Ebbs and flows …

Life has its ebbs and flows, its highs and lows, its challenges and its joys. The calm, everyday times are often followed by times where we struggle a bit and grow through the learning of how to deal with those struggles.

It's been an emotional couple of weeks. Mom’s birthday was August 28 so I took flowers to the cemetery and I sat there quietly with my prayers and my memories. Her cute smile when she was up to something funny, her boundless energy, her enthusiasm and her endless encouragement. So much that we learned from her. Cooking wasn’t one of them on my part. My sweet Mom just had no patience when it came to teaching me how to cook and most tries would end up with her telling me to “go out in the yard and help your Dad.” So, I learned how to garden instead. Haha!

Gramma had surgery and hasn't been doing well since then (she'll be 98 on 10/3); her body's healing but she's talking to angels and saying she wants to go home. (I should clarify that she’s my ex’s Gramma but we remained family nonetheless and I love her as if she was my own blood.) Before the surgery, she lived on her own and did everything for herself. Now she's confined to a bed at home and hospice is helping. Before her surgery, I took a pic of us. I wish it showed how pretty her blue eyes are. She’s always entertained us with wonderful stories of her youth. She doesn’t tell us stories right now.

My dad's birthday was Wednesday; he still hasn't spoken to us in over a year. I sent him a box of See's chocolates, as I always do for holidays and special occasions with a card saying I love him and miss him. I tried calling him, knowing it was futile because they have caller ID and don’t answer the phone. I always let my cousins know when his birthday approaches so they can send him a birthday card if they’d like. I still do that. I still love the Dad that we used to have in our lives.

One of my best friends has been caring for her dad for the last six months (battling cancer); he passed away Wednesday night. Her loving selflessness in caring for him was such a tribute to the relationship they shared. She’d drive a couple of hours to spend several days with him, then drive back home for several days, repeating that routine week in and week out. He was a good man and she would do anything for him and did. He will be missed by many. My heart is so sad for my friend.

Sometimes you just have to sit down and have a good cry for the sorrow in the world and the grief that our loved ones have to bear. One of my mantras is “Receive what you are given.” When we have to receive sorrow, we have to accept it and deal with it. Find the lessons, cry a bit, feel the depth of the emotions that you feel and not shove any of it away. And then we re-balance and look up at the stars and give thanks for a roof over our head and food in the cupboard. Simple gratitude for the abundant blessings in life.

An Inspirational Hero: Trevor Roach

My daughter, son-in-law and two granddaughters have a large and very close circle of friends. This group of families gathers together frequently: camping, celebrating birthdays, supporting and sharing life with one another; the kids have pretty much all grown up together as one large, extended family.

Trevor Roach is the 12-year-old son of one of these friends, a boy with the biggest smile you can imagine (well, you don’t have to imagine because you can see it above) and a heart to go with it. Skateboarding, riding dirt bikes, playing Legos – a kid filled with excitement and joy; all boy.

Trev was initially diagnosed with cancer (leukemia) on 12/29/10 when he was just 9 years old. He fought the cancer with courage and chemo, went into remission after 1 - 2 rounds and continued his treatment session. He was doing so well that he had the line removed in September 2011. Before Christmas 2011, his mom Belinda saw the signs that the cancer was back, but the blood tests said otherwise. On 1/11/12, his blood tests finally caught up with the signs his mom was seeing (a mother knows her child) and his cancer was back in full force. He was once again admitted to the hospital and the line was put back in.

Chemo was started immediately. His doctors suggested that a bone marrow transplant was his best hope for beating cancer for good. On 2/28/12, a donor was found who was an 8 out of 10 on the matching scale. On 4/27/12, Trev had his bone marrow transplant and was “re-born.”
 
Although his health improved after his transplant, his donor cells never fully took over his body. At the end of August, just 125 days after the transplant, Trevor’s cancer was back with a vengeance. This brave, young boy fought the cancer this 3rd round with every chemo drug known, even ones that haven’t been used in years; his doctors had to get FDA approvals to use some of the medications. Nothing worked to keep the cancer at bay. It aggressively took over his body.

He was able to go on a big family-and-friends camping trip for New Years 2013 and rode a quad with boyish joy from sunrise to sunset for three days straight. Then it was back to the hospital for platelets and more tests. Friday 1/4/13: young Trev was readmitted into the hospital—his body 93% cancer-ridden—and it was estimated he had a few weeks left. Another round of treatment helped to prolong his life for a few additional weeks. He was able to go home to spend good times with his loving family (mom, dad, older brother and younger sister). Trevor was readmitted on April 6 for the last time. The cancer spread to his spleen, then to his liver and on April 18, shortly after midnight, Trevor beat the cancer by leaving it behind in his body. It may have conquered his body, but it could never, ever conquer his courageous spirit.  

