A Light in the Dark

Anyone else out there feeling some strange sense of relief that we are finally well into January? Feeling also a measure of guilt. A bit of a betrayer. Christmas came this year a little harder than hoped. For a few different reasons. 

One, It was the “off” year with our married kids so they wouldn’t be home for the holiday. That missing of kids at Christmas thing isn’t ever easy for any of us as parents. Even though we know it’s how it goes. Even though we are incredibly grateful for the wonderful in-law families provided our married children. We still miss them. Once someone said to me, “But, Jody, you have so many children, surely you don’t miss one or two.” Umm, No. That’s not quite how it works. I promise. Anyway, we know we need to share and we do. And we really try not to inadvertently put any kind of pressure on our kids in the process. Well, we try. 

On top of that, Rick and I both had the flu over Christmas. It crashed over me right in time for Christmas Eve. And made for quite a week. So that meant the kids who were planning to come the day after Christmas also could no longer come. Which meant no sweet grand baby girl under my Christmas tree this year. Plans derailed. Again, these things happen to all of us. I get it. But I didn’t like it. And I guess I just let it all get to me. 

So many people struggle in the holidays. In ways so much worse than some kid missing or flu getting. Loneliness and lack and sadness and sorrow can grow deeper when the rest of the world is rejoicing. I'm not sure I always got this or empathized very well, but this new season of life with cancer has marked me with a new understanding.

I’m not really sure I have words to explain how the holidays can feel for someone who has been given a statistical expiration date on the short side. I know I am not a statistic. I know God is in control of that date and all my days. He’s ordained them and knows the very number, but still, the weak, frail, human side of me flirts with the future in a not so nice way. And for some reason the holidays highlight this hesitation over my future.  I felt this way last year as it was my first Christmas stamped Stage Four and, I suppose, this year, it was much the same. Try as I did, I wasn’t able to completely combat or avoid it. 

There’s something so momentous and milestone-ish about a big holiday or a birthday or a brand new year. It's a clear marker of time. One Christmas to another Christmas. One year to another year. 2023 to 2024.  Resolutions and goals and Happy New Years. And all that “The Best is Yet to Come” stuff. All happening every time 12 months rolls around.  All of it feeling so sprightly pronounced. So brightly proclaimed. So big. 

I tried to keep it small. Manageable. Controlled and calm. But between the sadness and the sickness, I let it grow unmanageable and, most definitely, out of control. I found myself in a dark place. An angry place. An easily angered place. And though embarrassed this morning as I write, I confess, even a “poor me” kind of place. Pitiful.

I typically look on the bright side. I mostly try to find a silver lining and a sliver of hope. That eternal hallelujah in the hard. I try. But, is it okay to admit that doesn’t always happen as it should? As I want?

Maybe you have felt that way at times too. And wondered what’s wrong with you (with me)? 

Why can’t I get my emotional health together? 

Why can’t I pull myself up and out of this funk, this hole, this hurting.

Why is the darkness so dark? The anxiety so anxious? The sadness so sad? The struggle so real?

Is it a lack of gratitude? A lack of grace? A lack of grit? Or perhaps just a lack in general? And, by the way, if you weren't already spiraling downward, that kind of thinking will get you there really fast.

Is this how we all feel at some point, in some place, at some time? Maybe. 

Again, I’m embarrassed to admit it. I have so much for which to be thankful and grateful. So much. And I mostly keep that gratitude close by. So who am I to feel abandoned by God or doubt His goodness? Why am I so easily brought down? 

What is this weakness within me? 

But that is exactly it! There IS weakness within. Great weakness. And God knew that in my design. And He knows it in my day to day. And He sees it in my darkness when it comes screaming or seeping or crashing or creeping. He sees it. 

But, He doesn’t just know it and see it, He promises to meet it even in the very depths of my sorrowful soul.

He promises. And He proves true. Over and over and over again.

Psalm 139. I read it this morning and the words which I love and know well met me in a new and encouraging way.

“Even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.” (vs. 12)

My darkness. My sadness. My valley. It is nothing for Jesus and His light. Even the darkness will not be dark for Him. There is no place I can go too dark or too deep for my Savior. 

“If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, EVEN THERE your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.” (vs. 9-10)

Why? 

Because He, “created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb … My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I woven together in the depths of the earth. You saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.” (vs.13-16)

I could go on and on with this chapter in Psalms. I encourage you to read it. Read it when you are in that pitiful place of poor me. Read it when the darkness feels too dark or the depths too deep or the sadness too sad. 

Read it when you feel weak. Alone. Angry. Afraid.

Do you know why this passage met me so poignantly this week? Because I had been in a dark place. Sometimes we must feel the dark before we can fully see the light. This is true in science, this is true in self. One makes the other better known. A symbiotic revealing which happens in this relationship. And because I have the light of Jesus within me, I cannot stay in the dark places of my soul, no matter how sad. I just can't. Even when I had selfishly decided to go ahead and let myself be depressed, I could feel the flicker of His light within. 

Oh, dear ones, it is a battle through and through. It is a digging in and most desperate place in the world of spiritual warfare. It is real. It is relentless. It is ruinous. And, I fear, in this God forsaking world, it is running rampant.

You can read all of the self-help books and make all of the most hope-filled new year’s resolutions, but none of it will make much a difference without knowing that Jesus is in the dark and in the depths right with us. The dark is not dark for Him.  Not one bit. 

“Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for YOU ARE WITH ME.” Psalm 23: 4

The flicker of this reminder was exactly what was needed to dispel the dark. Nothing else was going to work. No amount of bootstrap pulling up or happy face putting on or bright side looking at. 

Only. Only. Only the light flicker and finding of Jesus standing, sitting, weeping, wrestling … and being with me in the dark. 

"I am The Light of the World. 

Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, 

but will have the light of life."  ~ John 8:12

 

Unfinished for Christmas

I opened my computer early this morning and up popped a calendar reminder: Christmas Day Tomorrow. As if any of us need a reminder. It is almost innate, this internal clock which starts ticking from the time the turkey day dishes are properly put away. I imagine most of us—children and adults—keep track of the weeks and days pretty well.

And then it is upon us. And we are down to hours. And counting minutes. And we know there are certain things which just won’t get done by this all important day. At least for me there’s always a thing or two I thought I’d accomplish or finish before the 25th arrived. Always.

What is it this December that you didn’t complete in time for Christmas? 

For me it was a cross stitch sampler for my new granddaughter’s nursery. I started it the week she was born in September and thought surely I’d have it to wrap up for her (and mostly for her mommy) by Christmas morning. I was certain a Christmas deadline would be no problem for me. And yet here we are on Christmas Eve and I’m not quite 50% done. This gift won’t be wrapped up and under the tree tomorrow morning. 

There was a day when I’d have stayed up late and gotten up early for weeks at at time to finish. I don’t do that any more. I know it’s just counting stitches and pulling a threaded needle through little holes. It doesn’t require that much. It’s easy enough, but when life isn’t so easy, even counting and stitching can sometimes present a challenge.

But, the truth is, every year there’s something that doesn’t get checked off the list. For all of us, I bet. Maybe it was getting a family card sent or baked goods for the neighbors delivered. Maybe it was just getting some semblance of ribbons and bows on all the gifts. Maybe it was that one special gift you wanted to find, but kept coming up short. 

Maybe it’s harder things—Fixing an estranged relationship or bringing back a prodigal child. Maybe it is restoring a restless marriage or surrendering an unhealthy addiction. Maybe it is coming home from the hospital or feeling well enough to get up off the sofa.

Because baked goods and bows don’t much matter when there are harder hurts and deeper discouragements.

We will all greet tomorrow morning with something that failed to get done or fixed or repaired or reclaimed. Some small, some big. But, dear ones, let that unfinished something serve as a reminder. Though we don’t need a calendar reminder to tell us tomorrow is Christmas, we all need to be reminded that Christmas is Christmas because a baby was born in Bethlehem so many years ago. God came down in infant flesh because there would always be something about us unfinished and undone. Always something incomplete.

That baby lying in a rough wooden manger would point to our God on the much rougher wooden cross come to save us from all of our own undoing. 

Every thing we cannot finish, He tells us, “it is finished.” 

Finished because of His perfect love.

Finished by the work of His blood.

Finished for us.

Every broken, bruised and battle-weary thing. Every best intention, hopeful plan and lofty goal. 

Every attempt to fix. 

Every desire to repair. 

Every shred of pain. 

Every moment of loneliness.

He came for it all.

If this Christmas you don’t get all the presents wrapped or the cross stitch sampler stitched or the cookies baked, I want you to give yourself grace and let it go. These are not the things which matter most.

But, dear ones, please don’t go into Christmas morning missing the beautifully finished gift of God’s grace and love. The best news: It requires no work on our part. Only turning our eyes to Jesus and bowing down before that simple manger in Bethlehem.

Merry Christmas!

[And—lol— for those of you still wondering what in the world even is a cross stitch sampler.  Please let me explain: It is needle work which through little thread Xs, creates a picture and includes the baby’s name and date of birth. It is not a very popular craft these days--gone with stenciled walls and gingham country curtains--  but something I wanted to do for our Mimi Grace.  It will be finished in time for her first birthday next September]!

Instructions for Christmas

Decorating for Christmas is always one of my favorite things. And this year feels much the same, except I keep coming across notes tucked into my holiday storage boxes.

Last year, after Christmas, as I spent extra time taking things down and putting them away I was facing another round of scans in early January. Scans do something unkind to a stage 4 cancer patient’s mind. Scans mess with us. I’ve always been a person wired to hope for, and even, expect the best, but these past couple of years have introduced me to a new, more skeptical side of myself. Unfortunately, at times, a more anxious side. I still hope for and pray for and ask for the best, but I have this self-protective thing in me which, I notice, on occasion, attempts to manage my expectations and keep in check my slightly Pollyanna-ish personality. 

So those scans had me on edge last January. And as I put away my Christmas decor after the holidays I started writing out detailed directions on how to install the garlands on the railings and the candles in the windows. I left written and typed out sheets of paper in the boxes before I stored them in our basement. I left diagrams just under the lids. I told myself it was to make it easier on myself next year, but if I had been completely honest, I would have admitted it was also for a "just in case" kind of scenario. Just in case 2023 happened to go awry. Just in case I wasn’t able to be the person to hang that confusing garland on the front porch or place those electric candles in the right windows. Just in case. We will leave it at that. 

Super dramatic, right? I agree. And I really try to stay away from that kind of thinking, except I have a terminal cancer diagnosis and so sometimes that luxury affords me not.

