My mom...

I’ve been slowly writing this post for weeks and now I am running out of time. Where to begin… April 15^th my mom went in for an MRI on her head. She had been having word recall issues for months which kept getting worse and I finally convinced her to get an MRI “just to be sure”. Although I thought a tumor was real possibility I don’t think I ever really thought what that would truly mean. Unfortunately that possibility was true. There were two tumors in her brain, both very sizable (I saw the scans). Two days later she had surgery to remove one but the other could not be touched because of the location. After two weeks of healing from the surgery, she had her first round of radiation and chemo. She recently had another scan to see impact of treatment and it was as we fearing, it’s worse than before treatment. We were told in April standard life expectancy is 12-18 for her particular type of cancer and now we are being told she has a few weeks, maybe a month.

I’ve always considered myself on the emotional side. I am female after all. I’ve always cried pretty easily about stupid things like movies. I cry for both happy things and sad things so me crying isn’t always a bad thing. I HATE crying in front of people though, even in front of my husband. Even if people don’t see me crying, they can see the evidence that I have been because my eyelids puff up to 10x their normal size for hours, sometimes longer than a day. Something has changed inside of me in these recent years though. I’ve become emotionally tougher. I’ll still cry when a dog dies in a movie but I rarely cry over personal things. Obviously this turn of events changed that. I have no idea how many times I’ve cried at work now. Every time I do, I pray no one comes to my desk. I make the mistake of reading emails from my Dad while at work and every time there’s been further bad news, I’ve received the phone call while at work.

Having said all that, for the most part I’ve held myself together fairly well, perhaps better than most my family. Whatever changed me recently has gone a long way to get me through this. To some it might seem I’m handling this a little too well because it seems like I’m not overly upset most of the time. I have my moments people, trust me. I like to keep those moments to myself. I decide when to talk about it when I know I can make it through the conversation calmly.

I had a busy schedule planned this year before all this happened. Originally I said scrap the whole race season but as I kept swimming, riding and running towards no real goal I realized I depended on it to get me through every day. If I stop for just one second and really think about everything I will breakdown. So I keep going. I keep pushing myself. I keep myself busy physically and mentally. I know this isn’t the best way to handle the situation but everyone grieves differently. I’m not in denial. In fact I came to accept the situation for what it was and how it would end better than most a long time ago.

After postponing as long as possible, I signed up for two races, my A races for the season. If I can’t do a races for whatever reason, I don’t care. I really don’t and at this point that’s highly possibly. The training still benefits me in more ways than I can count and there will always be more races. During a motivational quote hunt a while ago I came across this: 

“This is where I take out my frustrations, my fears, my sadness, my insecurity. This is where I find my faith, my hope, my dreams, my happiness. This is where I belong.” (Sorry I don’t know the source otherwise I’d give credit.)

This quote speaks to me in so many ways. The week this all started I did more running than I had since my half marathon. I also started running faster. I often think of my mom when I’m on the road or in the pool. I have a choice on how I live my life, on how much pain I want to push myself through. I have the energy (most of the time) to keep going. She does not. And for that reason, I have the motivation to keep on pushing and even push a little harder. I often feel happiest during the day after I’m done training while I’m still high on swim bike or run endorphins. It’s amazing what those endorphins can do.

I owe a lot of people a thanks for getting me into this sport but my mom is certainly one of them. Growing up we had a pool. She and only she was the one that taught me to swim. I never had any formal swimming lessons and I certainly could use them but I’m a pretty decent swimming thanks to her. My mom was never a “cyclist” but she enjoyed going for rides. Every once in a while she would spend a summer doing rides every week. Her mindset on biking was around enjoyment. She would take her time, never go for speed and took lots of stops for rewards like Diet Coke. I would occasionally go with her on rides since she knew I wouldn’t push her to go fast. Her longest ride was over 40 miles. For a while I looked at that as the distance I had to beat. If she could do it, so could I.

My mom was very adventurous before us kids ruined her. She skied, did high diving, taught gymnastics, got a minor in physical education and that’s all impressive given the time period she grew up in when female athletics were rare. I always said I wish I knew her when she was young. It was always enjoyable seeing the moments where her adventurous side came out. I like to think I got some of my adventurous side from her.

Watching my mom, this wonderful woman, waste away mentally and physically is unbearable. I don’t even see it every day and cannot imagine how much worse it is for my dad and sisters who do. She is not the same person, she hasn’t been for a long time now. I’m so afraid that when I think of her, I will think of how she was in her final months. That is not the person I want to remember because that is not who she is. This is the person I want to remember… an amazing mother and a strong woman.