Abundant Blessings ... #3

The light of life sparkles in my eyes.  I'm here -- I'm on the right side of the grass! Even though I have grappled with many things over the last year, the positives so greatly outweigh the negatives. A cancer diagnosis changes every relationship in your life.  It's simply impossible for your connection with another person to not be adjusted when faced with a life-altering event. For a few relationships in my life, my diagnosis marked the beginning of a slow and insidious death. For others, it was the dawn of new levels of sharing and caring.

Blessing #3: My sister, Maureen

For all of my 55 years, Maureen has been my big sister. Older than me by two years, she was the one I played Barbie's with, fought with, snuck out with, loved, and hated.  Maureen and I do not share any genes in common, as we were both adopted by our parents at birth. One only has to look at our physical appearance to find evidence of this fact.  She's a string bean, the skinny Jolly Green Giant, and I'm ... NOT! We are also very different people internally in a myriad of ways.

I suppose it's natural, as the little sister, to have constantly sought my big sister's approval. In the past, inferiority plagued me any time we were together,and I never felt like I measured up.  She was always taller, skinnier, prettier, and more successful (in my mind, anyway).

Cancer changed our relationship!

Poor Maureen has been nicknamed "Dr. Lewis" by our family for several years.  Having been B.C.'s best nurse (in my opinion) for greater than 30 years, Maureen is always the "go to" person when any of us has a medical issue or question.  Obviously, she was one of my first phone calls after I got my diagnosis. Over the next months, whenever my brain felt littered with questions, Dr. Lewis came to the rescue and, if she didn't know the answer, she investigated for me.

It is overwhelming for me to think how deep and complex the layers of caring are that Maureen has shown to me this year. Remember when I was ready to walk away from chemo during cycle 1? It was Maureen that talked me through the nausea, pain, and devastation I felt. Traveling over 7 hours each way, Maureen came to cook Easter dinner, spent an entire week with me at the trailer in Kelowna, and motivated me through the 5 km run on Sunday. If I had a dime for every phone call she has made, checking up on me, making sure I'm not overdoing it, or answering a medical question, I could retire! Every call ends with the words, "I love you so much and I'm so proud of you!"-- every call. She is gracing me with the validation I have sought my entire life.

Maureen in Ashcroft for Easter

Previously, there was never doubt that we loved each other, but now the "obligation love" has transformed into genuine, expressive, from-the-heart love. Maureen has become my soft place to fall -- a place with acceptance, validation, unconditional love, sentimentality, and a new closeness I didn't know we would ever experience.

Celebrating the end of another week of radiation in Kelowna

It was this cancer-induced expression of love that brought the HUGEST

blessing of my cancer journey.  On February 13, 2013, Maureen called me with the words, "I wanted to get you the best Valentines gift, so . . ."

PS: the sentence ends in Abundant Blessings ... #4 :) :)