Trust me, my attitude is very positive for a girl wearing these kind of statistical shoes and fighting this kind of undignified diagnosis. Most of the time I have ridiculously high hopes and every reason to believe I am going to keep fighting this disease for many, many years. But, as I mentioned above, there’s this new, slightly more skeptical, side with which I’m constantly confronted. I have statistics. I have too many stories of stage 4 patients. I know things. I see things. I fear things.

This is what living with stage four cancer sometimes looks like. The part you might not notice. So I'm telling you. 

And the mother and wife and woman in me wants to be ready. She doesn’t want her family to throw down that garland in frustration because, “only mom knows how to really make it fit the space.” She doesn’t want the dining room tree ornaments to end up on the family room tree or the stockings to be hung in the wrong order or the wreaths to be on the wrong doors. (gasp!) She doesn’t want a holiday season to come and not be well celebrated because, “only mom knows how to…”  I fully realize that all sounds pretty silly in the face of  cancer... or really anything. I know none of that stuff is a truly big deal, but in some weird way, for me, it was. Is.  

And I know when the day comes where I may be sick or weak or weary or (hopefully) old, I will want my family to carry on with all the courage and creativity that I’ve spent decades trying to pour into them—cancer or no cancer. 

Because life is brief. There are no guarantees. And as mothers we never know what lessons have really been learned. What traditions will be carried on. What memories made. What things remembered. We can’t imagine not being the one to wrap the presents or choose the yearly ornaments or plan the menu. We can’t fathom a day where we won’t be in the kitchen baking cookies and barking orders and checking on the turkey.

But for all of us, sooner or later, that day will, indeed, come.

Last year as I removed the ornaments and folded the stockings and wound up the garland and lights, I allowed the King of Lies to take hold of my very human, very fragile, heart. I allowed The Liar to whisper what ifs into my uneasy ears. He scared me. Of course he did. He is really good at his job. 

And, somehow, I thought if I wrote out directions and detailed a lot of drawings, I would be able to silence his insidious plans to sabotage my peace.

But he is a liar. And those were lies. And satan isn’t in charge anyway. Not one bit. He wants to keep me unsteady and unable. He wants desperately to make me incapable and ineffectual. He’d like nothing more to shut this girl down well before cancer does.

It’s a truly weird balance as we consider the brevity of our days—each one of us—and yet, place our full confidence in the perfect timing of Jesus. I know. I don't get all of it either. But it bears considering.

And that’s why I so desperately need the Truth of Jesus. Every day. Every hour. I think of the hymn I heard my grandparents sing so often growing up. They sang it a lot. I think because as older, wiser people, they knew. They got it.  Like I know now. Like I (mostly) get it:

“I need Thee every hour

Most gracious Lord

No tender voice like Thine

Can peace afford

I need Thee, O I need Thee

Every hour I need Thee

O bless me now, my Savior

I come to Thee.”

Annie S. Hawks, 1872

I don’t really fault that Jody from early last January. She likes her ducks in a row. She always has. Rick and I laughed a little as we pulled out those storage boxes this year. He was actually pretty impressed with my uber organization. The man loves a good diagram and chart. Trust me, it’s not easy to impress a #1 on the enneagram when it comes to organization. But impressed, he was.

Speaking of Rick, he’s been amazing this year in helping me get the house ready. Though he does a ton around our house daily, the holiday decorating was always my thing and he mostly just cheered me on and enjoyed the end result. But this year, he didn’t hesitate to jump in. He has been like my own personal 6 foot 3 1/2 inch elf. It’s been fun and he’s been a fantastic help. But, please, for his sake, no Buddy the Elf jokes! =)

But this morning as I sit here in this first week of advent and think about my many feeble attempts to be Christmas ready and prepared, I have to kind of laugh at myself. A decorated and ready house is so incredibly insignificant in life. But a dedicated and ready heart is what this season is truly about. It’s eternal life.

It’s not about preparing my rooms, but preparing room for my Savior and the celebration of His birth. 

In the words of Isaac Watts’ famous 1719 Christmas carol, 

Joy to the world, the Lord is come

Let Earth receive her King

Let every heart prepare Him room

And Heaven and nature sing.

You probably know that carol well, but did you know Watts wrote this hymn based on Psalm 98? 

Sing to the Lord a new song,
for he has done marvelous things;


his right hand and his holy arm
have worked salvation for him.

The Lord has made his salvation known
and revealed his righteousness to the nations. 

He has remembered his love
and his faithfulness to Israel;


all the ends of the earth have seen
the salvation of our God. 

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth,
burst into jubilant song with music; 

make music to the Lord with the harp, with the harp and the sound of singing, 

with trumpets and the blast of the ram’s horn—
shout for joy before the Lord, the King. 

Let the sea resound, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it. 

Let the rivers clap their hands,
let the mountains sing together for joy; 

let them sing before the Lord,
for he comes to judge the earth.


He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples with equity.

What a beautiful psalm full of resounding seas and clapping rivers and singing mountains. As a lover of nature, this resonates with me deeply. I get it. But, dear ones, we cannot ignore that final verse. “For He comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples with equity.”  He surely will. As much as I'd prefer to focus on the pretty and bright things of Christmas, that day of reckoning is very much a reality. 

As much as we want to prepare our hearts for the sweet Baby Jesus who found no room in the inn, we must also consider what we are doing to prepare our hearts for the Righteous One who will return and who promises to judge. 