Trevor Roach had the hugest amount of fight in him and was always smiling, even on his bad days with fevers and sickness. He had the best time he could have on his good days, loving dirt bike riding, trains, remote control cars, boats and trucks and especially Legos. He was the Lego master!

Countless people were touched by his story and fighting spirit. He was visited in the hospital by sports celebrities and others, including Brian Deegan, Kyle Loza, LA Sheriff’s SWAT, Wheelz, a few members of the Ducks and many others.

In his last few weeks at CHOC, there were over 30 people a day from his extended circle of friends visiting Trevor, giving him their love and support. He loved it! He was surrounded by hundreds of family friends, teachers, nurses, children, sports figures and all who grew to love him and his strong spirit.

At the celebration of his life on April 28, the mortuary was packed to overflowing with hundreds of people whose lives were touched by this hero-child; the chapel was filled, the courtyard, the foyer and overflowing outside. The mother of a little girl who also had cancer and shared a hospital room with Trevor told of how this rough-and-tumble little boy would get on the hospital room floor with her daughter to play tea party; so kind-hearted and generous.

My daughter and her family weren’t here for Mother's Day today ... and for very good reason. In young Trev's last days, he asked his mom if they could go to Big Bear Lake one last time. As sick as he was, she had to tell him no, but “we’ll meet you there afterward” at the first opportunity. So, Trevor's family, my daughter's family and other close friends went camping in Big Bear this weekend to meet Trevor and celebrate him in the beautiful mountains he wanted to visit again.

 

How quickly things change …

A couple of months ago, I was thinking about how nice and quiet my life is, no drama or Big Events, just a contented, happy life. Things can change so quickly, though, and so dramatically. In the last two months:

• I left my job
• My dad’s wife passed away
• My daughter was in the hospital for tests related to her lupus
• Dad’s dog had to be put down
• A good friend/neighbor passed away

