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The Low of a Battle
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It’s hard to watch someone you care about get sick, to wither away down to nothing, to try to stay strong for everyone around them, but yet get tired of trying. It’s hard to watch someone you love struggle with watching this happen to someone close to them. You watch their face change from day to day with the ever changing news from good to bad to good to bad.
What I am talking about is my sister and her best friend’s struggle with Ovarian Cancer, we will call her BC. When I see my sister stressed out from worry, I feel it too. I worry about her and what is going through her mind…the stress, the worry, the concern, the sadness, the empty feeling that is growing in her heart, the hope that she has and the want for that to stay strong. BC was my sister’s best friend since the day she moved here. BC has become part of our family, she has become like a second sister.
BC is in an awful battle with ovarian cancer but is also struggling with staying strong…putting up the fight that it takes to make it through. BC has had a rough road as of late with multiple hospital stays, the last two lasting 2-3 weeks each. She is struggling with her weight, she is down to 85 pounds. She is struggling with the Chemo treatments, keeping food in her system, hydration etc. She no longer wants to get out of bed for a short walk around her apartment. Yesterday my sister got a phone call from BC saying she hasn’t been feeling well and she has decided to go to the doctor to see what is going on again. She called back after going to the doctor to tell my sister that she is being admitted once again to the hospital and asked her to come sit with her while her boyfriend and sister go home to pack for the stay. We were in a store finishing up some shopping with this call came in. On the way home my sister received another call from a friend explaining the truth behind the hospital admittance. I hear my sister in disbelief in the backseat, my heart dropped, my mind went to the worst news, I drove in silence waiting for the call to end to be updated. We arrive home and she hangs up with her friend and she is livid. My stepmom and I ask what is going on and brace ourselves for bad news. The truth was that BC had begged to be admitted to the hospital. My sister is shaking with anger, BC has given up and wants to be in the hospital. BC is surrounded by people that love her, that are asking her to stay strong and fight. BC has fought, she has fought long and hard but she is becoming tired. That is to be expected.
The question is when as a friend do you cross that line and get in her face and let her know that she must not give up..she must keep fighting. Is it completely out of line to tell BC to quit being selfish and fight not only for herself but for everyone around her?
BC agreed earlier to seeing a counselor to help her mind through this. She has yet to talk to anyone, she has also stopped taking her depression medicine. This is not good. BC can be a handful when she is not in a good mood (which woman can’t be) and of course everyone around her is trying to keep her as happy as can be. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. But when do you say enough is enough and take the chance and intentionally piss her off and say point blank..You will talk to someone whether you like it or not, you will take your medication, you will keep fighting..you will not give up! Your intention is not to make her mad and upset but help her to deal with the cards that she has been dealt. Her loved ones don’t want to cause any unnecessary stress, I wouldn’t either but yet you don’t want to see BC give up and say she can’t do this anymore. No one wants to hear that. No one wants to lose the gem that BC is to this world. She is loved by all and the world would become a shade darker without her in it.
My sister left my house yesterday afternoon with this struggle. As a friend when do you cross that line and quit enabling her to make this choice of giving up. When do you look her in the eye and say “you will not give up and leave me, your family, and yourself”. I have yet to hear what all happened last night at the hospital but I can only hope for the positive.
I was talking to someone else about all of this last night and their outlook is not good. I wanted to jump through the phone and strangle this person. You can’t think negatively! I don’t want to hear your reality outlook on the situation and so help me god if this person says what was said to me to my sister I will have words with them and it won’t be pretty. I do believe they know better but still, I wouldn’t put it past them.
I refuse to let my thoughts turn negative. We all must stay positive, have beautiful thoughts of recovery and victory for BC. She needs the strength from everyone around her, everyone that loves her more now than ever.
We love you BC, stay strong, stay with us and fight.
In Your Honor – Always Say I Love You.
