The Reason

Here goes nothing. I am finally divulging the reason for my trip home last month. A few months ago while I was out shopping with Baby Bean my mother called me and told me she had some bad news. She wasn't sure how to tell me, and I could hear by the emotion in her voice that she was trying not to cry. I thought she was going to tell me something was wrong with my dad. When she was finally able to talk, she told me she had just been diagnosed with breast cancer.

My head went into a tailspin. I couldn't wrap my brain around what she was saying, or the fact that she was saying it was happening to her. I wanted to sit down and cry, but I was in the middle of a store with Baby Bean on the verge of being fussy. I choked back my tears, and checked my emotion. My personal phone call was not the business of anyone in that store. Our conversation continued for a while more, as my mom told me how she felt about all of it and how she would handle treatment. The diagnosis wasn't 100% positive yet, so she had a biopsy scheduled.

A few weeks later, the biopsy revealed that she did, in fact, have breast cancer. It was in the early stages, but it was spread throughout the tissue, leaving her with the only course of action being a mastectomy.

Not very many people know my mom recently had breast cancer, or that she had surgery to remove it. I have wondered to myself many times over the months why I wasn't comfortable talking about it to anyone. I love my mother very much, and I care about her and what she is going through, but I was having a hard time expressing it to anyone but Hubs.

After much soul searching, I realized it is because if I told anyone, it was like admitting that my mother is human. She can get sick, and one day she will die. I can't handle that thought. My mom has always been the rock. The person who never gets sick. The Eternal Being. So to hear that she had a life threatening illness was something my subconscious would not let my consciousness handle.

I had suppressed my feelings for months, and still only told a few people. I didn't want people telling me they were sorry and asking how I was doing. I wasn't the one fighting the battle, my mom was. Normally I don't turn away people's good intentions, but when it came to my mom, I couldn't handle them. I didn't want them reminding me she is mortal.

It wasn't until the day of her surgery that I finally let all of it reach the surface. My little brother sent me a text to tell me she was in surgery, and I sat there, thinking of her in the OR, sedated by anesthesia, and I cried. I cried so hard. It hurt. I ached for my mother. I couldn't bear thinking of her in an OR, and it pained me to think of her trying to recover from it all.

I had booked a ticket home a month before the surgery. I would go home to be with her and bring her newest grandbaby. I didn't care how much the ticket cost or the fact that I really couldn't afford it. I knew that flying by myself with my 5-month-old could be disastrous, and at best, would stress me to the max. In the days leading up to the trip, I managed to stress myself out pretty good. Every time I thought about getting through security, take-off, and landing, I would start to sweat and panic, but I made myself get over it. I would make it work, and I would be there for her.

Since the surgery, my mom has gone back in and been found to be cancer free. It has been determined that she will not need any further treatment. They caught the cancer earlier enough that it had not spread anywhere else in her body. She has officially fought the war with breast cancer and won!

She might be sporting a battle wound, but my mother just returned to her immortal status in my eyes. She is a fighter and a healer. With my dad, she is the glue that holds our family together through thick and thin. I am not ready to be without her, which is why I could not entertain the thought of cancer besting her, and it didn't.

I love you very much mom. You are an amazing woman, and I am honored to call you My Immortal Mother.

For My Mom

I'm not sure at what point it hit me, but I was really feeling the motherhood vibe big time on our trip to Cayman. (Yes, apparently Cayman was a real eye opener for me all around. lol) I have felt a real sense of connectedness to the baby since I was about 8 weeks along, but the past few weeks I have really started to realize what having this baby in our house means, and how we will have her for the rest of our lives. I am so excited at the thought! A sweet little baby girl to raise, adore, dress up, pamper, cuddle, and be proud of forever. A darling girl to take on vacations to Disney World (or Land), Scotland, and beaches; to teach how to swim, love dogs, garden, etc. What an absolute blessing!

Thinking about all of the wonderful things we are going to be able to do with our daughter makes me reflect on my own mother, and how over the years she always put her children first. She always made sure we didn't miss out on anything we wanted to do, even if it meant she would have to invest a lot of her time sitting in bleachers doing nothing but watch her children take swim lessons, or at little league soccer and baseball games, or sit through marching band competitions in freezing weather for hours on end. More often than not, these time investments meant late nights for my mother who owned and worked her own business out of our home, which she did so she could be home with her children while they grew up.

Somehow, my mom put in all of these hours with her children and her business and she never missed a beat. She never complained. She did it because she loved us. And up until now, I never fully realized how much of herself she put into raising us, caring for us, and being the proud mom in the stands. My mom is freaking amazing! I just feel bad that it took me being pregnant with my own child to fully realize just how much devotion she showed to her children, and just how much of her life she gave up to support and take care of us. She worked hard to earn her money, and she earned her money to spend on her children. She bought our school clothes, paid for our piano lessons, bought our toys, paid for our Christmas presents, bought gas and insurance for our cars, the list goes on and on. Yes, she had help from my dad, but she worked to make up the difference. I can't think of a thing that I wanted to do that my mother told me I couldn't do because she didn't want to pay for it or have to support it. I had piano lessons, dance lessons, trumpet lessons, and swim lessons. If I wanted to give it a try, my mom made sure I was able to give it a try.

My mother is probably also one of the most unselfish people I know. She bought things for my baby before I was even really thinking about it. Within weeks of finding out I was pregnant, she bought the most adorable crib set, and sent it off a few weeks later along with some burp rags and bibs that she made herself in the wee hours of the morning. Once they arrived, she admitted that she felt bad that she bought stuff for my first baby before I did, which made me smile. (I don't mind one bit that you bought things for the baby first mom. It is your prerogative as grandma!) She is so giving and caring, and she does these things just to show how much she cares. Like when my sweetie and I got married, she came over to our apartment the first night we moved in and brought all of the ingredients we would need to make cookies.

I wish that I had appreciated my mother fully over the last almost 3o years of my life, but I didn't completely realize how unconditional her love is until I began baking my own little baby bean. I can honestly say that from this point forward I will never look at my mother the same way again. I have an even deeper love and appreciation for her than I have ever before.

Thanks for everything mom. For being so fantastic, and for being such a wonderful role model. For being so giving and caring, even when I'm sure I didn't deserve it. I hope that one day my little girl will look back on everything I did for her and be as appreciate of my efforts to raise her as I am of you right now. I am really looking forward to your visit next week, and having some real mother/daughter bonding time. I love you loads!