Friends

“God determines who walks into your life…it’s up to you to decide who you let walk away, who you let stay, and who you refuse to let go.”

I have been so lucky to have so many good friends in my life.  Each of my friends has made my life so much richer, and I love the magic, the beauty, and the laughter they have brought to my life!  Now these are folks are my “special” friends who are near and dear to my heart.  I would do anything for them!  I have quite a few friends who all mean something to me, but these folks are my pillars of strength right now.

It has been so hard for me to share with my friends that I had cancer.  I tried to do this cancer journey by myself, and you know what?  It was the worse thing I could have done to myself, or to my friends…  You will see in Jaime’s story, she nailed it on the head when she said I was pulling away.  I am the one that helps my friends, I am the one who is strong, and I am the one who is the cheerleader for my buds…

I find it so hard to ask for help, and it still is.  Cancer is teaching me to ask for help, and accept it…  It still is not easy, and I still want to pull away from everyone, but these special people will not let me, and I am so grateful.  I just may learn that it is ok for me to let others take care of me and ask for help yet.

Jaime, Alutiiq:  What can I say about her?  In the last 6 months, Jaime has become my best friend.  She cracks me up, she lets me cry, and I can be as goofy as I want around her, and trust me, I can get pretty dang goofy, and to have a friend who doesn’t bat an eyelash when you are acting like the world’s biggest goofball, is a friend indeed!  Her partner Daniel has also turned into a pillar of support, and I am so lucky to have them in my life!  These two are good, good people, with just the biggest hearts ever, I just love her to pieces.

When I told her I had cancer, I told her and my friend Karen at the same time.  It was so hard to tell them, but I was crying at the drop of a hat, and I wanted to let them know so that could understand (without me telling them), that I was going to be pulling away…  I am so grateful she did not let me pull away.

Jaime wrote a story about me for  one of her homework assignments (she is going to school to be a cardiology nurse), and I have posted her story in it’s entirety on a separate web page (see Jaime’s story).  In this story, she called me Charlotte, after Charlotte in Charlotte’s Web, it made me cry…  I was so incredibly touched.

Karen, Alutiiq:  I am soooo blessed to know this beautiful woman!  Karen came to work for me about 6 months ago, and we were only working together a couple of months, when I told her I had cancer.  I did not realize at the time, how important she was to become in my life.  She keeps me on track, gently reminds me to take care of myself first (I am a workaholic), lets me cry, laugh, vent, and has incredible faith in me, it blows my mind!  Karen is also my sidekick on our crazy trips.  She said that we needed to be a reality TV show, because it seems like whatever can go wrong will!  You have to travel with her to understand what it is like to be a “penguin.”  She and I carry tons of boxes of health fair materials and food out to rural Alaska, and trying to get it from Anchorage to out there is so dang funny!  When we get tired after 9-10 hours of working, we both kind of waddle together, and Karen dubbed us “penguins!” 

When we travel, we laugh at everything!  We’re dropping boxes, or arriving to the health fairs with barely nothing but ourselves because some of our materials didn’t get shipped with us, so we have to wing it, or like on our last trip, we had 15 boxes to take with us on a 30-seater, twin-prop SAAB, and it is sooo incredibly funny that all we can do is laugh until it hurts!  I am so glad to have her in my life!  You know what else is so cool about Karen?  She seems to know everyone and their mother!  I’ve never seen anything like it.  Her and her husband Mark are two of the most kind-hearted people I ever met, and that must be why they have about a million friends!!  They are truly a Godsend!  I have posted Karen’s story in it’s entirety on a separate web page (Karen’s story).

Melany, Fairy Godmother:  Dear, dear Melany, she is my Dr. Fairy Godmother who is sometimes mischievous and playful!  She is living proof that fairy godmothers do exist!  I have known Melany for over a year, she is a cancer educator of extraordinary powers.  😉  She knew how difficult it was for me to talk about cancer, and how I had plowed right through it before with no help.  When I found out I had cancer again, I shared with her how FRUSTRATED, SCARED and EMOTIONAL I was this time…

She has been there for the highs and the lows.  She has been my undying cheerleader, and has been trying to show me that it is ok to ask for help, and that it is ok to take care of myself.  She has been showing me that it is ok to have cancer, and that the cancer is not me… it is not who I am…   She has done so much to keep my spirits up; she has dragged me to yoga, lunches, and is always sending me kind thoughts, cards and little gifts.  She lets me talk about my cancer, and she makes me laugh about it.  You know what Melany’s gift is?  She makes cancer fun, yes, she makes cancer fun!  And that is NO SMALL gift!  Everyone should have a Melany; they just don’t get no finer then her.

I do have others in my life, such as Donna, Colleen, Lisa, and Candy.  They are always there for me, always.  They just let me be myself, and it don’t get no better than that.  All my dear friends have been letting me cry, vent, and joke.  They invest their love and time in me, and I know this is a great gift, I am so blessed.  Their concern, their warmth, their love, and their humor, has been sustaining me through this difficult time, and yes, this is difficult for me.  I hate it, I hate that I have cancer.  I hate having to do chemotherapy, I hate not being my spunky ol’ self… but their love and support keeps me putting one foot in front of the other…

I love you my friends…