You must always say I love you. Life is too short not to. You never know when someone will be leaving your life. I have a story for you and I hope it will open your eyes to two things. On May 26, 2005 I got a phone call from my step father. He told me that my mom was not feeling well. She had been having severe headaches for awhile now and she had been to the doctor to get a couple of lumps under the skin removed. She told my sister and I that it was “nothing”. He told me that he had called an ambulance to take mom to the hospital. My sister and I live in Nashville Tennessee and my mom lives in Aurora Indiana. I hung up the phone not knowing what to think. My husband told me to pack my bags and my sister also and head up home because it could be nothing and then again it could be something big. As my sister was walking down the driveway with my 3 year old son I was shaking. She came in and I told her what was going on. We packed up and the kids too ( a 3 year old and a 5 week old) and headed for Indiana. We pulled up out front of my mom’s house around 4 am and my stepdad was waiting for us he had not been asleep. They took her to the local hospital and had ran a CT scan and found 4 spots on her brain. While trying to take this news in I took the kids upstairs and put them to bed and tried to get some sleep myself. In the morning (Friday) I took the kids to my sister-n-law’s house and my sister and I headed to Cincinnati. By this time they had sent her to Good Sam in Cincinnati for further tests. We get to the hospital and she is in the ICU. My sister and I are pretty much freaking out to say the least. My mom god love her says what on earth are you two doing here and where are the kids? I love my mom always worried about my kids. They ran some tests in the morning and before lunch we got news that my mom had 7 brain tumors. This was a total shock because before yesterday there was nothing (that we knew of) wrong with my mom except for the headaches which she covered up nicely. The doctor said that they were NON life threatening and they could be taken care of with surgery and radiation. My sister and I left for lunch feeling a little relieved thinking in the long run she was going to be ok. We got back from lunch and they were wheeling her out for her first radiation treatment and they told us to go along. The three of us went down with her. When we got there the radiologist took my step dad back to talk to him and we stayed out with mom. She was even joking about her tan going away. My step dad came out and told us to come back with him. My heart dropped. The three of us sat down with the doctor and he proceeded to tell us that our mother was covered with cancer from head to toe. She had melanoma. Every organ in her body was ate up. He told us that we had a decision to make. We could go ahead with the treatments but the end result was all the same. Mom could stay with us for two days or with a miracle two months. But it didn’t look good. We made the decision to not do the treatments and put her through any unnecessary pain. We would only be keeping her around for our selfish reasons. That was the hardest decision I have ever made in my life, my mother’s fate was put in our hands pretty much. We made the decision to get her home as soon as we could so she could spend her last days in her own home with her own things. I can’t explain to you what was going on in my head. I became numb and stayed that way for about a month. We went home that night to try to get some rest and was called back to the hospital around 12:15 in the morning. The nurse said her pupils weren’t responding and that is one of the first signs that they are going. We all had just got to bed and hopped right back up and I took the keys to drive us up. It was the weirdest drive I have ever made. It was barely raining but there was a very eery silent calm in the air. In the distance I saw lightning and all I could think was that was mom fighting for us. We got there and she wouldn’t even respond to us. No movement but she was still there. We slept on the floor all around her that night. I got up about 8 in the morning and walked in her room from the restroom and she opened those eyes and like nothing happened said what on earth are you doing here this early. She didn’t skip a beat. The nurses said they can’t explain how this happened. They’ve never seen someone start to slip away the way she did and come back like nothing happened. That Saturday was one of the best days. Mom sat up in her bed she ate all day she laughed and cut up with us like nothing in the last two days happened. She just kept saying she wants to go home and that she is so happy that Lindsey (my sister) and I have each other. We had made arrangements for her to come home at 12:30 the next day, Sunday. We had hospice coming to the house to set everything up. Mom was coming home. We left her that night eating her Mentos and watching HGTV her favorite channel. That woman would watch it 24/7 if she could. We told her that we loved her and she was coming home in the morning. We got up Sunday morning and headed up early. When we got there mom was in pain, bad pain. Her head was hurting so bad. We sat there with her for a couple of hours and the nurse gave her some pain medicine and mom wanted to take a nap. We left her at 10:30 to come home and meet with the hospice people. We told her we would see her in a couple of hours. I held her hand and told her that I loved her and she said it back to me and she squeezed my hand. We were at home when we got a phone call at 11:30 saying mom’s vitals weren’t good. Five minutes later they called back and said her breathing was slowing. My sister and stepdad headed up to the hospital and I stayed behind waiting for my grandma and my husband. I called back up to the hospital at 11:46 and she had already passed away at 11:45. The nurses were all in there with her so she wasn’t alone. We were too late. She never made it home.
You never know how much time you have. Always say I love you, even if you are just running to the store and will be back in 10 minutes even if you fighting say it. You never know when its the last time.
Please do not be sad from my story. Just remember…Always say I love you.
Thank you for taking the time to read it.
My mom loved the sun. She always had a tan. We were always outside during the summer growing up whether we were on the boat for the weekend or at the pool. Hell, we grew up with a tanning bed in our home. My mom has psoriasis and the tanning bed helped with that. With summer upon us and the outdoors being our favorite place to be I ask of you this, please wear your sunscreen, wear your sunhat, protect yours skin. I suggest against tanning beds now but if you feel you must please do it in moderation. Melanoma is a deadly cancer when undetected it can consume you, it’s one of the quickest spreading cancers. I still love the sun but I am smart about it now. I hope you will be too. If you see a mole that is suspicious don’t hesitate to get it looked at. Get your skin checked once a year to be safe. Melanoma is nothing to be messed around with or ignored.
A Smorgasbord Post: A letter, the recap and a benefit.
I have so much to cover. This is going to be one hell of a smorgasbord of a post. I could break it up into different posts I guess but…oh what the hell here we go.
First we will start with a letter. I see a new trend going on with my blog, letters to things that will never write me back. They (I don’t even know who the hell ‘they’ are) can’t write me back, ‘they’ don’t even have hands to write with, hell ‘they’ aren’t even real people. So far ‘they’ have been my cold, my eyes, and another cold. This time it will be a Mother Nature. I might be going crazy.
