I am sitting at the Barnes and Noble Starbucks Cafe with the sole purpose of writing. And guess what? I can’t get signed into my wordpress account. My laptop, which was my Mom’s, won’t open my Microsoft Word application. But alas, I will find a way and write on!

I have had quite a tumultuous year. Whew. My head is still spinning. I began this blog as a space for me to process my bariatric surgery and weight loss journey. I wrote in this sacred space several times before it all felt too raw to share with the interwebz. I’ve had some time to process some of the emotions, some of the changes and feel more ready to share what I’m learning.

I have shared with many people when face to face about this journey. I can count 5 people just in my own life who have chosen to have bariatric surgery after consulting with me. My encouragement and my positive experience seemed to give the courage they needed to proceed. I am thankful that my journey has been helpful to even one person!

I have lost 90 pounds since I began my journey towards health more than a year ago. My one year surgery-anniversary was October 17. While I was excited to celebrate this milestone, and all the baggage I no longer carry with me, my heart is still heavy. The weight loss has been just a piece of the transformation the Lord has been doing within me.

My Mom died on September 4 after a very short brain cancer illness. She had what was thought to be a stroke on April 30, making a 95% recovery within just a miraculous few days.

Her condition progressed rather quickly beginning in July. She was having trouble making sense of things and finding words became more difficult. One day, she said she was not able to read something on her phone. Dad immediately took her back to the hospital.

In that small little ER room, Mom told each of us that she thought this was the beginning of the end for her life. She just had a sense of knowing. I told her that I heard her and believed her when she says that’s what the Lord was telling her, but we were going to cheer her on in her stroke recovery and rehabilitation until we had reason not to.

That reason would come later in that same evening. That week brought results of brain tumors on her MRI, brain biopsies and orange hair. The ER doctors found the large tumors, granting her a hospital admission to the Cancer Center and kicking off a series of tests confirming a terrible diagnosis of Glioblastomas. The orange hair came as a result of the sterilizing solution used on her head for the brain biopsy. Mom’s glorious white halo of hair became the brightest orange and stayed that way for weeks!

Once the diagnosis was confirmed, Mom was ready to confront these tumors with whatever treatment was necessary. We met with neurology oncologists and oncology radiologists and came up with an aggressive treatment plan.

But Mom’s condition was worsening quickly. Dad was beautifully caring for her every need at home. Basic care, eating, toileting, bathing all became so very difficult. She was more and more fatigued with each day, sleeping most of the day. She lost her appetite. As difficult as it all became, she faced each of her treatments with the readiness with which she faced the rest of life, saying “Let’s do this!”

It became apparent after several of her cancer treatments that her sweet, strong body would no longer handle the aggressive approach. She was admitted to the hospital for evaluation of a change in her mental status and to get some fluids the latter part of August. While they were trying to treat her worsening symptoms, she kept telling us that she wanted to be loosed! “Let me loose!” Working alongside the oncologists and radiologists, it was determined that Mom was not going to get better this side of heaven.

Her cancer was not shrinking. Her condition was not improving. And in fact, the treatments were decreasing her quality of life. She had made it very plain to us in those days, but really in the years preceding, what she wanted when this time in her life came.  She did not want her life prolonged when the quality of her life was diminishing.  Now, I am so thankful we had those hard conversations in years prior, before it became a necessity.  As uncomfortable as these end of life conversations are, I am thankful we knew what she wanted when the time came.

Doctors discussed what palliative care meant and what it meant when a DNR bracelet would be placed on her wrist. She had made it really clear to us that she was ready to go. We knew exactly what she wanted. And yet it was so hard to let her go. Dad, David and I prayed with her, for her and over her, all the while, she was begging to go be with Jesus.

Sobbing and dripping with tears and snot, a blanket of wild peace came and rested upon us.  We agreed with her and with her Lord to let her go. We let the doctors know that we wanted to begin palliative care and determined that the Kate B. Reynolds Hospice Home is where she would spend her final days.

This horribly hard decision was made on Mom and Dad’s 49th wedding anniversary, August 31. In a wild mixture of grief and peace, we moved Mom to Hospice later that day. That blanket of wild peace came to rest upon each of us in the sweet and sorrowful days that followed.