The email hit me like a two-by-four to the face. We have seen so much death, so much suffering, that we can become numb to it all. But this was nearly my breaking point.

Make-A-Wish New Jersey, the organization that grants life-changing wishes for children with critical illnesses, has been forced to put more than 100 of its special trips this spring and summer on indefinite hold because of the pandemic. There, in front of me on my laptop screen, was just a small part of that devastating list.

Megan, who was going to Hawaii this summer ...

Rebecca, who wanted to visit the healing waters of Lourdes ...

Anthony, who was booked for a Disney vacation ...

On and on it went. Feeling sick to my stomach, I had to close the email before I finished reading it. Here are young kids, after fighting for their lives, preparing for a special journey or encounter to give them a little slice of happiness.

The coronavirus was taking that, too?

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I thought about just deleting the email because telling this story would just add more sadness to a world already soaked with it. Then, the man who sent it, a Make-A-Wish volunteer named Alan Medvin, suggested I talked to “the perfect kid.”

His name is Rishi Duggal. He has battled acute lymphoblastic leukemia for three years. He wished to go on a trip to the Galapagos Islands this summer -- a trip that, because of the coronavirus, has been canceled for now.

And during that call, this 13-year-old kid from Skillman said something that changed my outlook on just about everything.

“I would wish, if I could, to stop this virus.”

# # #

Rishi told me the entire story about his ordeal over Zoom last week, his mop of black hair hovering at the bottom of the screen. He started to feel these weird bumps on the back of his neck, and then acute pain in his clavicle and collarbone. Doctors wanted a biopsy, but even then, he wasn’t worried.

What kid frets about a horrible disease?

The test results came back two days later. His parents, Munish Duggal and Veera Rastogi, broke the devastating news to him in the backyard.

“What did you do when we told you?” Munish asks him during our conversation.

“Well ...” Rishi hesitates.

“You can say it.”

“I threw up.”

He said the first year was “especially horrible.” His trips to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital and the Cancer Institute of New Jersey were too frequent to remember. He spent three and a half weeks there when an abscess in his leg required surgery, then another 10 days when the swelling returned. He battled infections, pneumonia and low blood pressure.

But, from the beginning, Rishi decided he had to embrace what he calls “little glimmers of hope.” He had his friends and his family, and when he was healthy enough, he immersed himself in sports and his guitar lessons. He is a huge NBA fan, and he celebrated when his Toronto Raptors -- he was born in the Canadian city and spent the first half of his life there -- won their first title.

This becomes clear pretty quickly from talking to Rishi: He isn’t the type of kid who is going to spend much time feeling sorry for himself.

“I was really shocked and then scared,” he said. “But then you just after a month, you kind of get used to not feeling well -- which is not a great feeling to have, but it’s it’s OK. And then you just well, you have to take the bright side.”

The bright side, for him, was exploring the world. Rishi loves to travel, so when he was feeling well enough, he went with his family to India, Costa Rica and other far-flung locations. That’s why, when it was time to pick his Make-A-Wish trip, he eschewed the more traditional Disney vacations and picked the Galapagos Islands.

He loves to snorkel, explore and experience nature, and he figured that was the best place in the world for all three. The trip was planned for August, soon after his final leukemia treatment. Then, the coronavirus changed everything, and this adventurous middle schooler learned that he was at a higher risk because of his already compromised immune system.

I asked him, given all that’s going on the world, if he would consider changing his wish. I was wondering if he would be reluctant to travel so far away. He interpreted the question another way entirely.

That’s when he told me that he would wish away the coronavirus if he could.

# # #

When I tell this story to Mike Dominick, the director of communications for Make-A-Wish New Jersey, he isn’t the least bit surprised. His organization granted almost 600 wishes in the most recent fiscal year, and the grace and humility of the kids never ceases to amaze him.

Some of those wishes are elaborate. One kid wanted to train with the Las Vegas police after seeing their response to the Harvest music festival shooting. Another wanted to attend the Duke-North Carolina game in Chapel Hill and hang out with Coach K and the players. Another wanted to spend a week with the cardiothoracic surgeons at the world-renowned Texas Heart Institute.

These trips are planned for months, sometimes years. So, yes, this has been a difficult few weeks for the the Make-A-Wish employees. Now, instead of planning those life-changing experiences, they find themselves taking those trips away -- in a few instances where the kids’ bags were already packed.

“We’ve had over a hundred wishes postponed, and I use the word postponed deliberately,” Dominick said. “We are focused and determined that we will grant these wishes.”

But he knows that some of the kids won’t make it to next summer. That’s the reality of this devastating time in world history. More kids are going to get sick with critical illnesses, which means when the world finally opens back up, Make-A-Wish New Jersey’s 30 employees will have a busy few months. They’ll be ready.

Until then, Rishi plans to enjoy every milestone, big and small. He looks forward to the day when he can get outside and play with his friends again, for sure, and that long-awaited day in August when he completes his final treatment.

That trip to the Galapagos Islands? He will be waiting patiently for the chance, and that at a time of personal sacrifice all over the world, he knows there are far more important things.

“Even before my illness, I was always a positive person, but it just taught me to be even more grateful and even more happy,” he said. “Even small opportunities come your way or small things that can make you happy, then you just have to be really grateful for it and be happy that it’s there.”

Here’s my wish: That everyone could get a dose of positivity from this kid.

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Steve Politi may be reached at spoliti@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @StevePoliti. Find NJ.com on Facebook.