Cancer Does Not Discriminate -

A young woman I know died last week from cancer that began in her breasts, went to her brain, landed in her lungs, and she was dead within 9 months of diagnosis. She left behind a devoted husband and 2 year old child; they had been married less than 5 years. They were a beautiful family, obviously in love, and they had just moved in to a new home.

Today I spent time with a woman my age, whose husband has been dying of cancer for more than 8 years. His miraculous remission was taken away from him a few weeks ago, when his tumor reappeared, choking off his liver, kidneys, gallbladder, and intestines. This woman has been his primary caregiver for all of these years, defining herself through his cancer and related illnesses that needed nearly 100% of her time. She has no idea who she is, who she wants to be, or even how to begin thinking about this, yet she has been preparing for this time for so very long.

On Thursday I had the opportunity to visit with a young mother just finishing her last treatment of chemo, and preparing for her 30+ rounds of radiation. She's scared; not of the treatments, but of "what's next." Her life has been so wrapped up in the false security of cancer treatments, that she's lost sight of the world around her, and yet she's so anxious to get back into that world that her anxiety is controlling her. And she can't go back to who she was, and tomorrow is filled with the fear of the unknown.

Damn - cancer sucks, and it is no discriminator of age, stage, gender, livelihood.

The young mother who died last week? And who knew her days were quickly coming to an end? She wrote her obituary, and these were her closing words:

"...but it occurred to me that this life is about the fight for immortality, not for mortality."

Cancer Sucks