Every life is peppered with major, life-changing events: starting school, getting a driver’s license, graduating from high school and/or college, getting married, buying a house, having a child. These events can be exciting, fun, scary, sad. Sometimes they’re planned and anticipated for weeks – excitement and anxiety building until “the big day”.
Sometimes they’re unexpected and difficult to accept: losing a job, caring for an ailing parent, breaking up with a mate, developing an illness. These things can blindside you – knocking you down, taking your breath away like a punch in the stomach.
I speak from experience. I can tell you the very day it happened to us. It was that day, just over two years ago, when we sat in the doctor’s office and heard the doctor say to Todd, “you have cancer.” It was actually more like, “Blah blah blah blah blah. Blah blah blah non-small cell carcinoma. Blah blah blah blah." He said it so nonchalantly that, if you weren’t paying attention, you’d totally miss it. In fact, Todd did! I had to stop the conversation and say, “Todd, he said it’s cancer.”
I remember the feeling of nausea that started deep in my stomach and grew up and up, into my throat. My mind was racing. “Who do we need to call?” “How will we tell the kids?” “What’s the next step?” We had known it was a possibility, but I don’t think either of us really ever thought it would be cancer! Our life together so far had been fairly charmed. We were happily married, we had beautiful kids, we had good jobs. We were going to grow old together and have amazing grandkids. Anyone that knows my husband, knows that he has always been considered “lucky”. Good things just happened to him. We weren’t used to getting bad news!
Leaving the office, we walked to the car in silence. Once inside, he reached over and grabbed my hand and said a prayer. I don’t remember exactly what was said, but I do remember the feeling of helplessness. In that instance, I understood – maybe for the first time in my whole life – what it meant to rely completely on God. We were both raised in Christian homes; we knew right from wrong. But, somewhere along the line, we’d gotten lazy. We hadn’t taken our family to church in years. We’d strayed far from our childhood morals and ideals. But, when faced with a problem bigger than we could handle, we knew what to do. We hit our knees.
Over the next several months, cancer consumed our lives. It affected our diet, sleep habits, schedule, relationships. The doctors didn’t give us much hope. So we pumped vitamins and supplements, juiced more vegetables than you can imagine each day, and drank fruit smoothies every morning - doing our best to attack the cancer in the most natural way. Upon finding out that the mass below his right ear was growing, we opted to have it removed, and traveled to Houston for a grueling 11-hour surgery. And somewhere in the midst of all this fear and chaos, our home and family were restored. While “getting our house in order”, we began praying together, reading our Bible, and going to church as a family again. Todd and I grew closer and were reminded how blessed we were to have each other.
It has been over 2 years now - a milestone in recurrence expectations! We PRAISE THE LORD everyday for His healing touch and for giving us this time together --- but, most of all, we THANK HIM FOR THE CHANGES IN OUR LIVES as a result of this cancer. In many ways, our lives are sweeter and happier from going through this experience.
“Thank you, Lord, for giving us this ‘kick in the seat’ and reminding us how important it is to use our time on this earth wisely! Through it all, we have felt Your hand in our lives and we know that, no matter what the future holds, You are in control.”
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