We must. 

Even at Christmas. 

Especially at Christmas.

Even when the images are pastoral and idyllic and so lovely, we must remember being ready has to do with so much more than our holiday preparations. Let all these wonderful details point us to the most important details of all -- our heart preparation. 

Joy to the World, the Lord is come.

Joy to the World, the Lord will come again. 

And the good news is we don’t need to do anything. Unlike with Santa, we don't have to be good enough for Jesus. That's why He came. For us. Out of love. For us. We don't need typed out instructions or detailed drawings, we need only bow before The One who truly does make heaven and nature sing and worship Him.

Flight Talk

It was an early morning flight from Atlanta to Cleveland today for my cousin's funeral. Being last minute, our seats weren't together. As we approached our place in the plane, Rick asked the man in the seat next to mine if he wouldn't mind switching with him and moving back one row so we could sit together. The man quickly and nicely obliged.

Friendly chit chat went on for awhile between our two rows. We established that between the four of us we had one Steeler, one Eagles and two Browns fans. We joked about football and then the plane settled in for our take off. 

After a few minutes of quiet, the obliging man and his new seat mate struck up their own conversation. 

I tried not to eaves drop, but my seat was directly in front of them and I couldn't help but overhear a good portion. 

Two men sitting together. Different football teams. Different skin colors. But they began talking. They might have started with football, but quickly moved on to the topic of politics and, yes, even race. They shared their opinions and seemed to agree on most everything. 

From there they waded pretty fast into the waters of religion. No, that's not right. Not religion, but their faith. They talked about Jesus. They talked about what it looks like to follow Him. They talked about their fathers and their upbringings and their families. They shared details of their lives and what led them each to a relationship with Him. They discussed God's word and they encouraged one another as brothers in Christ. 

I really wasn't trying to listen, but at some point, I just resigned myself to the fact that I didn't have much a choice.

I listened. 

Because, sometimes, we should.

These two men talked for the entire two hour flight.  They talked and they laughed. They might have shed a few tears. And it blessed me. It blessed me immensely. It was the very best of what can happen when two people begin talking. When two people begin sharing what's similar and listening to what might potentially be different. One question I heard asked by both of them several times was, "what do you think about this?" 

I loved that. What if we all sat closer to strangers and asked that kind of question. And then listened. Really listened and let that other person talk. What might this world look like if we had more positive airplane conversations?

Because we know flight talk can sometimes be pretty weird. You have this time where you are kind of stuck with someone you typically don't know. A forced proximity for a set amount of time. The question always is: Do you engage and invite an opportunity to connect with another human being or do you put on the headphones and hide in your own stuff.

I realize sometimes we all need to put on the headphones and hide out a little. I get that. But not maybe as much as we think we do. 

I'm just saying that today two men on a plane from Atlanta to Cleveland connected in a powerful and meaningful way. 

And it was beautiful. 

We are heading to the funeral of my cousin, Marc, today. A diehard Steelers fan, yes, but more importantly, he was a man who loved to converse and connect and debate and discuss. He loved people and he loved to engage with them. 

He would have really loved listening to these two men today on the airplane.

Every Reason

This afternoon I have my next PET/CT scan. It's been 6 months since the last one. I had been doing them every 3 months, but my doctor--in the hope to give me a break--pushed this scan a little further since things looked stable.  In the interim, we've monitored in other ways. I have every reason to believe this scan will again show my cancer as stable.

Every reason to believe it, but of course anxiety still knocks at the door.

Every reason to believe my doctor knows what she's doing, but I still wrestle with the what ifs. 

Every reason to trust Jesus holds my future, but still fear rises and takes my breath away. 

Every reason ... and, yet, that doesn't mean I don't feel the weight of this disease and it's daily burden of never ending treatment and consuming thought.

So, as is often the case, this morning's devotional passage met me right in this very place of struggle --desiring to hope + trust God, but still feeling anxious and unsure. 

Psalm 42

"My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me all day long, 'Where is your God?'

"Why are you downcast, o my soul? 

Who so disturbed within me?

Put your hope in God,

For I will YET praise Him, my Savior and my God."

"My soul is downcast within me;

Therefore I will remember you ...

Deep calls to deep 

In the roar of your waterfalls;

All your waves and breakers have swept over me."

"I say to God my Rock, why have you forgotten me?

Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy? My bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me saying 'where is your God?'"

"Put your hope in God for I will YET praise Him."

Can you just hear and see the wrestling of David as he writes this Psalm? Tears. Downcast and disturbed, even feeling forgotten ... but I will YET praise you. I will remember you, God. I will remember your character and who you are and what you've promised. 

Following Jesus doesn't mean all the human emotions just easily fall away and all is okay. No, it means we have a place to be held when we fall and things aren't okay. A place to go to when we are anxious, unsure, afraid, and yes, even angry. 

Jesus can give us a peace which passes all understanding, but He can also allow us to wrestle and wrangle with some very hard things in this life. Nowhere in His word does he promise an easy existence on this earth. In fact, He is pretty clear, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

And so today I'll scan at 2pm and then we will wait for the results in these next couple of days. 

As always, I would sure love your prayers. 

How can you specifically pray?

For clear and stable scans.

For my eyes to be on Jesus.

For my family. This is about all of us. 

For some tough side effects from current meds.