Dear Mother Nature,
We need to talk about your weather trends this winter. I am not happy with your weather, I am not happy with your snow. One of the reasons I love it here in Tennessee is because of the weather. It doesn’t *usually* get crazy cold until January and the snow *usually* doesn’t come until late January or February. This year you decided to start in December with the frigid temperatures and the snow. Not cool nor is it funny. I have had it. I woke up this morning to almost 3 inches of snow on the ground with more coming throughout the day and even more falling and accumulating tomorrow. What the crap is this, a funny joke? Well you suck at being a comedian if that is the case. If you were on a stage I would so throw tomatoes at you. So now with all this snow on the ground and it being Tennessee, schools are out once again and will be for at least half the week. Do you not understand that the kids need to go to school? They need to go so they can learn and most importantly be out of the house in a social setting away from us moms so we can get done what we need to get done. I don’t mind a snow day later in the week, Wednesday is good or even Thursday. But to throw up your white stuff on a Sunday night into Monday with even more on a Tuesday..are you kidding me? Do you not get that we just spent the entire weekend with our kids and we now need a bit of a break? Now don’t get me wrong I am grateful to not here my annoying beeping alarm in the am but I had stuff to get done today and now that is shot. Instead I will be in the house with an 8 year old and a non stop talking 5 year old. I will be less at least one ear come days end. Take right this second for example, I am trying to type a post and I have my 8 yr old standing in front of me with silly puddy saying ‘Mom, look at this’ every 6 seconds when he puts it in a different shape and my 5 yr old doing the same thing while yelling at the dog for trying to eat her silly puddy. You obviously have no children and have no idea what you put us moms through. I would love your cooperation from here on out for the rest of the winter and I would prefer your shenanigans later in the week from now on. Thank you in advance for listening to my requests and complying.
Sincerely,
Jamie
Ok moving on..
I had a great weekend. Friday evening brought the old 3 back together with dinner and drinky poos afterwards. Fan-tabulous! I had a great time catching up and hanging out. Much needed. Saturday needless to say I didn’t exist because I am old and honestly it takes me a day to recover from just a late night anymore.
Yesterday was the benefit for Brandi and it was A-Mazing! I arrived around 3:30, the music started at 4. When I got there the place was already 85% full! Unbelievable!!!!! Throughout the night it just kept filling to the point that there wasn’t an empty seat in the place and you couldn’t walk through. It was amazing to see all the people and feel all the love and support that was in that place. 50-60 people drove up from Louisiana (where Brandi is from) to be there with her for this event. Absolutely amazing. And a band from New Orleans came up to play. I felt like I was right there on Bourbon Street. Brandi got up and used every ounce of energy she had to be on stage with the Wooten Brothers. She is a true trooper. Throughout the evening they had a silent auction with amazing items. The music talent I don’t even have words for…it was amazing. Between the New Orleans band to famous musicians in Nashville I was wowed every time new people took the stage. When I left last night at 7:45 they had already raised $8,000 and this morning I heard they raised $11,000 last night and that does not include money from the silent auction. The Kenny Rogers even donated $1,000 to Brandi plus another grand from another well known country musician. Un-believable! Brandi is much loved throughout our town. I heart Nashville for so many reasons and one main reason is the way this town comes together. It was first proved to me when we had the flood and again last night when the place almost met capacity. Brandi is loved by all and she will strive and win this battle with cancer.
We love you Brandi!
And to you Nashville, I love you, I am proud to call this wonderful city home. To see everyone come together for whatever cause it is and to witness the love this city can show is by far hands down what makes this the most amazing city to live in. The only complaint I have now with you is the weather and hopefully my letter to Mother Nature will heed much needed results in that department.
A Benefit for Brandi. A concert in her honor, spread your love!
As some of you have read in earlier posts a good friend of mine and my sister’s bestie is in a battle with Cancer. The doctors original thought was she has ovarian cancer. She had a full hysterectomy last week to rid her body of the Ovarian Cancer and during the surgery found a tumor the size of her stomach and spots throughout her body, one being on her pancreas which has brought up the possibility of it being Pancreatic cancer. They are awaiting the results of the biopsy, which should be in later this week and will know for sure what it is, but for now they are sticking with Ovarian Cancer. She will be starting Chemo in just a few weeks. She is 29 years old and the sweetest girl you will ever know. She will light up a room when she walks in with her huge smile and laugh, she is hilarious, she is loving, she is caring and just all around a great girl and I am proud to say she is my friend. She is loved by so many around our city and Sunday 3rd and Lindsley is throwing a benefit concert in her honor. The benefit concert has a huge list of performers and most likely more artists will be added seeing that on fb people are adding to the comments that they or others want to perform. The current list of artists that will be playing the benefit: Dave Pahanish and The Rust Belt ,Tom Bukovak, Marcel, Jessica Andrews, Kristen Lee, Keith Anderson, Josh Hoge, Andy Davis, Rick Huckaby, The Wooten Brothers, Old Union, Johnny Neel, Chris Bledsoe, Randy Boen, Jack Pearson, and Very Special Guests…..
So if you are reading this and live in Nashville get your tooshie to 3rd & Lindsley Sunday at 4:00!
- My sister and Brandi. (Brandi in the white shirt)
We Love You Bran!
It will be a night of great music, friends, love and support.
If you are curious to learn more about Brandi, her battle, and her progress you can visit CaringBridge. She has her very own page set up (and the link will take you straight to her page) where you can follow updates and her progress throughout her battle. Stop by the page and show your support and sign the guest book! She is a strong, loving and caring girl and we all know that she will beat this and shine just like she does everyday.
So to you Brandi keep your head high. We all love you and are pulling for you and we all KNOW you will beat this.
We send you our strength…
**Update**
The results are back and it is Ovarian Cancer. She starts her chemo on the 20th. Outlook looks a-mazing!
Becoming Numb…again.
I want to be numb, I will be numb. 2 blows in a week. Cancer. I hate it and I can’t stress that enough.
