Fill Your Soul With Hope

I’ll never forget the day my parents told us that my mom had cancer. I remember where I was sitting, my father’s face, and the advice he gave us about how we all needed to just continue living – that mom’s cancer was just a part of our lives, but that it didn’t mean we should stop living all the other parts as well.

Even more, I remember the day they told us they were stopping treatments. In the age before cell phones, I would use the office phone at lunchtime on days when mom had doctor’s appointments to ask how it had gone, how her numbers looked, did we think the most recent round of chemo was working, etc. When I called that day, dad said, “Well sweetheart, let’s just talk when you get home from school.” A friend found me in the hallway right outside the office and held me as I cried. After she passed away, Emily and I would rush out to the car at lunch time, drive the 10 minutes home, eat for 10 minutes, and drive the 10 minutes back to school just to spend a few minutes. Catherine and dad would alternate getting food ready for us. It probably wasn’t every day, but I remember it like it was a ritual.

You never really get over the loss of a close loved one. My husband has commented several times that I mark time in my life as “BC” and “AC” – “before cancer” and “after cancer”. “I must have been young, because it was before mom got sick.” “Mom had lost her hair, but she was still feeling good, so I must have been about 14.” “I know it was at least a year after mom’s funeral, but before I started college.” Mom is never far from my mind. My late teens was a hard, but also happy time for me – my dad, my sister Emily and I did our best to deal with the dark heaviness that comes with a great loss, and to this day I probably feel a more-than-is-strictly-normal connection with both of them from that time.

Cancer has touched so many in my family, either through a full-out battle with a diagnosis, or increased odds through genetics. Eventually my dad remarried an amazing woman whose husband had died of cancer. (Their daughter was going through cancer at the same time.) Only a few short months after their wedding, another of my stepsisters was diagnosed with cancer. She battled fiercely for 4.5 years and, in a similar fashion to my mom, I will never forget when she went off her chemo treatments. I miss her dearly, and one of the great injustices in this world is that I think my husband would have gotten along with her famously. I won’t name names, as their lives are personal and their own, but suffice it to say, cancer runs in the family through many people.

I think my father’s remarriage is an incredible story. Over 40 years ago, my parents moved into a house in Orem, UT. Within a very short amount of time, my mom and Sandra (the woman who would eventually become my stepmother) were put into a presidency for our church together and became fast friends. Their husbands met and also became the best of friends – for years, they would do double dates and combined family functions. My eventual stepmother was the first person besides my parents to hold me in the hospital. Sandra’s husband got cancer a year or two into my mom’s cancer fight. It’s truly one of the greatest manifestations of God’s love in my life. I don’t think God gave Larry and mom cancer, but I think He knew and helped prepare the way for joy to follow sorrow. Sandra has enhanced my life in so many ways. She brought joy and life back to my father. She has loved my nieces and nephews. She fell in love with my husband after our first date, and was one of his biggest champions while I navigated my fear of loving again. She is bright and joyful and funny and kind. I understand so well why she was one of my mother’s dearest friends.

And I will never forget as my parents sat across from me a few weeks back to let us know that my stepmom is now facing the same cancer that took my first mother. It feels like a very unfair form of déjà vu. Life is full of moments that feel like everything pivots, and this is one of those moments. I won’t attempt to describe my feelings – they are lengthy, unknown to even myself, and ultimately not relevant to why I sat down to write this. I feel such a gut punch right now, but I also just needed to express to the universe that there can be joy and peace amid turmoil and pain. “It's funny how, when things seem the darkest, moments of beauty present themselves in the most unexpected places.” Spencer and I had planned a trip to Disneyland this last weekend (months ago, to escape some other hard things that we have been carrying – hilarious) and were considering cancelling it in view of everything going on. Sandra and dad told us in no uncertain terms to go. That we had to create moments of joy and laughter and lightness – to keep living.

“Choose to focus on those things that fill your soul with hope.” Dieter Uchtdorf.