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Eternal Flame This is a story about my Mother, who battles cancer and is currently winning. She has survived lung cancer, undergone 2 surgeries and 2 very difficult rounds of chemo. She is 74-years old and is my hero. By: Shelly BrownA candle burns brightly; the flame stretches and shines; it smiles...well almost. It represents hope. Hope for a cure. Hope for a better tomorrow. Hope for our faith. Hope for peace. Just keep hoping. It is a waiting game. Time stands still until you hear the dreaded phrase. You have cancer. It hurts in the pit of your stomach, you feel weak, afraid. You Cancer can be beaten cry, you scream, you cry some more. You tell someone and they tell someone and then the pain comes. The raw and undiluted craw in the very pit of your gut spills to the top of your head, it aches everywhere. Your life is on hold, how could this be? You did everything right, but you know you didn't. There is no need to lay blame. It is the hand that you were dealt. Now what? Deal with the plethora of appointments, more waiting, they call your name, you wait in yet another cold small room for yet another person you have never met, yet you hope he or she has all the answers. The answers you want to hear. Is there time? Can I get help? Now you are in it and in it deep. More doctors, more appointments, more tests, more treatment, more waiting. I do not know what is worse, the notion that your Mother has cancer or the notion that you have to wait again to find out if there is more. She crumbles, she rises up, she cries, she screams, and she lashes out at the world. All is not well inside her head and her heart. The pain of cancer is real, it brings new pain to old wounds, old family wounds, sores that are raw and bleeding with pain, emotional scars that have never healed, can they go away? Will they go away? The mind is a powerful machine. What path do you take? The winding road that leads you to a bright tomorrow filled with hope and love, or the crooked road that is full of life's potholes, deep gaping holes of pain, depression and despair. It is a tough choice to make. The latter choice would be much easier to bear, it is right there, the pain that is. You would not have to look far to grab onto it. But "they" are worth waiting for. The "they" is your family. Your support system, your shoulders to lean on, and voices to hear comforting, positive words of encouragement to go on. We were a family of four, now we are a family of three. We lost Daddy to cancer, yes cancer, in 1997. The slow painful death, the cancer that stole his body for 19-years, but that cancer did not break his spirit or his mind. It did take his heart; it stopped beating December 2, 1997. We thought that was it. Our hearts were broken. But life was about to teach us a few more lessons. We didn't think we had the strength, the courage, or the heart. But we do. We are in this together. My Mother, my brother and me. The four musketeers are now three. Our Mother is our rock, always was, always will be. We will do anything to help her. She gave us life, breathed hope into our lungs and whispered loving words into our ears. She is always there, a strong presence, ready and willing to help us, even in her own sometimes dark cancer strived life. That is the love of our Mother. It is real and warm and beats strong like the blood that runs through our veins. I am proud of my Mother, proud of her choices, proud of her determination to beat this thing. Life is what you make it. My favorite poet Robert Frost said, "Two roads diverged in a woods, and I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference. I know what road Mother is taking. God bless her in her journey, she is not alone. Shelly Brown is living in Pickering, ONT. |
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