For a supernatural strengthening of heart + spirit as I am on this road for the rest of my life. 

And to "Take heart!" Because Jesus has surely "overcome the world!"

Grateful, Jody 🩷

The Eleventh

November 11th. Remembrance Day. Armistice Day. Veterans Day. Whatever we call it, it was on this day at 5:45 in the morning the Allied Forces and Germany signed an armistice agreement bringing World War I to an end. Fighting officially ceased later that morning at the eleventh hour on the eleventh day of the eleventh month. 

Something in my wiring really loves that tidy “11th” kind of agreement. How precise and clean and controlled. The stuff of storybooks. Strange that it should be the way war came to a close. Feels almost a complete paradox.  As if we can ever gloss over something so grueling, so gruesome, and then quickly give it a nice name and a pretty package. 

But that’s exactly what we do. All the time.

When we make up. When we fix up. When we tidy up. In our relationships and in our real life.

I wonder about those people living through the first world war years only to be hit so soon with the second world war. Just a couple of decades later. Did they not want to stand up and shout out and shake a fist — “Wait just a minute here! We all agreed to get along.” Didn’t they remember that eleventh hour on that eleventh day in that eleventh month? That agreement?

How quickly we forget. 

We are war forgetters.

We, even more so, are peace forgetters. 

There is little remembrance in fighting or in trying not to fight. Not when the lines have been crossed and the crosses lined up. We forget.

We move on after our troubles and our trials and our tiffs. We claim willingness to work hard and harder and harder still.  We sign armistice agreements all the day long with our children and our spouses and our colleagues and our neighbors … and then back to war we go. We are warring people. In our countries and in our cul-de-sacs. In our nation and in our nature. 

Like we cannot help ourselves.

We claim to be progressive and improved, more enlightened and less entitled, and yet war on we do. Conflict and chaos bedmates to our broken world. We’d like to think we have a measure of control with our policies and positions, but like that tidy 11th-ish package on that November day in 1918, we can call it anything we want, it won’t change the challenges of our humanity.

We are like dogs who return to their vomit. Even more instinctual than our tidying up, is our throwing up. Throwing it down. Down. Down. Down.

And there is little remembrance at that moment of rage and rift. 

When Jesus gathered his disciples in the upper room for the last supper and the first communion, he offered bread and wine saying “do this in remembrance of me.” 

And when he had given thanks, He broke it and said, “Take, eat; this is my body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of me. In the same manner he also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 1 Corinthians 11:24-25

His body broken. His blood shed. For us. For you. For me. 

Knowing the brutal hours ahead of Him. Knowing the spiritual and physical war surrounding Him. Surrounding us. And yet he offered a most perfect agreement. A New Covenant. A chance for all those who believe to truly have peace. True peace. Lasting peace. Eternal peace. 

He took our place on the cross. 

He died the death we deserve. 

He surrendered His body for the sins we commit. 

Because He knew there’d be no way for us to keep an armistice agreement or any agreement on our own. No matter how tidy. No matter how hard we try. 

We are way past the eleventh hour of everything and if nothing else shows us our need for a Savior this day of remembrance surely does.  

So today we give abundant thanks for those who served and sacrificed. But let this day lead us to remembering the ultimate sacrifice of the One "who did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Mark 10:45

A Biker Brawl & My Birth Story

When my dad was in town a couple of weeks ago he told me a story about the day I was born. It was only vaguely familiar. But such an outlandish tale I was surprised I hadn’t heard more about it in the course of my life.

On November 8,1968—the night I was to be born at St. Alexis Hospital in Cleveland Ohio—there was a massive biker-gang fight nearby between the Hells Angels and a group called The Breed (what a name!). Apparently these two cycle gangs had been at war all year and it came to a head that evening at a Motorcycle Trade Show in the Hall of the Association of Polish Women. 

The NY Times said it was “a long-smoldering grudge.” The melee began just after 10pm when the hall was filled with over 800 people. Someone yelled, “Now!” And the brutality began. Knives, chains and clubs were the weapons of choice. The police were quick to the scene with tear gas and rifles, but not before hundreds were injured and many killed. 

A few miles away, while my mom’s OB was getting ready to deliver me in the maternity ward upstairs at St. Alexis, hundreds of badly sliced bikers were being carted in the doors below. My dad said it was a brutal scene. All these big, burly men with massive wounds filling the space. Every room occupied. Hallways filled and overflowing. Many died that night. The headline in the Cleveland Plain Dealer described it as the  “worst gang battle in US, say police.” 

I can’t help but think about my dad in that situation. Can you imagine? Your baby girl is about to be born any minute upstairs and that kind of craziness is taking place down below? 

Did he keep that information from my mom as she was in the throes of childbirth? I suppose that wasn't difficult as men in the 1960s didn't step foot in a delivery room. But I think of how today we set the stage for childbirth and make elaborate plans focusing on calm lighting and soft music and meditative breathing and support people. And it makes me almost chuckle thinking about that night in the late 60's when I was to be born. No one decides to give birth in the middle of a biker bloodbath.

The scene was so bad it demanded all hands on deck. Needless to say, the obstetrician had to leave my birth and go stitch up the sliced and slaughtered bikers in the hallways below. I guess some lowly assistant was left to deliver me. I wonder how my deliverer felt. Perhaps thankful they were called only to welcome into the world a newborn baby instead of being forced to tend to the war wounds of highly aggravated gang members. Or maybe not. Maybe they were disappointed to be tasked with something so mundane as a baby born. Maybe they would have preferred the action downstairs. Who really can say? 