Today started off good, I was in a good mood, the kids were happy and I am having an extremely good hair day. Yes a good hair day and it warrants an evening out. If you would have asked me this morning that would have been the reason behind wanting to go out tonight. Now that the day has progressed I want to go out so I can become numb.
Monday my sister’s best friend, who is also my friend and might as well be my own sister had a full hysterectomy due to what they thought was ovarian cancer. During surgery they found a tumor the size of her stomach, 2 spots on her vertebrae, a spot on her pancreas, a spot on her liver and appendix and a couple of other masses. The spot on her pancreas changed or I should say questioned the doctor’s diagnosis. He has never seen ovarian cancer spread to the pancreas which now makes him think it is pancreatic cancer….not good. They biopsied the spot and sent it out of state, the waiting game has begun for the results. So in addition to a full hysterectomy they also removed her appendix and the other masses they found. She is 29 years old. This is not cool. My sister needless to say is a hot mess and is questioning herself being able to deal with this again if it takes a turn for the worse. We lost our mom 5 years ago to cancer suddenly which is why she doesn’t know if she can handle this again. Happy thoughts…positive thoughts. That’s all we can do right now. I worry. I worry about our friend, I worry about my sister. I am finding my strength once again for her.
To top that news off I was aware that my step uncle was under observation for cancer as well, cancer of the bile duct in the stomach. He went to the Mayo Clinic to start chemo, or he thought. After further observations there at the clinic the outcome is not good. They can do nothing, it is too far. He now has 8-12 months to live…he is 55. His cancer is so rare that the normal yearly checkups did not catch it, nor any symptoms he had warranted an alarm. My stepmom just lost her dad last year to cancer and her mom 2 years before that. We have officially become “the other people” that this happens to. This sucks.
It makes me mad, it makes me sad. It makes me angry and once again question even the thought of a god. You listen to people say God will see you through, God will heal, God will make everything ok. Really? Are you fucking kidding me? I am sorry but I call bullshit once again. If there was such a God then he wouldn’t let this happen to people. He would heal and not let them die. He would take away their pain and make everything ok. I have yet to see this happen. And NO taking them away from us does not mean ‘He is making it ok an curing their suffering and putting them in a better place’ Fuck that, that’s bullshit. This is one reason that I believe there is no God. There fucking can’t be. If he so fucking great then this shit wouldn’t happen. It would be the douchebags that are loading our prisons, the child molesters, murderers, rapist that would have this shit happen but No they are sitting in there wasting space and human life being healthy. I call BULLSHIT!
*If I offend you I am deeply sorry but this is how I feel*
Good News mixed in with Bad News.
This is it, the last day of school for almost 3 weeks, and it’s only a two hour day. My son begged and begged last night to not have to go today, he is currently still sleeping and has no idea I let him stay home from school. Heehee! My daughter on the other hand wanted to go because they were having a Holiday Party *because god forbid they call it a Christmas Party* and her teacher was making pancakes for all the students. Em won’t pass up pancakes at any time! So it starts..the almost 3 week break. It will be fun, I am looking forward to it and I know the kids are ready as well.
Yesterday I took my son for his 8 year check up at the doctor. What a mad house that was! Everyone is sick and I just hate taking the kids to the doctor when they are fine to be around a bunch of sick people. I really wish they would separate or divide the waiting room…sick side/well side. They were so busy and so backed up that our appointment was at 3:00 and we weren’t called back till almost 4:00. Not cool when kids are involved but oh well. What I learned yesterday shocked me. My son is, like I said, 8 and he is 4’5″ tall and weights 63 lbs. He’s huge! 80th percentile for his height and 70th for his weight. I thought for sure the dr. would tell me to put some weight on him..he is a bean pole! I am going to have one tall kid on my hands. I am 5’3″ so he is going to pass me up in no time, scary. I was doing laundry the other day and we all have black long john type shirts and I actually grabbed my sons and went to hang it up in my closet, that proves right there my baby is not so much a baby any longer. *sigh* I can’t get over how big he has gotten, how smart he is, how caring and loving and just an all around good kid. I am truly blessed with my little boogers.
Yesterday my sister called with some not so good news regarding one of her closest dearest friends. This friend is considered part of our family, we have adopted her as one of our own, she is loved by all of us and is very dear to us. Her and my sister have been friends since my sister moved here in 2004. She has been sick for around 2 months now not knowing what was wrong, the doctors would tell her it’s one thing and put her on medication only for the medicine to irritate what ever it is that is wrong. Back to the doctor she would go and they would change their mind and change her meds, at one point putting her on medication that cost $900. That is absolutely ridiculous for medicine to cost that much, just saying. This back and forth has went on for a couple of months. She can’t really eat anything, stomach spasms, tiredness, pain in her abdomen etc. the poor thing has lost so much weight she looks sickly. I am surprised they have not put her in the hospital on an iv. She is about 5 inches taller than me and weighs way less than me, poor thing. This week she went back in for more tests and the doctor called with the results a day early..that is never good. My sister called with the news that her friend has Cervical Cancer. Then later in the day the doctor called back and said it wasn’t cervical cancer it is Ovarian Cancer. Well lets get it right here! Damn Doctors! Anyway, it involves the ‘C’ word and I flippin hate the ‘C’ word. My heart sank and I could hear the worry in my sisters voice as we started to discuss the news. We lost our mom to cancer so we both don’t do well with anyone having cancer. It is such an evil disease and just saying the word stings my tongue. Her friend is so young, such a good loving person, wants so bad to have kids and have her family. My sister just kept saying why couldn’t this have happened to me, I am the one that doesn’t want kids. I did not like hearing that, I have accepted that I will most likely never have a niece or nephew from her besides her dog, but the thought of my sister having something like this broke me. I refuse to even play pretend with the idea. I don’t know anything about Ovarian Cancer so the first thing I did this morning was google it. In my mind Ovarian Cancer was a less severe form of cancer and I thought highly treatable. The first thing I read this morning is Ovarian Cancer is the 5th leading killer cancer. My heart sank. Now we have no idea what stage the cancer is in, further tests will tell. I can’t help wanting to curse the sky. I am just trying to have positive thoughts for a positive outcome at this point. I worry about my sister. If god forbid this turns down a road with an awful outcome, I don’t know how she will deal. But for now we will stay positive and hope for the best. I read that, depending on the stage of the cancer, they can treat it with a major surgery removing the ovaries, fallopian tubes and uterus and ending with chemo to destroy what ever is left. Hopefully it has not spread past her ovaries and fallopian tubes, if it has that is where it gets scary. Time and tests will tell. My thoughts are with this friend, I love you girlie.
