Mom – Update no.1 – Life Interrupted

Thank you to everyone who’s offered prayers and words of encouragement. I feel so blessed by how many people have reached out toward me and my family. I don’t have a ton of answers but I do have some and will share where we are at this moment.

We received some very hopeful news regarding the cancer. It is in fact the breast cancer that is back after 21 years. Crazy but true. It is the type that has the estrogen receptors at the ends which means it is responsive to treatment. Now she is in line for more tests on her heart and brain and more of her body to determine where exactly the cancer is and if her heart is strong enough to undergo chemotherapy.

My sister and I are looking to move her to California to be near and with us for this next phase of treatment. There are a ton of questions swirling through my head and no one has any definitive answers for us. It is forcing me to live in this moment. The one I’m in right now. I can think about the next few days or even couple of weeks, but I can’t go much farther than that.

She is still in the hospital, her best friend is with her. I’m planning on taking another trip back when she is discharged from the hospital. When this is, I don’t know but most likely next week.

(It feels good to write some of this down. Maybe it will help me grasp what’s happening a little more than I think I am. I’m tired and fighting a cold so the urge to just crawl into bed is strong but there is so much to be done! Doing is good for me though, it keeps me focused and moving forward and I need that.)

Now we’re on to questions about where she’s going to live, treatment options and insurance coverage. I feel lost with some of it and overwhelmed but know that between my sister and I we’ll figure it out. Right?! We have to.

There is so much more I want to share, get out of my brain and on paper as they used to say about her. About who she is. There is this crazy combination of laughter and anger that makes up who she is. A New York accent even though she’s lived here for the past 40 or so years and a sense of humor that can border on the line of inappropriate which makes it all that more funny.

She has that humor and strong spirit still and is, I’m sure, making her floor the most fun to be on for any of the nurses at the hospital.

I’ll update more as I know more and again, thank you to everyone who has us in their prayers.

Here’s a photo of my sister, myself and my mom from my shower when I was getting married to Matt. Thanks Christine for finding this! oxoxoxox