As we get closer to Christmas, I continue to reflect on how much our life has changed in a year. Last year at this time, I had already had 2 chemo infusions, was working full time, getting used to wig wearing, constantly going to the maternal fetal medicine doctor to scan the babies to check on them, and we were trying to get in the Christmas spirit with our 2 excited kiddos. The babies were taking up so much space that walking even for small distances caused me to be out of breath and my body physically hurt constantly. Anticipating Christmas- the joy, the lights, the beauty, the rest- certainly helped me get through that season. I also could relate to Mary carrying baby Jesus because I was so large on Christmas Eve 😂

Remembering that God sent his only son as a sweet baby to Earth; nothing compares. Knowing I’m loved and treasured; priceless. Sharing the Good News with our sweet kiddos and listening to their prayers; absolute joy. Celebrating Christmas is more than the lights, the gifts, the fun, the snow, the music in our home. Remembering Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us; that brings true excitement and joy for me.

Truly this is my favorite time of year. This year, life is so incredibly different. I’m not insanely pregnant, I’m getting used to short hair, we have 2 beautiful baby girls that are almost ONE and I still have a hard time saying we have 4 kids! We have learned that our village is BIG and we love all the people that have showed up for us in the darkness of this past year. God is good.

Merry Christmas to you all from our family to yours! Stay tuned for some family pictures and news of the twins’ first birthday party!

I’m truly an optimistic person, and a woman of faith and and I’ve tried to approach this cancer journey with as much optimism and faith as possible. Smile through the pain. Remember why I’m enduring this season. Be thankful for all our love and support. 

And I am. I truly am. 

But I can’t keep hiding and lying my way through this. 

I can’t be optimistic every day.

This has truly been the hardest thing I’ve ever done. This year has been incredibly long and hard and sad. 

Even if we just were walking a cancer journey, this year would have been wild. 

Even if we were just walking this first year with twins, this year would have been wild. 

We are walking both. 

I’m walking both. 

As much as I am so thankful for all my people, they didn’t live the twin pregnancy, 16 iv chemos, hair loss, and bilateral mastectomy, weight gain, and now a million other pills and appointments. 

I’m jealous of people who got cancer easier than me. Like when they are retired. They just get to go to treatment and go home and rest. And sleep and not take care of anyone. Getting cancer at 70 when you only have to care for yourself is not the same thing I’m going through.  Getting just radiation and not losing your hair – not the same. People that were diagnosed after me and are already done with treatment. Doesn’t that sound ridiculous? Cancer is cancer. 

I have truly suffered. This grief I wish I could just tuck into my pocket is just too big right now. It walks before me and surrounds me and I just try to move through it. 

I recently learned that my doctors don’t expect return of original energy levels until one year after IV chemo. I had no idea. I expected to be back to normal after I recovered from surgery. Nope. I’m looking at feeling this endless fatigue and weakness for another 6 months. 

I’m so tired I can barely do my job. Or take care of my family. Or get a good night’s sleep. Everything I’m doing to kill all the cancer and keep it from returning has absolutely altered my life in a way I never wanted. 

Cancer has altered the lives of those around me. Michael carries a huge load for our family. He has always been incredible at sharing the load of parenthood, but for the past year he has had to do even more. Even when he’s tired and almost has nothing left to give, he continues to give even more. I’m constantly in awe of the man I married.

I can’t be the wife and mom and teacher I want to be. My mom can’t be the fun nana she wants to be- just being here for fun times and spoiling the kids. She is a third parent in our home and I’m certain she never saw that coming. My kids don’t get the most energized or most patient mom they deserve. I’m glad the babies won’t remember this time because I certainly didn’t do every night time feeding like I did for the big kids. I just couldn’t.

As a Christian, I don’t believe God gave me this cancer as a punishment or lesson. I think cancer is a product of our broken world and if I can or if I ever figure out what caused it, I will do everything  in my power to prevent it from happening to my loved ones. Or anyone. Because cancer alters lives. Forever. 