On another depressing note, my step-uncle has been in the hospital. It is my step mom’s oldest brother. They had a scare earlier in the week when the doctors decided it was cancer, then took that back and decided it was something else. It has something to do with his lymph nodes. I am confused on this one. She is taking off tomorrow with her other brother to go see him in the hospital in Evansville, I will wait with positive thoughts for the news on him. He is being sent to Missouri somewhere to a specialist very soon. I wish I could remember what she said they thought it was but it was a bunch of big words that sounded like a foreign language to me. I had never heard of it before. My thoughts are with them as well.
I hate to be such a downer but this is life, and it is my life at this moment in time.
Past posts brought to their new home.
I am bringing a couple of things to my site that I wrote over the course of 2 years on another blog that I tried to keep. I am bringing them here where they belong with me. Here they are all wrapped up in one post, so this is going to be a long one.
It’s Been 3 Years Written: Thursday, May 08, 2008
It’s been just shy of 3 years since mom has gone and it hasn’t gotten any easier. You would think that time would heal the heart but it hasn’t. Yes, I have accepted that she is gone but it is hard, so hard. A day has not gone by in 3 years that I have not thought of her, her smile, her laugh, the way she would say “Jamie Dawn” or “Lindsey Sue”, the way she would always make me feel better, agree with me even if I was so so wrong. She was not only a mom but my best friend too. She was always there, always. I think back on the 28 years I spent with her, our ups and downs, our fights, our wonderful moments together, our shopping sprees, and just time alone talking. She was the best woman in the world. No one can ever replace her. It gets so hard during this time of the year because of my daughter’s birthday (she was born 5 weeks before mom died and that was the last time I saw her before she went in hospital), mother’s day and of course the day she died, May 29, 2005. Thoughts just rush in and rush out like wildfire. I sit and I weep and then I smile because I know she is ok now and not in pain anymore. She hid the pain so well. She always looked great and acted like there was nothing wrong so Lindsey and I wouldn’t worry. She was so strong. The 2 1/2 years that my son spent with her were so special and believe it or not he remembers her. We have movies of them dancing together like she danced with me and Lindsey. She loved to dance. She would turn music on in the living room and her and I would “dance like no one is watching”. Which is one of my favorite mottos now. My daughter unfortunetly only met her once and spent only a week with her the week she was born. It breaks my heart when I think about that Emily will never know the most amazing woman in the world. She was the best grandma to Will and she loved Emily more than anything. She would have been the best grandma to my kids. She got down on the floor and played and taught Will so many things in his two and half years. She could of taugh Emily so much. My girlfriends will sit and talk and ask me questions about my young years and I don’t know the answers to some of the questions but I mom would know. She isn’t here to answer them. Situations that come up with my children that you would call your mom to ask, I am stuck. Yes, I have a wonderful mother-in-law that is there any time I need her but it’s not the same. I want my mom!!! I miss her so much. I have a great step mom but it’s still not the same. Only your mother can give you a hug and tell you it’s going to be ok and you believe her. Mother’s day is very hard for me. I want to buy my step mom a card and tell her happy mother’s day but I feel like I am betraying my mother. I can’t shake that feeling no matter how hard I try. I can’t do anything to make her come back, I can only remember. Memories are a great thing that no one can take from you. She was taken at such a young age, she had so many great years left. I miss her so. I have my sister with me here and I honestly don’t know what I would do with out her. She is my backbone, my best friend. The best aunt to my kids. I love her so much. I don’t think she realized how much she means to me and my family. For the last 3 years I have had only memories that make me smile and remind me how wonderful my mom truely is. I miss you mom!
As I Sat Here and Wept Written: Thursday, December 11, 2008
My morning did not start off as planned today. I checked my email about 6:45 this morning and had a message that my old friend from school commented on my myspace blog. I went to myspace to see what Adam had said. I have two blogs on my myspace page about my mom. He commented on the second one and said “I read your blogs for the first time tonight and I cried (which is hard for a tough cop to admit). I too have wonderful memories of your mom and our time on Briarwood Drive.” Adam was a very good friend of mine all through middle school and high school. He was always at my house. This touched me so much to know that my mom meant alot to him too. I immediately started to cry, hard. Emotions ran through me like wildfire. I have not cried like that for my mom in awhile. I started to think of all my friends that were there for me through all of it. Friends that I had not seen since high school came to my moms visitation. It meant so much to me to know that they were there. They stayed there with me through the night and the next day. You find out who your true friends are when you need them in tough times. Those who stay by your side and hold your hand truly love you. I honestly don’t know if I could of made it through it without them. I appreciate them so much.