Reading through the articles, I found many choice pieces of writing. One of my favorites was a comment made by a character named "Sex." That's what the motorcycle world knew him as, his real name being Arthur Zaccone. Sex, well--perhaps we should call him by his given name, Arthur--told the reporter covering the story, "I knew something was going to happen when we saw some Breed from New York and New Jersey and none of them had their old ladies with them." The newspaperman went on to explain that "Motorcycle outlaws always call their wives or girlfriends "old ladies." 

Another paragraph offered this description of a couple of neighborhood bystanders, "Two old men came out of their houses, and stood in shirtsleeves in the falling snow, staring at the Cleveland Pneumatic Tool & Co parking lot at E. 77th Street and Marble Avenue." Can't you just imagine those men standing out on their driveways (in shirtsleeves) with snow falling gently around them and a gang fight heating up violently before them. "Old Men Shake Heads Sadly," was the article's poignant title. 

After hearing my dad tell this unbelievable story, I continued to think a lot about it. Coincidentally, the following week I was scheduled to share my life’s story in my Bible study group. In the desire to know each other better, we have been taking time to do so this month. My dad's telling of this crazy birth tale seemed perfect timing. It would be a tremendous opening to what I was planning share with my group. So jotting down a few notes, I decided to research it a bit further. It took no time to pull up the article from a digital copy of The Cleveland Plain Dealer. There it was in black and white and plain as day … the gang war did happen just as my dad said. All the gory details were included in these digital pages and, mesmerized, I poured over them in disbelief. 

But the most amazing thing I learned in my research was that it wasn’t actually my story. 

As much as I wanted it to be, it wasn’t my start to life. When I finally looked closer at the article, the date jumped off the page ... March 8, 1971. That was the day after my younger sister, Jess, was born. Oh my gosh, it was HER story!  

That dramatic entrance to the world didn’t belong to me, it belonged to my younger sister. Of course it did! I was at first disappointed and then couldn't stop laughing. As parents are so apt to do, my dad had gotten our stories confused. The event had happened. And it had happened to my parents, but it was my sister being born on that chaos-filled night, not me. 

And though I do love a good story, I must, unfortunately, relinquish this one to her. 

But doesn’t that fact make this good story even a little bit better? I feel like the mistake of it makes it in someways even more interesting. Maybe it's because that is so often how life works. Our stories blend and combine and, sometimes, get confused.  

Has that ever happened to you? It happens to me all the time. I’ll be trying to remember something and I can’t quite get all the details correct. I can’t quite picture who was there or where we were or what exactly happened. I have to be careful of embellishment. I have to be careful to correctly report. I have to be careful of the narrative I am allowing myself to believe. In full disclosure here, I sometimes can be prone to making bad things worse and good things even better. 

It could have something to do with growing up in a good size family. We all blended together. We knew to answer to any sibling name when our parents called for us. “You know who I mean!” We knew we had to speak up to be heard. We knew we had to forge our own way and make our own plans and take charge of our own stories. There can be a lot of good in that kind of growing up. 

I'm pretty sure my kids kind of feel the same way. I’ve heard them too many times say, “No, mom. It didn’t happen quite like that.”  And then they have to remind me of the correct details. I don’t always have a digital newspaper article to pull up, but I do have kids who help keep me on track. 

Kind of like that Progressive Insurance "replay” commercial that’s been airing on television so often. So funny, by the way.

This "old lady" can tell you that the 55 years of my life have been filled with stories. Stories which I do own and can confidently claim. I might not have a dramatic birth story which includes a biker-gang brawl, but I have a story which God is clearly writing. And as I sit here this morning after my birthday, I am overwhelmed with the many, many sweet pages God has written all over my life. Yes, there have been some painful ones as well, and I don’t know exactly what the next chapter brings, but I know my God is the Perfect Author and He uses my story (and your stories too) to tell the much greater story of His. 

And for that I am thankful. 

We've Raised Awareness, Now it's Time to Raise the Bar

As "PINKtober" begins its final week, I’d like to share why this isn't necessarily an easy month for some women with stage 4 breast cancer--this month where we see the breast cancer pink ribbon on everything from tennis apparel to trash cans ... from police cars to every form of packaging. 

I've always been on board with raising awareness and heaven knows I love a good event. But friends, I've been struggling in the past weeks as everywhere I turn I see pink. I would really love a chance to help others see, maybe not red, but just a little more clearly. 

It's hard to explain--I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it--but allow me a minute to at least attempt what it feels like to sit on the other side of this not so rosy line. I’m still processing, but I’ve spent a few weeks learning about why women with stage 4 breast cancer aren’t exactly excited about all aspects of the PINKtober campaign. It’s not just the constant pink reminders of our incurable disease, but it's, more so, for many, some misleading messaging and, unfortunately, maybe even the misallocation and misrepresentation of funds raised. 

Yes, the pink ribbon campaign has done amazing things to raise awareness and dollars, but most people do not realize how little of that includes stage 4 breast cancer. The percentage is in debate--Some say less than 2% ... others claim it's now risen closer to 7%--But, regardless, 2% or 7% going toward research for stage 4 breast cancer is simply not enough. 

