We’re In This Together
I thank you all for your comments from the “Remembering” message.
I came to realize a long time ago, as Leroy and I were just beginning our unchartered course through Cancer World, and as he began to write every day, on the “My Cancer” blog, that this was going to be a life changing event. Not just because Leroy’s prognosis was so awful but because we really didn’t know where this journey would take us. How it would mess with our life together and how we would handle it as individuals.
We had no choice but to take it one day at a time. Cancer gives you no other choice. One day life was close to feeling normal and the next day it wasn’t. So, instead of trying to plan around it, we tried to squeeze the better parts of us into the unsettling parts of our new reality.
That’s what Leroy’s strength was in fighting the disease and I gained my strength from following his lead. I really think he got stronger as his cancer metastized. He had found a new family, in all of you, who appreciated his honesty. Your connection startled him at first, but he eventually grew to understand his words were your words too. He had the gift of putting into words what so many cancer patients felt.
I’ve tried to do the same from the caregivers place.
This community has held my hand during some difficult times. Even though Leroy’s struggle has ended, I still bump heads with fallout from the loss. I know I’m not the only one.
So, we’re still here to help each other over what ever pops up down the road.
It’s just what we do here.
May 23, 2011 @ 6:49 pm
You are doing what you are supposed to be doing just as Leroy did before you…offering a port in the storm when the tempest gets too tough to handle and you do it from the perspective of “walk a mile in my shoes”. For all that you do for us, we are grateful. Without this forum, our voices would rarely be heard. The Mighty Oak could with his voice get everyone’s attention and speak his and our truths. The tiny dogwood whose persistence will produce its beauty in seasons to come is no less a force….a force for good and for HOPE. This what you offer us, Laurie.
May 24, 2011 @ 9:10 am
Thanks Laurie, for all that you do for us. You have carried on Leroy’s legacy with so much passion, so much love and so much expertise that you have lifted us all to another level. I do believe that it takes one who is or has gone through this to be able to represent us in this way.
And thanks to you, too, Al, for so eloquently expressing what I feel too.