CANCER? JUST KEEP DOING WHAT YOU'RE DOING

Sometimes life is not fair. What then? What do we do? Complain? Cry? Whine? Become angry? Or do we learn something from it and find out what it is trying to teach us? Over and over life is about teachings and choices. We choose the reaction to every action. Emotion is very powerful, being emotionless is powerless. People who feel,-respond. People who don't feel believe they are powerful and in control. The emotions are there they just refuse to give them power, Not every emotion deserves power over you, but you must feel it and ride it out or it will consume you eventually. During my health battles with cancer and LCH, I refused to give in. I accepted my cancer diagnosis and that was it. I didn't let it consume me, nor did I let it dictate my life. I was not going to accept that this was it. My doctors had continuously told me my prognosis is not good, 6 months is what I kept hearing from them. One day I said to my doctor "you be the doctor and let God be the timekeeper". No man on this earth has the power to predict when you will leave this earth or how, (We are not talking about murderers). When you are diagnosed with a terminal illness you go through a cycle of many emotions, Fear, anger, hurt, guilt, disappointment, grief, and the list could go on. You have to let each emotion in and feel it and let it go. It will consume you if you don't. Once you have done that you have to move past it. Death is part of the life cycle, it is inevitable and there is no way to avoid it, Preparing for it just like we do for anything else in life is the important thing. My doctors often ask me what am I doing, how am I living, what am I eating. I tell them nothing has changed I still do what I always did, and they respond the same every time.

JUST KEEP DOING WHAT YOU'RE DOING!

So what am I doing? I'm living!!! I am going to live until I die! We all are, don't be surprised. When I would hear "you have about 6 months", I would think in my head how do they know that? I could leave this office today get in my car pull out of the parking lot, and get hit by another car and killed. I lived 6 more minutes not 6 months. Can my husband sue them, they said I had 6 months? So I don't allow man to dictate life to me. Because one has a terminal illness does not mean that is what they will die from. I often think of situations in life where people had no clue when they got up that day, that it was their last day here on earth. Recently 4 police officers were shot and killed right up the street from me. They were drinking coffee, and doing their jobs. Did they know today was the day? Of course not or they wouldn't have been there.

The people who lost their lives in the 9/11 attacks, I wonder if out of those thousands if any one of them had been diagnosed with cancer? If so, they surely thought that is what they would die from. Life is a gift every day. We take life for granted as if we are somehow going to beat the odds and we will be the one who difies all odds and lives forever. Not happening. I really caused a comotion in my family when I went over to the local funeral home and made all of my arrangements. Was I accepting that I was going to die, of course, we all are. What I was doing is preventing my family from having to go through something that was not nessecary. I knew that the "emotions" they would be feeling at my death would prevent them from making a smart decision. My husband would spend way too much money, he and the kids would have a dispute over "what I would have wanted". So I did it myself, to spare them all of the pain at that time. I actually surprised the director of the funeral home, because we had coffee together and went over things, I cracked jokes about stuff while I was there. He said to me, "whatever you are doing just keep doing it, I don't think you will need these services any time soon, but it is ready for you when you do". I got a free coffee cup that day too. That was 3 years ago, My heart is right with God I tell my family every day I love them. My husband and I don't go to bed angry at each other.

I sit and watch the squirrels play outside my office window. I plant stuff in the spring and start new life and watch it grow. I go outside with my 10 year old in the rain, and we hold our face up to the sky and open our mouths and let the rain beat on our tounges, I have big bar-b-q's every chance I get. I sit and listen outside on sunny days to sounds. Basically I live. Even though I don't work outside the home anymore, I didn't quit. I now work from home when I feel like it. All these things you can do too. Feel, love, live. Today is the day to live, yesterday is gone and tomorrow is not promised. Live today, prepare only- for tomorrow, when it comes live some more. Dream, and share those dreams. Never give up. Tell people you love them. Find people you haven't spoken to in years and tell them what you wanted to say. Today is another opportunity because tomorrow may not be possible.