I joined a special club due to cancer, I lost both parents to the disease years ago. I joined a club no one understands until you get your initiation, then it all becomes clear.
There is a saying about losing a child, that a parent never recovers. Losing a parent is pretty much the same way. The ache is always there, reminders at times making it more acute, some even making you smile.Losing a parent, you lose a legacy. You lose that person you could always go to. That person you could ask questions, things like:
I'm getting older and my body does this. Did yours?
My child is doing this, is it a family trait?
Tell my children about when I was a child, tell them that funny story.
I'm confused about what to do next, can you give me any advice?
And not be judged.
There are the words from friends, and family, but the words from parents were the only ones really soothing the soul, from that first skinned knee, to now silence. In our club, we miss those words, meant only for us, spoken with love.
Cancer taught our family that we were stronger than we imagined. In the short time we lived the journey, we fought together, we never let it win. We watched it take piece after piece of the person we loved, loving more was was left in the process until we told them peacefully that "it is time." Cancer, you may be a disease that robs in the night, you never took the soul, you never took the family, you never took the love. We remember it. We have the pieces they left behind, a video, a heartfelt letter, a picture, we have our memories made before cancer. And it is those memories that make us smile, even when you miss them.
Take that cancer. You'll never win.
No comments:
Post a Comment