Worst of all, my dad is no longer speaking to his family.
When Dad’s late wife was in the hospital, my brother and I spent time with him each day there; my brother usually took him in the morning and then I went in the evening to sit with him and then take him home. In spite of the circumstances, it was wonderful to be with my Dad again and listen to his stories, talk with him, share conversation and jokes.
After my mom passed away in 1990, we spent a lot of time with Dad, but after he remarried 16 years ago, that changed. We’d invite him and his wife to get together and were told they already had plans with her family. We’d invite them to holiday gatherings; at first, they’d come for an hour or so, then leave to spend the afternoon and evening with her family. One Christmas, we pulled up to my brother and sister-in-law’s home just as Dad and his wife were leaving so we had to give them their Christmas presents through the car window, with the car engine running and his wife telling us to hurry. Eventually, they just stopped coming to our family’s holiday gatherings so they could spend the time with her family instead. It was sad for us and we missed our Dad tremendously, but there wasn’t much we could do.
(Eight years ago, my Dad and his wife became legal guardians of three of her grandchildren, who have been living with them. Two of them, an adult grandson and a minor granddaughter, still live with him. He’s no longer legal guardian of either. I’m very proud of my dad to have stepped up to help raise his wife’s grandchildren, even though he was already in his 70s at the time.)
When Dad’s late wife passed away in May, my brother and I spent each day with Dad, helping him with finding bills and other paperwork, getting things organized so he could handle things more easily. (Dad’s had some strokes and suffers from memory loss at times.) We also wanted to be sure the home was safe and healthy for Dad. It was a mess (a lot of hoarding): paper piles everywhere, medicines and medical equipment in multiples of multiples, multiple kitchen appliances, boxes of food on the floor, a lot of things on the floor, actually, instead of put away.
And the kitchen – when Dad and I checked the produce drawer, there was rotten, blackened, moldy food filling the drawer, with rotten tomatoes that had gone to liquid in the bottom. A container of flan had an inch of mold growing on it. The freezer was completely stuffed with freezer-burned food. You get the picture. Not a safe place for a man with memory loss. He could’ve eaten the rotten food or mistakenly taken the wrong medicine.
My brother and I worked at cleaning up the kitchen and the bills, etc. for over a month. We took him on errands, getting prescriptions, making appointments, having lunch, taking him grocery shopping for foods he wanted. We started looking at services who could come in to cook and clean for him. We had a wonderful time finally being able to be with Dad, gathering his stories as we worked together to have a safe kitchen area for him. Kitchen surfaces were greasy and dusty; we knocked down cobwebs from corners and walls. As we cleaned, I’d ask Dad “Do you want to keep this?” If he did, I’d say “OK, let’s wash it and honor it and display it nicely.”
I took him to my cousin’s retirement/birthday party one Saturday and he had a wonderful time seeing family he hadn’t seen in many years. He accepted our invitation to attend my granddaughter’s/his great-granddaughter’s birthday party on 6/16 and we made plans to go to the pier for breakfast on Father’s Day 6/17. He also accepted my daughter’s/his granddaughter’s invitation to join the family at an Angel game and he was looking forward to all of these.
On Friday, June 15, I brought a family album with me for Dad to enjoy. He asked my brother to please make copies for him because “I don’t have any pictures of my family in the house.”
One of the appointments we took him to a couple of weeks before was to see his trust attorney, who reviewed the trust with him. When Dad reviewed it, he protested and told the attorney that he wanted changes made to it, including giving my brother Power of Attorney and  making sure that his children and granddaughter were included in the trust. (Dad’s original trust was changed in 2009, after he’d had his strokes and memory loss. The previous trusts for each of them provided that his wife’s family received her estate and Dad’s family received his, including the home that he and Mom had bought and paid off. The 2009 trust gave everything to the three grandchildren, which Dad said he wasn’t aware of.) The attorney suggested that Dad think about the changes he wanted made and to come back to make all the changes at once. My brother later prepared a list of Dad’s wishes so Dad could review and make certain of what he wanted changed.
So on Friday, June 15, everything was wonderful with Dad and I again confirmed I’d pick up him at 1 for his great-granddaughter’s birthday party the next day. On Saturday, I went to pick him up; no answer. I called the house; no answer. I called his wife’s family members; no answer. I went to the neighbor’s house and she didn’t know where he was, either, but was finally able to contact another of his wife’s family who said that Dad was safe, but wouldn’t share where he was. The next day was Father’s Day and my brother planned to pick him up; called the house; no answer. On Monday, he came to pick up Dad for his doctor appointment; again, no answer.
I was extremely worried about him by this time. We hadn’t heard from him for three days and didn’t know if he was OK or missing or what. I called the police, who met me there. Dad was OK, but the grandson and granddaughter were yelling at me and saying that they didn’t have to answer our calls about my Dad, that we never visited Dad (they probably didn’t know their grandmother always had other plans so we couldn’t) and that Dad didn’t want to talk to us. I left in tears.
And so it’s been like that ever since. We thought we could finally have Dad back in our lives and after two months of joy with him, we’ve been robbed of that again. My daughter took Father’s Day gifts to him two days later and although he came to the door (his late wife’s family was there), he didn’t let her in or give her a hug or kiss. My daughter and my dad used to be like two peas in a pod, super close and loving; as a kid, she accompanied him everywhere; after Mom passed and we’d visit Dad, she and he would snuggle closely together, her little head tucked under his arms wrapped around her, watching TV.
I don’t know how my Dad is doing. I wake early each morning, praying for his well-being and for a safe home for him to live in, with . I send him loving thoughts through my prayers. I miss him and am broken-hearted that no one has a kind heart to let us know how he is. Our primary concern is for our Dad’s well-being, that the home is clean, that he’s eating good food, with no rotten food or things on the floor he could trip on. I know that deep down, my Dad still loves his family, each and every one of us. I pray that we can gather together again some day and share our family’s love again.

To those touched by sorrow …

Being the Pollyanna that I am (“let’s play the Glad Game!”), I simply don’t understand the depth of despair and darkness that one must be in to take one’s own life. What a horrible place to be in! Without hope that things will ever get better, in such mortal pain that even knowing that others will be enormously hurt by the act of suicide doesn’t dissuade the person from ending his or her life.

What makes the people of Haiti—many pulled from the rubble, many with amputated limbs, many with no homes or businesses to go to—what makes the Haitians able to continue to struggle on, even to sing as it’s been reported? What makes the Amish families who lost their daughters in a heartless massacre capable of not only coping, but to find forgiveness in their hearts and move on through the pain? What makes any of us reach the depths of despair … yet still trust that things will change, that we won’t always be in this dark place, that even in the worst of circumstances, there is still hope?

And yet others who appear to be in less dire circumstances (emphasizing appear) are incapable of coping and making it through to the next minute. What makes one person resilient and another person fall apart? If we only knew.

I can only sense that it must be beyond any pain that I can possibly imagine, a place where a person feels they have no other option left. My prayers go out to the Osmond and Koenig families as their hearts cry in sorrow for their losses. May grace and peace touch their hearts during this time.