I hope in 10 years I look back and see this as a season. But I can’t right now. It’s all consuming, every minute of every day when my body is absolutely failing me. 

I recently came across this song that perfectly puts into words the pain that I’m feeling and the hope I have in Jesus. Read these gorgeous lyrics of the chorus and take a listen to this song sometime. 

Flowers by Samantha Ebert 

So I brought it up in a desperate prayer

Lord, why are you keeping me here?

Then He said to me, “Child, I’m planting seeds

I’m a good God and I have a good plan

So trust that I’m holding a watering can

And someday you’ll see that flowers grow in the valley”

So whatever the reason, I’m barely getting by

I’ll trust it’s a season knowing that you’re by my side

Every step of the way

And I’ll be okay

I know I’ll be okay. 🩷

Jesus- be near to me and my family. Help lift our spirits when the grief is too much. Help my body rest enough each day to do it all over again. Thank you for the people that love me when I’m at my worst. Thank you for continuing to sustain me. I can’t wait to see the flowers that grow is this deep valley. Soon. Amen. 

This morning I captured this gorgeous pink sunrise on the way to school. It felt like the sky was meant to be pink on this last day of October. 

I have so many thoughts tonight as I head to bed, as I think about my first October as a breast cancer patient. 

First, I’m so grateful to be here. I’m so grateful I had the best cancer team on my side at OSU.  Since the first day I met them, I felt special and heard and that they cared specifically for me and my circumstances. 

Seeing so much pink makes me proud that awareness has been spread and so many more women know their own body. Even 20 years ago self checks weren’t happening, and so many cases were caught later. 

Do I wish so many of these companies advertising pink products would just take out those awful ingredients in our food and personal care products? Of course..but that’s a problem for another day. Just being intentional and reading labels makes me feel like a stronger mom who is protecting the health of all my babies. 

I felt a little less alone this month. Reading others’ stories, talking to others that have walked this road have allowed me to see that a bright and full future is possible. 

And goodness gracious my people have shown up for me in ways I could have never imagined this year. My incredible mom, my sister, my dad, my brother, Michael’s family, and some dear friends and coworkers and our Berlin community. 

If you have walked any piece of this with me, thank you! Thanks for allowing me to rest, for checking in with texts and calls, for allowing me to complain without judgement, for amazing food, and for holding and rocking babies and playing with big kids. 

To my rock- Michael. You have proven “in sickness and in health” time and time again.  We are a great team and I’m so thankful for our beautiful life. I love being mama to our four kids and watching them grow and learn is the greatest joy imaginable. We are blessed.

Here we go. 

Today it has officially been one year since I was diagnosed with cancer. 

I was 31 years old and 20 weeks pregnant with twin girls. 

I didn’t have time to panic. We quickly got a second option, got appointments scheduled and started chemo all in 2 weeks. 

4 rounds of chemo. It was brutal. While working full time.

Twins delivery. Vaginal and c-section.

NICU stay. 4 lbs babies.

12 more rounds of chemo. 

Anaphylaxis shock. 

So much aching and crying and grieving for the life I wanted.

And goodness I shoved those emotions down as hard as a could. 

“I’m fine,” I’d say. Or “hanging in there.” 

But I wasn’t. My body continually tired to fail me. And I hurt everyday.  From chemo, from surgery, from endless appointments. 

Today, a year later. The pain is still fresh. 

This hard road still isn’t done. 

I’m still so broken. But so whole too. 

How? 

Jesus, my husband, my mom, my sister, our incredible family and village. 

And every time when I look around at my (4!) beautiful kids, I’m so grateful to be here, even in my brokenness. 

If you have followed my story or prayed for me, thank you from the bottom of my heart.  I never knew how much I needed encouragement on dark days. I still need it. Thank you 🩷 

This is me when I was 3 months into my cancer journey. No hair. Had chemo 10 days before I delivered the girls. Did chemo 30 days after the girls were born. I never took a picture of my bald head because it made me so incredibly sad. 

