Back Home

Ahhhh, back home. Home to my boys and my work and my life. This past week was intense. I was doing so well at keeping my head afloat and then I just felt like I went under. I spent the last week at my moms, arriving the night before she was discharged from the hospital and I stayed until Monday afternoon of this week.

The first few days at her house were challenging to say the least. I don’t think I stopped crying for three days straight. It was trips to the grocery store, to the pharmacy and getting used to strapping on my mothers new brace that I told her was her new best friend. A million calls to my sister and to Matt asking for help or to just listen. The cancer is up and down her spine as well as in her lymph system. There is a section of spine that is now no longer there and her stability is compromised. This is why she now has a brace that she wears whenever up and around to help support her body.

There is good news in all of this. It seems funny to say “good news” in relationship to cancer, but there is. The type she has is HER2 negative which means that it isn’t as aggressive as they thought and that between the radiation she had as well as the hormone pills she’s taking to starve the cancer of the estrogen it feeds off of, she should have more time than we originally thought.

So, I’m back up, breathing and smiling. Things are looking good and I’m feeling like I have a handle on my life again. I packed a car load of her most needed things, clothes, photographs, the things you take with you wherever you go. I left her on Monday early afternoon and my sister arrived that night and packed her in the car the next morning and drove her to LA. She’ll be staying at my sisters through mid January and then she’s going to come live with Matt and I for 6 months. Time, we have some time. Time for her to get to know Miles, to play with Mason and to enjoy our family. After those 6 months she’ll move to my sisters for her 6 months. It’s the plan that we have for now and it feels good.

Now, I have to quickly settle in to life the way it was only to get ready for our trip to Michigan for Christmas to see Matt’s family. Whew!

I must say that despite how difficult this past week was, I will treasure it forever. I was able to be with my mom, alone and talk and sort through her life. The drawers full of nick knacks and the photographs on the walls. The jewelry, the pewter collection, the stuff that makes up a life, her life. It was a gift to have that time.

It was hard to be away from Matt and the boys but they survived and had some good bonding time and now that I’m home, I’m appreciating everything all that much more. Life. Strange, wonderful, difficult and all we’ve got.