My mom has been gone now for 3 and half years now and I miss her today as much as I did the day she passed away. I have came to terms with what happened but it’s still not easy, I still get angry. I stayed mad at the world and at God for a year. I will never forget sitting in the ICU waiting room and my step-dad’s pastor came to talk to us. (for those of you that know me well know that I am not a religious person, this made me question everything ten fold) She looked at me and my sister and told us that god took my mom for a reason. WHAT! Don’t tell me that. What reason does God have taking my mom! Don’t you think that we need her a little more than he does? I was so mad to hear that. I honestly think that should be banned to say to people. I think now if he did have a reason for taking her away from us it’s so she can watch over us and keep us safe. At least that’s what I tell myself. But I still would rather have her sitting here by me watching me than from up above. I guess I am still a little bitter since I am sitting here crying again and just getting pissed. No one deserves their mother taken away from them. Maybe that just sounds selfish but I really don’t care right now, I want my mom. I want to call her again 3 times a day and here her voice. I was cleaning out a cabinet the other day and found a piece of paper that my mom wrote me a little note on 5 years ago. Why this just appeared I don’t know. But anyway. It was a note that she just left laying around after a visit. It said how much fun she had during the visit and that I am still her baby and she hates leaving me to go home and she just wants to take me home with her. I will keep that note forever. All this emotion is probably due to the time of the year. Christmas is my mom’s favorite time of the year. I think that is why I am so damn anal with my tree because I know it would make her proud. Her tree was always so beautiful. My sister put up a tree this year for the very first time and it is pretty too. What is odd is that she was out here cleaning out Emily’s room last week and brought out a random basket out of Emily’s closet. I was going through it and there was a picture of my moms very first Christmas tree (my mom always took a picture of her tree and wrote on the back the year, this one said my very first tree December 24th, 1972) and it looks exactly like my sister’s tree minus the ribbon. My moms and my sister’s trees were short fat and simple trees. My moms only had ball ornaments on it with a tree topper and my sister’s has ball ornaments on it with the same style and color tree topper. Coincidence? Who knows but I think it is special. My sister needs my mom right now probably more than ever. She is going through a hard time and I know that mom would make everything ok and help her through. I know that Lindsey feels very alone right now and I am doing everything in my power to be there for her but I know it’s not the same. I hope that she can look at her tree and think of mom and know that mom is actually there with her and helping her, Lindsey just has to look inside of her heart and she will find moms love. That is what I do when I need her. My sister and I have became so very close in the past 3 and half years and I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have her and I think she feels the same. We both try to fill that void for each other.
I love you mom and miss you so much, Merry Christmas.
I love you.
My New Tattoo Written: February 10, 2009
Ever since my mom passed away my sister and I have wanted tattoos in memory of her. I new wanted angel wings with my moms initials but I didn’t want the traditional angel wings, I wanted something different. Every time I went on the internet to get ideas I always came back to the same tattoo, tribal angel wings. I have never seen angel wings done this way and I knew this is what I wanted. I wrote down the web address and we headed to the tattoo parlor after the kids went to bed. I was a little nervous because it’s been 10 years since I have gotten one. We went to Straight Edge Tattoo in Murfreesboro. Lindsey ended up not getting her ‘mom’ tattoo because she wants a big spread on her side and has yet to have someone draw it up for her so she picked something different because she couldn’t let me get tattooed by myself. It’s a bonding thing. This is the second time Lindsey and I have got tattooed together. I took her to get her first one when she was 16, I know I am a great corrupting big sister. Scooter (yes my tattoo artist name was Scooter, fitting isn’t it) put my moms initials together with the angel wings and it looked great. Lindsey, Scooter and I went in a room to figure out where to put my tattoo. I knew I wanted on my back but I was thinking on my other shoulder blade and it was too big to put there so Lindsey suggested across my back because this tatt should be centered. I never pictured myself with a tatt there but it looked fitting there. Lindsey’s guy Paul was ready and so was mine so it was time. Scooter took me in the room and got me comfortable and began. I could here Lindsey getting hers in the other room. Mine took about an hour and it felt like I remembered. It didn’t hurt too bad the middle on the spine hurt the worst but I have felt worse pain. The ends by my shoulder blades was a weird good pain in a way. Lindsey was done before me and came in to watch the rest. Hers turned out great and so did mine. I was impressed. We were giddy like little 12 year old when we were done. They turned out fabulous! I am already thinking about my next one because you know when Lindsey goes and get hers done I have to go with her and I can’t let her get tattooed by herself.
Angel Wings in the middle w/ Mom's Initials
It’s a Happy, Sad, Bitter, Angry, Twisted Day Written: Friday, May 29, 2009
Today it has been 4 years since my mom passed away. I have not shed a tear today as of 5:43 but I also have been preoccupied by my sister, kids other people’s kids, which is great but as I sit here watching the news my mind begins to wonder and think. Now I do have wonderful memories of my mom and I keep those in my mind 24/7 but right now I just find myself pissed..just f’n pissed off. I look at my kids and become sad that they did not get to know the most wonderful grandmother in the world. I miss my mom, my sister misses her, my kids didn’t even get to know her. WTF!
