Fifteen Year Old Memories Rubbing Like Thorns

At the age of nineteen, I went through a rough time.  It all revolved around a diagnoses of my dad having terminal cancer.  I was home from college on Christmas break when he became ill.  The first doctors who saw him said it was heart related.  Later, it was a gall bladder problem.  so they removed his gall bladder and found odd growth on his liver.  In just a few hours my world flipped upside down and backwards.  Nothing has ever been the same, nor will it be.

I quit school as a veterinary technician, and signed up for a few local classes in my hometown.  He had several surgeries and was in and out of the hospital numerous times through April.  I tried to keep up at school, but was taking care of him, taking him to his chemo appointments an hour a way and well, chemistry and some of those tougher classes were not meant to be taken during a stress such as this. I dropped my classes that weren’t going to work out and kept a couple of fun classes as a welcome distraction.

Summer was coming and I had a goal that I had set a few years back that my dad told me to head for.  Of course for any of you who knew me back then, it was something to do with horses.  Horses were a major part of my life back then, before Kids, or BK.    They were my kids. lol

I had a goal to hit the #1 spot in the nation with my horse. My dad through the summer traveled to as many shows as possible with me.  Five days before he died, I got word, that I was sitting in the #1 seat.  As we were attempting to go to bed the night of Sept. 15, it became a known thing that he had less then 24 hours.  My heart was breaking, but I had done throughout this blasted journey with cancer, I shoved my feelings and emotions in a bottle and stood on my feet and watched my daddy’s last hours.  As I became exhausted, I finally headed upstairs around 11:45 pm to rest for a bit.  Around three am, I awakened to find that we were at the end…by 3:50 he was gone and I was left without my father on my 20th birthday…Never meeting my husband, children or knowing about my life now, so much fuller then a few horse shows and a national ranking.

I like to think he would be proud of who I am now…

I will never leave you nor forsake you. Hebrews 13:5

The LORD is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, My God, my rock, in whom I take refuge; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. Psalm 18:2

Over the last year and one month, I have watched my husband’s family face this same journey, as his aunt has fought cancer.  This week has been harsh, she is at the end and we are in a waiting game that is torturous. Our hearts are heavy as we say our goodbyes or see ya laters as I like to say.  That doesn’t make it any easier though, as we sit here and wonder if we are going to have a tomorrow.

Some of the purely shear, raw and torturous emotions that I faced fifteen years and four months ago have sadly resurfaced.  So, as we gather together as a family in the days ahead, I want to be the rock as they move towards their journey with out their mom, aunt, sister, grandma…I know what they face, I understand the emotions.  I want them to see Jesus working during this time.  The journey ahead is never easy, but with Him guiding us, we will get through it.

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