Metastatic Breast Cancer (MBC), also called stage 4, is the ONLY breast cancer which kills and yet only a tiny percentage is allocated for this research. 

Read that again.

Furthermore, 1/3 of women who "beat" early stage breast cancer will at some point in their life become stage 4/metastatic. Yes, you read that correctly, ONE-THIRD. 

Like me.

No one really likes to hear my story because it doesn't fit any of the things we know or like to believe. 12 years ago I was "early detected" and “barely stage one." I had pretty minor cancer and, yet, chose aggressive treatment. Did all the things. Fought like a warrior. Was told I was "cured" and had "beaten it."  Was called a "star patient" and assured because of my early detection and fighter mentality I WAS "the poster girl for beating breast cancer.” I remember my oncologist saying early on, “Jody, you’ll be just fine. You’ve nothing to worry about.” 

His words sometimes haunt me. 

I had less than 1% chance for this beast to reoccur. 

But, against all the odds, it did. It reocurred.

Now as a woman with MBC (stage 4) I will never "be cured" or "ring the bell" or "kick cancer's ass." Nope. Never. And so all that warrior and battle and victory talk is tricky for women like me. The messaging in this month makes it sound like if we (only) fight hard enough we can achieve victory. The problem with this is that the opposite then also feels true when we lose--and those of us with stage 4 will lose. “According to the American Cancer Society (ACS), the 5-year survival rate after diagnosis for people with stage 4 breast cancer is 28%.” Another not so gentle way of saying that is 72% of women diagnosed stage 4 will not live past five years. 

So what does that mean in the face of all this pink? We didn't fight hard enough? I don’t know. At best, it's confusing. I do know our main hope (now) is not going to be curing cancer or kicking its ass, no, it’s going to be buying time and praying for more treatment options to give us more years. That takes research. That research takes dollars. 

In the meantime we hope to prolong life.

And that is exactly why I don’t “look” like a stage 4 patient. That’s a topic for another post, but I know this confuses some people. "Well, gosh, Jody’s busy planning events and posting photos of her chickens and she has all of her hair. Seems like she’s doing great. She looks good. Surely she can’t be THAT sick." Well, it’s because, for women like me, it is no longer a sprint to be healed, it’s a marathon to stay alive. It’s the long game. We strategically are given medicine and treatments to keep the cancer at bay and keep us living life. At some point cancer will outsmart my current treatment and those meds will fail me. And at some point, I’m sure you’ll see me looking a whole lot more like a stage 4 patient. I know that’s a lot to process. I’ve had conversations with many of you. It doesn’t make sense. It’s easy to forget (for you maybe, not for me). But trust me on this, I know what I’m talking about. There isn't a silver bullet when it comes to stage 4. MY PLAN is for the treatments available to work well for me and give me LOTS and LOTS of years, but I have learned too much, I know if that's what happens, I will not be the statistic, I will be the outlier.

Sometimes learning things is hard.

I am also learning to understand why PINKtober isn’t an easy thing for women with MBC. As this has, unfortunately, become a big part of my life now, I spend a good amount of time connecting with others walking this same walk.

I'm in several (Facebook) groups with thousands of women with MBC. I read their stories and struggles every day.  I cannot explain to you the pain and sadness. Women who are alone and unable to work. Women who can't pay for treatment and have to fight with insurance companies. Women who bounce from one brutal treatment to another knowing it will never end. They will always be in treatment. Forever. Women, literally, at the end of their rope. Heartbreaking doesn't begin to explain it. There is nothing festive or celebratory or rosy-pink about it. I don’t really put myself in this category because I AM still living a pretty normal life. Yes, lots of side-effects and, yes, lots of mental/emotional/anxiety battles, but also lots of wonderful stuff too. I’m grateful. And lucky.

But, I don't have to tell you how hard it is for the women who struggle to see companies using the pink ribbon as a marketing ploy to tug at heart strings and increase sales. And, yet, we know that's exactly what happens in some cases. Certainly not all cases, but in some. It feels like gross commercialization. At times it’s hard to see some of the flippant, casual, and sometimes crude, comments made and posted. Those can hit differently when you're fighting for your life. It’s also agonizing to see all the hype and excitement over pink bows and pink socks and pink tennis skirts for a fun-feel-good-event. I once wore the pink tennis skirt and played in the pink tennis tournaments. Now, as stage 4, I am having so much joint pain and fatigue I can’t imagine I’ll be out on the tennis courts ever again. Instead, I brush by my tennis bag every single day when I walk through my garage and have to wonder.

I’m not saying it’s all wrong. Like I stated earlier, there are some great things which have been achieved in raising awareness. We are certainly ALL AWARE.  I’m just saying there’s more to the story. We need to be more aware of asking the question-- WHY aren’t more of these funds raised going toward the breast cancer which kills women? Especially knowing that 1/3 of all women who have "beaten" it, will progress to stage 4 --even the very best case scenarios, like me.

Early detection and awareness are great, but, I was both early detected and (more than) aware and there is not one single doctor who can explain why my breast cancer returned. Not one. Two of my three oncologists didn’t believe it. One of them told me to “go home and not worry about it,” even after the scans showed lesions. Crazy, I know.

Last week, out of my own wrestling, I asked the question to the specific Metastatic/Stage 4 groups of women I am in on Facebook. I simply asked this --

"Why is PINKtober hard for so many of you?"

