I shuddered, staring absently at the thin stack of papers, the physician’s voice resonating in my head. I watched my fingers quiver as I reached for the documents—another consent form. I felt helpless. Utterly helpless. But I shook my head and refused to sign. A nurse’s protestations joined the physician’s, echoing authoritatively through the tight confines of the white-walled office. I squeezed shut my downcast eyes and felt a tear trickle down to my lips. It was in that instant that a voice pierced the defeated silence in my mind: a voice as calm as it was unnerving in its content. I can’t do this. I just can’t. Signing meant granting my approval for having my (then-)only son, my one-and-a-half-year-old baby, Calvin, placed on a new suite of drugs, steroids known to cause liver damage and even liver failure. The signature would allow Calvin’s medical team to continue, free of legal liability, in the non-negligible event of permanent hepatic injury. But the signature was much more: a maternal sanction to proceed along the same route that not only had failed to yield any improvement but&mdas …