I am taken back 4 years ago yesterday when my sister and I were sitting in ICU with our step dad and his pastor and she had the fucking audacity to tell us that God has a plan for each of us…Really?!?! Does he?!?! She proceeded to tell us after mom had passed that he (God) has a plan for our mother and that is why she was taken from us. Well FUCKING BULL SHIT!!!!!! That line is the biggest crock of shit that has ever been told to me. What kind of plan would he have with a 51 year old woman who has a 28 and a 24 year old and 2 grandkids that need her. WE NEED HER! We still need her even though we manage day to day without her. do you know how many times still to this day that I think oh I could ask mom..well no I can’t because there was a ‘plan for her’ that didn’t include us! That’s just shitty. I want to scream sometimes when there are things that I want to know that only my mom would know the answer to and I can’t call her to find out. I could ask my dad but he wouldn’t know…mom would and she isn’t fucking here anymore. I just want to hear her voice i want to hear her say Jamie Dawn. I want to hear her ask Will if he has his dancing shoes on and I want to watch her dance with him in the living room. Emily didn’t get to have dancing shoes with mama. WHY????? I put my little happy face on and oh yeah everything is just fine and dandy..is it? I still hurt, I still cry, I still scream when I am alone, i still try to talk to her but I get no response. No one knows what it is like until it happens to them. You can say you can imagine but you can’t. You have NO fucking clue what it is like to lose your mom when you are 28 years old. NONE. Until your mom dies and she is no longer there to call to talk to, to vent to, to hear I love you no matter what. Along with being my mom she was my best friend. I told her everything. My heart hurts, it hurts so bad. I miss her so much. My sister hurts even though she doesn’t tell me all the time. I can see it in her eyes, i can hear it in her voice. She was mommies little girl, her sidekick. All that ripped from us. So yes I have the memories but sometimes I don’t want just the memories I want her back with me…here.
So God and his so called f’n plan can kiss my ass.
Always Say I Love You.
This was written Wednesday, December 6, 2006You must always say I love you. Life is too short not to. You never know when someone will be leaving your life. I have a story for you and I hope it will open your eyes to two things. On May 26, 2005 I got a phone call from my step father. He told me that my mom was not feeling well. She had been having severe headaches for awhile now and she had been to the doctor to get a couple of lumps under the skin removed. She told my sister and I that it was “nothing”. He told me that he had called an ambulance to take mom to the hospital. My sister and I live in Nashville Tennessee and my mom lives in Aurora Indiana. I hung up the phone not knowing what to think. My husband told me to pack my bags and my sister also and head up home because it could be nothing and then again it could be something big. As my sister was walking down the driveway with my 3 year old son I was shaking. She came in and I told her what was going on. We packed up and the kids too ( a 3 year old and a 5 week old) and headed for Indiana. We pulled up out front of my mom’s house around 4 am and my stepdad was waiting for us he had not been asleep. They took her to the local hospital and had ran a CT scan and found 4 spots on her brain. While trying to take this news in I took the kids upstairs and put them to bed and tried to get some sleep myself. In the morning (Friday) I took the kids to my sister-n-law’s house and my sister and I headed to Cincinnati. By this time they had sent her to Good Sam in Cincinnati for further tests. We get to the hospital and she is in the ICU. My sister and I are pretty much freaking out to say the least. My mom god love her says what on earth are you two doing here and where are the kids? I love my mom always worried about my kids. They ran some tests in the morning and before lunch we got news that my mom had 7 brain tumors. This was a total shock because before yesterday there was nothing (that we knew of) wrong with my mom except for the headaches which she covered up nicely. The doctor said that they were NON life threatening and they could be taken care of with surgery and radiation. My sister and I left for lunch feeling a little relieved thinking in the long run she was going to be ok. We got back from lunch and they were wheeling her out for her first radiation treatment and they told us to go along. The three of us went down with her. When we got there the radiologist took my step dad back to talk to him and we stayed out with mom. She was even joking about her tan going away. My step dad came out and told us to come back with him. My heart dropped. The three of us sat down with the doctor and he proceeded to tell us that our mother was covered with cancer from head to toe. She had melanoma. Every organ in her body was ate up. He told us that we had a decision to make. We could go ahead with the treatments but the end result was all the same. Mom could stay with us for two days or with a miracle two months. But it didn’t look good. We made the decision to not do the treatments and put her through any unnecessary pain. We would only be keeping her around for our selfish reasons. That was the hardest decision I have ever made in my life, my mother’s fate was put in our hands pretty much. We made the decision to get her home as soon as we could so she could spend her last days in her own home with her own things. I can’t explain to you what was going on in my head. I became numb and stayed that way for about a month. We went home that night to try to get some rest and was called back to the hospital around 12:15 in the morning. The nurse said her pupils weren’t responding and that is one of the first signs that they are going. We all had just got to bed and hopped right back up and I took the keys to drive us up. It was the weirdest drive I have ever made. It was barely raining but there was a very eery silent calm in the air. In the distance I saw lightning and all I could think was that was mom fighting for us. We got there and she wouldn’t even respond to us. No movement but she was still there. We slept on the floor all around her that night. I got up about 8 in the morning and walked in her room from the restroom and she opened those eyes and like nothing happened said what on earth are you doing here this early. She didn’t skip a beat. The nurses said they can’t explain how this happened. They’ve never seen someone start to slip away the way she did and come back like nothing happened. That Saturday was one of the best days. Mom sat up in her bed she ate all day she laughed and cut up with us like nothing in the last two days happened. She just kept saying she wants to go home and that she is so happy that Lindsey (my sister) and I have each other. We had made arrangements for her to come home at 12:30 the next day, Sunday. We had hospice coming to the house to set everything up. Mom was coming home. We left her that night eating her Mentos and watching HGTV her favorite channel. That woman would watch it 24/7 if she could. We told her that we loved her and she was coming home in the morning. We got up Sunday morning and headed up early. When we got there mom was in pain, bad pain. Her head was hurting so bad. We sat there with her for a couple of hours and the nurse gave her some pain medicine and mom wanted to take a nap. We left her at 10:30 to come home and meet with the hospice people. We told her we would see her in a couple of hours. I held her hand and told her that I loved her and she said it back to me and she squeezed my hand. We were at home when we got a phone call at 11:30 saying mom’s vitals weren’t good. Five minutes later they called back and said her breathing was slowing. My sister and stepdad headed up to the hospital and I stayed behind waiting for my grandma and my husband. I called back up to the hospital at 11:46 and she had already passed away at 11:45. The nurses were all in there with her so she wasn’t alone. We were too late. She never made it home.