I received an unbelievable amount of stories and responses to that question. Hundreds, in fact. Most all of them explaining that they "dreaded" this month and felt "assaulted" by the misrepresentation and “gross commercialization” of the pink ribbon. These are women who are in the darkest, deepest trenches of breast cancer. Women fighting for a few extra years of life and dealing with one awful treatment after another knowing there won't be an end ... until there is.

I think their voices need to be heard. 

One woman in this group shared an article she had written on why more stage 4 research MUST be the goal: 

“While the pink ribbon is well-known for representing the fight against early-stage breast cancer, it is not inclusive of stage IV.

It’s a sad fact that today, nearly everyone knows someone who’s had breast cancer. Yet there’s one fact not everyone knows: 

30% of people with “cured” early-stage breast cancer who’ve “beaten” the disease will eventually see it return as stage IV, also known as advanced or metastatic breast cancer (MBC). 

That means the disease has spread to other parts of the body, a diagnosis that carries an average life expectancy of around 36 months. While the average survival rate of a breast cancer diagnosis is 90% over five years, that statistic tumbles for metastatic breast cancer, dipping to 29% over five years.

Many women with metastatic breast cancer will live only a handful of years. But about one-third will live at least five years after their diagnosis. And there are outliers who live for 10-15 years after such a diagnosis.

MBC is the only form of breast cancer that kills. 

Yet while MBC claims the lives of 115 people in the U.S. daily, less than 7% of US breast cancer funds raised go toward researching new treatments for it. 

Worldwide, more than 685,000 people die of MBC annually. 

Those shocking statistics explain why more and more people are embracing a reimagined breast-cancer-awareness ribbon that goes beyond pink — there’s no surviving or “beating” MBC, just buying time via treatment. 

The pink ribbon has done a lot of good. It has reminded people to get screened, and it has helped to raise a huge amount of funds. But at the same time, it has been used to raise money for purely corporate pockets, including the pockets of several prominent breast cancer charities. 

It has become a symbol of the idea that everything will be OK, breast cancer is only an annoyance, just a year out of your life, and you'll go on happily from there. The pink ribbon as a brand is a misrepresentation of the truth of breast cancer. 

And, most importantly, it is not a cure.

What the ribbon should represent is the need to fund medical research in order to save lives.”

Pink is not a cure.

Research can and has saved lives.

With more and more new treatment options, patients like me have a better chance to live longer.

Thus a tricolor ribbon, for metastatic breast cancer, aims to raise awareness for the need to direct funding toward the development of life-extending treatments. 

In it, green represents the triumph of spring over winter, life over death; teal symbolizes healing and spirituality; and a thin pink-ribbon overlay signifies metastatic cancer that originated in the breast.”

Dear friends, please don’t view this post as sour grapes. Sure, I have some pretty sour moments, but mostly, I do have a lot to be very thankful for. I spend most of my days really trying to focus on the beautiful and the blessings of each day. Those of you who know me, know that my life is truly in God's hands. I trust Him with it. Completely. But I also have felt a prompting to go ahead and share some of my newly gained perspective. I wish I didn't know so much. I wish this wasn't my story. But it is and I believe that our stories and our journeys and our lessons learned are meant to be shared.

 We've raised awareness, now it is time to raise the bar. 

One last thing--there's an organization which does use its dollars raised for MBC research and funding. 

Please check out the METAvivor organization. METAVIVOR.ORG

Thank Heaven for Little Girls

In the past few weeks I got to spend--not nearly enough--but a good amount of time caring for my new granddaughter, my daughter, and my son-in-law. 

I didn't do anything all that ground shaking. Didn't close a big deal. Didn't publish a novel. Didn't get my name in the newspaper. Didn't rescue a puppy. 

Didn't even hardly get all the laundry finished. 

But I did this little thing called caring for family, and, for me, it wasn't a little thing in the least. For me it was probably more like the thrill of my year. 

Maybe my decade. 

You think I exaggerate? 

Though prone to an occasional exaggeration every now and then, in this case, no.

I assure you, a thrill. 

Being there for my first girl as she became a mom to her first girl, and then to watch her tenderly (if not a bit tiredly) navigate these first sacred days of motherhood ... I mean, seriously. No words for the way it all made my heart swell and swoon and simmer and melt.

Truly good. 

A gift. 

A grace.

Thank heaven for little girls. 

And big girls. 

And the beautiful mother~daughter relationship that God saw fit to give us here on earth to make life a little bit sweeter, hard things a bit more tolerable, heavy things a little bit lighter, wonderful things a little more wonderful. 

Hanging on Mimi's nursery door is a little door hanging pillow (yes, that's a thing) declaring this very sentiment--Thank Heaven For Little Girls. I found it at a baby boutique (this is also a thing) and gave it to Emily as a shower gift. 

About 28 years ago I had hung almost the very same pillow on Emily's nursery door. I had saved hers all these years. Why? I don't know, I guess I'm a saver of door hanging things. 

But last week, while visiting them, I knew I had tucked it away so that one day I could put it on my adult daughter's bedroom door as she slept. (Well, sort of slept). 

While staying in their home, I took a special grandma kind of delight walking past both of their doors draped with tiny pillows declaring thanks to God for their lives. 

Door hanging pillows or no door hanging pillows, doesn't much matter, but giving thanks to Him in heaven is a gift most holy. 

Truly, thank Heaven for little girls.