God had created this longing in my heart. He had a plan for me. My calling has always been to be a mother. (Bla. Bla. Bla. You have heard it all before, right? Pretty sure everyone knows how important being a mom is to me.)
In 2011, this dream was just beginning. I had snagged the husband of my dreams. I had a two year old daughter and a one year old son. I had hopes for more children. I desired a large and loud family.
And my husband and I were on our way to that, until I walked into the breast care doctors office on February 28th. That day I learned I had stage two breast cancer. Estrogen positive. Progesterone positive. Her-2 positive.
From May 2011 to October 2012, I received chemotherapy. I was told to be on birth control because a fetus would suffer dire consequences (deformities or death) if I got pregnant during my chemo. After that, I was supposed to take tamoxifen, the drug that would decrease my levels of progesterone and estrogen, for five years.
I was angry. I mean, real angry. It is isn't the right way to deal with things, but I put God on the "silent treatment." I couldn't believe He had just given me my dreams, a new and young family, and then allowed me to be sick. Allowed for me to be only able to watch my children play from my spot on the couch or hear their giggles down the hall from under my bedcovers. My husband had to do almost all the work parenting our babes, and I certainly wasn't being the mother I had dreamed to be.
I worried about not seeing children off to their first days of kindergarten, or whether they would remember me if I suddenly got a serious infection and died. (Morbid, yes. But it is a reality for some. I met a young woman and spent every Friday with her for months, as we lounged, talked and slept during treatments. I saw her one week, and attended her funeral the next. Reality. It hits, and hit me hard when she died.)
I was angry with God. Because He gave me this calling to be a mother. He instilled in me a desire to take care of children. And here I was, laid up, barely able to take care of myself, worrying about leaving children motherless. And even after chemo was finished my doctor's advice was not to have more pregnancies, because a pregnancy would increase the hormones that helped my specific type of cancer to grow.
I lost my breasts,my hair, and the ability for more children. Honestly, I grieved the loss of another pregnancy, or another biological baby, more than any other part of the cancer situation. Some days I was bitter, other days I was depressed.
At that time, anyone would have said that that anger, the sadness, the disappointment was justified.
Here's the deal though- God has a purpose for everything. And in the midst of a cancer diagnosis/ treatment, it is sure hard to see a silver lining. It's easy to see that loss, and be hopeless.
Here's what God did for me: He gave me more children. He didn't let my dream of a big family die. After all, He had given me this calling. He had placed the longing in my heart. But He had more in store for me than I could have imagined, or planned for.
In 2013, a beautiful dark haired girl was born miles away and without my knowledge, but four days later a social worker carried her into my home. Almost a year later, a judge declared her my daughter, as if I had given birth to her. And I had loved her as if she was of my flesh since the moment she entered my life.
I worried about not seeing children off to their first days of kindergarten, or whether they would remember me if I suddenly got a serious infection and died. (Morbid, yes. But it is a reality for some. I met a young woman and spent every Friday with her for months, as we lounged, talked and slept during treatments. I saw her one week, and attended her funeral the next. Reality. It hits, and hit me hard when she died.)
I was angry with God. Because He gave me this calling to be a mother. He instilled in me a desire to take care of children. And here I was, laid up, barely able to take care of myself, worrying about leaving children motherless. And even after chemo was finished my doctor's advice was not to have more pregnancies, because a pregnancy would increase the hormones that helped my specific type of cancer to grow.
I lost my breasts,my hair, and the ability for more children. Honestly, I grieved the loss of another pregnancy, or another biological baby, more than any other part of the cancer situation. Some days I was bitter, other days I was depressed.
At that time, anyone would have said that that anger, the sadness, the disappointment was justified.
Here's the deal though- God has a purpose for everything. And in the midst of a cancer diagnosis/ treatment, it is sure hard to see a silver lining. It's easy to see that loss, and be hopeless.
Here's what God did for me: He gave me more children. He didn't let my dream of a big family die. After all, He had given me this calling. He had placed the longing in my heart. But He had more in store for me than I could have imagined, or planned for.
In 2013, a beautiful dark haired girl was born miles away and without my knowledge, but four days later a social worker carried her into my home. Almost a year later, a judge declared her my daughter, as if I had given birth to her. And I had loved her as if she was of my flesh since the moment she entered my life.
The following month, I learned that I was pregnant. Despite what doctors had advised, my husband and I were once again, excited for this new life. Sadly a few weeks later, my child entered into the Heavenly realm before making her appearance on earth. We grieved. I cried from a deep inner pain that I never knew women felt with the loss of a miscarriage.
But my grieving was interrupted within a month when our last son was born, hours from our home, but with every one of his immediate family members at the hospital to meet him. I watched him breathe his first breath and cry his first cry. And I realized that THIS family, the one God created just for me, was my satisfied longing that I had held in my heart all my life.
Cancer didn't mess with my purpose, and it couldn't hold me back from being who I was made to be. Cancer was just a detour that beautifully lead me to my destination. Cancer created the urgency in my heart to adopt, and because of that, we were licensed foster parents in just the right time to take in our youngest daughter, and then her younger brother.
Today, I am a mother to four wild, loud, God-loving children. And one precious child who lives in Heaven with our God, waiting for her Momma to come hold her in her arms for the first time.
I can appreciate that my calling, my purpose, is the same here as it will be in Heaven.
A Mother.
And if I get cancer again, I will better understand that it can't rob me of me. I won't childishly put God into the silent treatment. I will be able thank Him for what He has taken and made good.