You never know how much time you have. Always say I love you even if you are just running to the store and will be back in 10 minutes even if you fighting say it. You never know when its the last time.
Please do not be sad from my story. Just remember…Always say I love you.
Thank you for taking the time to read it.
When I see a Red Bird I know it is you watching over me.
Image by spisharam via Flickr
Here I am watching the Stand Up to Cancer special and my heart aches as my eyes well up with tears of pain and sorrow for myself and everyone that has been touched by this evil demon of a disease. Five and a half years ago I lost my mom to cancer, Melanoma. It still seems like yesterday I was standing bedside and hearing her say Jamie Dawn like only she could. See, I did not have a lot time with her after we found out…only three days. It was too late and her body was overran by the cancer when she was diagnosed. There was no chance for chemotherapy or radiation treatment just time to say I love you and be there and to savor the time. We had plans to bring her home so she could go in peace surrounded by her things and family. She never made it home. It was too late her body was worn out it was time for her to go.
When I look out my window and see a red bird sitting on the fence or in the tree I know it is my Mom watching over me and my family telling me she is still with me and she is ok now, no more pain.
How I miss you mom and I continue to tell myself you are still here with me watching over me and my family. I hope you are well wherever you are….
I love you.
Living through a TV show for a little more ‘Time’.
Image by ToniVC via Flickr
The new show on Showtime, The Big C, is one of my favorite new shows. It is about a woman, a Mom, with Melanoma and her ‘time’ left. The reason is personal, it touches me in a very true and honest way. My mom passed away 5 years ago suddenly from cancer, Melanoma. Last week when I watched the first episode I had no idea what it was about, I was just too lazy to turn the channel after watching Weeds. When I learned that it was about a Mom with Melanoma I didn’t know if I could watch it, I thought it would be hard hitting this close to home for me. I stuck with the first episode and loved it. This week I fell even more in love with the show. The meaning of the show, what the mom is doing. The mom has not told anyone in her family that she has been diagnosed with Melanoma and has maybe 18 months to live. She has kicked her husband out prior to knowing and has vowed to spend the summer doing great things with her son. She said in the last episode, after yelling at her son for never picking up his clothes, that she has wasted so much of her time in her life picking up clothes and closing cabinet doors (which the husband and son are guilty of). She burned some of the son’s clothes that she picked up off the floor along with her couch because she has always hated it..You go girl!
Her son was scheduled to leave for soccer camp for 6 weeks over the summer and she at the last minute decided that he wasn’t going to go, instead they will spend the summer together doing fun things. The son of course was furious and thinks she is just being mean, remember he does not know his mom has cancer.
Here’s the kicker, this is what made me bawl my eyes out last episode. The son goes to sleep for the night and she gets a pillow and blanket out of the hall closet and sleeps next to his bed. What is she doing? She is making the last of her days memorable for her son so when the day comes he doesn’t look back and say I wish I would have stayed home from camp or I wish we could have done this or that. She is making this time precious. She is making her time Great.
Yes maybe I am living through the show at the moment because I didn’t have a chance to do so with my mom. My mom was diagnosed with advanced Melanoma on a Friday and we lost her 2 days later on a that Sunday. My sister and I didn’t have 18 months, hell we didn’t have a week to spend. We had 2 days in the ICU at her bedside. I treasure those last days, there is not a day that goes by that I don’t recall something that was said, holding her hand for the last time, saying I love you for the last time. It shatters my heart that we didn’t have more ‘time’.
So the fact there is a show that deals with the ‘time’ that you have touches me very deeply. There is a meaning in this show that some might just not understand. You never know when your ‘time’ will be up, you will never know how much ‘time’ you have with your loved ones, your children. You must live your life like tomorrow is your last, you must tell the ones you love that you love them, always treasure these moments..this ‘time’ that you have.
I would have done ANYTHING for just a little more ‘time’.