A year ago, October wasn’t Breast Cancer Awareness month for me. I maybe wore pink on a Friday at work or maybe bought something with the ribbon on it at the grocery store. 

That’s not my life anymore. Breast cancer awareness is every day for me. Every day when I look in the mirror, at my hair, my port, my in-between surgery body. Every day when I take 7 chemo pills and tons of other meds to reduce symptoms. Every 3 weeks when I meet with my oncologist and get an infusion. 

So this October, wear all the pink you want, but please remember to notice those suffering. The scars-mental and physical-don’t disappear.  Remember to do self-checks monthly to catch something early.  Early detection saves lives. Chemotherapy saves lives. Oncologists with years of experience save lives. 

I am thankful for all the pink. It’s been my favorite color my whole life, so the more the merrier 🩷🎀

Here I am, 2 months after surgery. After a lot of conversations and many hours of worrying and deliberating, I decided to go back to teaching this year. My surgery results provided a good result, but not the best result. The chemo I had from October to May shrunk my tumor, but didn’t eliminate it. This finding led to a more involved treatment plan for this fall and winter.

I’m now taking a chemo pill and doing IV immunotherapy until the end of February. I won’t lose my hair again, but that’s about the only positive side effect to both of these treatments.

I’ve spent some time feeling sorry for myself- I hope someone can relate. I find myself crying out to God, wondering “why me?”. I don’t want to be a patient anymore. I’m counting down the days until I’m done. I’ve read that many young patients feel more grief when treatment slows down, when we finally have a chance to breathe and are not in constant survival mode. That rings true for me. A twin pregnancy, working full time, and being a mom to 2 young kiddos left me with no time to process and sit in the sadness of our situation. I didn’t have time to be sad or scared. I just had to keep going. After my surgery and the quietness of the summer, I was finally left with time to think deeply about this last year- to think deeply about the trials and triumphs.

Cancer took my hair, my body, my security in living a long and healthy life, my independence, my time.

Cancer gave me 7 full months with the twins, a renewed sense of self, a desire to maximize family time, the realization that minor stresses aren’t worth the time worrying about them, new friends, and an entire community feeding us and loving us. I’m so grateful.

What I’m doing now is not easy. My body is still healing and working and momming full time takes its toll. But, Michael and mom are always there, picking up the pieces I can’t. I also find myself saying “you’ve made it this far, you can accomplish anything.”

Goodness, I would never wish cancer on anyone. But goodness, has it been a teacher of its own this year. I pray that one day families won’t face this awful diagnosis. Research has made incredible gains, and I’m optimistic new treatments are on the horizon.

Jesus, be near, to us and all those we love 🩷

I wanted to say thanks to much for everyone’s prayers leading up to my surgery. It was hard to put into words the anxiousness, yet calmness I was feeling just days before.

The surgery seems to go smoothly, but we won’t have a pathology report for a few weeks to see if I’m officially cancer free. Regardless of that outcome, I’ll still have treatment either way, just more steps if any cancer was found.

After surgery has been rough. My blood pressure was very low during my overnight in the hospital, leading to lots of dizziness. Also, since my body’s immune system has changed so much with the 12 weeks of chemo, I have somehow developed an ibuprofen allergy. It wasn’t as serious as an anaphylactic response, but my breathing instantly got labored after they gave me ibuprofen. I’m so thankful this happened at the hospital and not at home, as the doctors and nurses were able to take care of it quickly.

It’s so nice to be home, but goodness surgery isn’t for the weak. This recovery is gong to be one of the hardest things I’ve done. I thought chemo was rough (and it was!) but this recovery is worse.

I am so thankful for my support team – Michael, my mom, my sister and in-laws. My coworkers brought some food for our freezer and our church is doing another meal train for us. I certainly feel so guilty not being mobile and not being able to cook for my family. It’s so hard to rely on others, but I have this greater peace knowing God has placed the right people in our lives to carry us through this season.