. One night, Gloria asked for her oldest sibling, 13-year-old Alissa, to sleep over at the hospital. One afternoon, Joe, 7, curled up next to Gloria and said, "I love you; you're pretty." And when Anthony, 5, learned Gloria had awakened from her coma, he said excitedly, "Let's go see her!"

Gloria talks lowly and slowly. She has an oxygen tube in her nose. But she is still Gloria. Her parents see that in her smile, in her humor, in her feistiness. They think about how much she has overcome this month.

On Aug. 11, Gloria's pain spiked, frightening her family, and she was rushed to the hospital. She knew she was in trouble.

"Hurry, hurry," Gloria urged as they arrived in the ambulance.

Minutes later in the emergency room, she started seizing. Her heart stopped, but doctors revived her before putting her into a coma that lasted nine days.

Amid all the commotion, Kristen dropped to her knees to pray.

If the ambulance had taken a few more minutes getting to the hospital, Gloria might be dead. Her mother believes God ensured Gloria would be spared that day.

During this month, the Strauss family has faced its greatest fear — the possibility of life without Gloria — and gained greater perspective.

"We will talk to our children a lot more about heaven," Doug said. "Even if we are all healthy, we will talk about heaven. Period. We will do it so that our kids understand this as well as we do."

The family is at peace, Kristen says, or as close to it as they can get right now. School starts Tuesday. Somehow, the Strausses will manage. Somehow, they will take care of Gloria, too.

Her parents fear she hurts more than she admits. Gloria takes 80 milligrams per hour of Dilaudid, a strong pain medicine. If she feels pain, she asks for even more of the drug, but it causes extreme fatigue. Gloria sleeps most of the day, and she wants to stay awake, especially when her siblings visit.

With the entire family circling Gloria, Sam, 3, climbs into his sister's bed and whispers to her.

"Does it hurt?" he asks.

"No," Gloria replies.

Sam maneuvers around the maze of Gloria's tubes and rests his head on her shoulder.

Jerry Brewer: 206-464-2277 or jbrewer@seattletimes.com.

The Strauss family is sharing its story with Seattle Times columnist Jerry Brewer and photographers Steve Ringman and Mike Siegel. This is the eighth story in an occasional series that began in May. The Times will continue documenting the family's journey as Gloria fights cancer.