Embracing Love and Family - Thank you Chris Jett

In July and August of 2018, while waiting on diagnosis and testing, I like most of you had a handful of family outings to attend.

But on the weekend before my results came in, I had a two-fer...lol (two family events in one day). This happens to me all the time. It actually worked out in my favor, because it provided me a day, just one, to tell everyone everything and then to refocus on "pretending" I was okay.

My first outing was with my biological dad's family. We had a little gathering to celebrate summer birthdays and show love to each other. Through the years we have all spread out and it takes a big event to get us all back together. I started off talking to my beloved Aunt Aleta, my second mama. She is a nurse and had been one of my earliest calls when things were going wrong. I slowly made my way through most of my relatives. I was upbeat, they were upbeat. I said it was nothing, they said it was nothing. We ate and just shared life with one another. Strange as it sounds, looking back on it, I was comforting them more than they were comforting me. After all it had been less than five years since we buried my dad and one of his brothers is in ill-health (love you Uncle Jimmy). So the last thing I wanted to do was burden them with bad news. I promised to keep them all informed, shared hugs and left.

At this point in my day, I still was more optimistic than scared. It weighed on me, but not too much. I was actually starting to believe I may have dodged a bullet.

Then I got to my stepdad's. Comparing my step-father to my biological father is like comparing night to day. My step-dad is practical, thrifty, strict and stickler for the rules. My dad would give away things to those in need, always helped others, was easy-going, had his own set of rules and definitely was not thrifty. So, as I got closer to his driveway, the same driveway I first drove on, the house I grew up in, dread started to make it's way into my head and heart. I would be seeing my Sister, Kim and her family and having a mid-summer cook-out. We all have that one person in our life, that just personifies perfection and makes every thing look doable and easy. That's my Sister, Kim. She has done life RIGHT and let me just say, God has blessed her for her faith and loyalty. She has always been in the back of my mind the image of what I "could" be if I "tried".

We were preparing plates to go outside and eat and I found myself in the Kitchen with my brother-in-law, Chris. God knew what he was doing putting those two together, they just compliment one another with a seamless ease. Where one stops, the other begins. I love them both dearly, but have never been close to them. We do holidays and family things, but we don't visit or share on a deeper level (which is definitely my fault).

I digress, so..I was in the kitchen making my plate and had had to go to my car to grab Alleve (my candy) to ease the pain. There I am taking pain medication and I just start telling him things that I hadn't even told myself. I told him of my fear, my weakness, my failure in Christ and he just looked at me with tears in his eyes and told me I was loved. He told me he'd pray for me. He shared with me a story about someone he knew that went through something similar (WARNING - TO ALL MY NEWLY DIAGNOSED LADIES - EVERYONE KNOWS SOMEONE WITH CANCER - AND THEY ALL HAVE RECIPES, TREATMENTS, SUPPLEMENTS - ADVICE-----GRIN----SMILE----SAY THANKS).

What Chris didn't know is that I had stopped believing that I was in deed loved by God, loved by family, loved at all. I had, for so long, given up on love and faith. I was cold and a loner (hence why I never visited much). His reaction to me gave the strength to then tell my sister and my step-dad. I think I knew then that my world was about to change, but I didn't know how, why, when or my response.

For most of us we categorize love into "Romantic"  "Maternal" and "Familiar/Friend". I think because we do this we reduce love to a word that means a little more than "like". After all how many times do you say "I love those shoes, that food, that movie, that song...etc." But, what my brother-in-law did was recognize my inner pain (trust me I was trying to hide it) and not say "you'll be okay"...but say "no matter the outcome, you are loved by God and IT WILL BE OKAY". His words woke me up, softened my heart which then was open to start receiving on a greater level after my surgery.

Love is so huge, so important that if you had to sum up the entire Bible into one word it would be LOVE!

I am not sure there is a word greater than "thank you" to express my gratitude to him for how he handled that moment. He definitely embodies "grace" and he and my sister live a life full of faith and love that just being around them is like being a little closer to God.

1 Corinthians 13:13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

1 John 4:16 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.

Jeremiah 31:3 The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying: "I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness."

AND OF COURSE THE GREATEST ACT OF LOVE IS DESCRIBED IN JOHN 3:16

     "FOR GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD THAT HE GAVE HIS ONE AND ONLY SON, THAT WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM SHALL NOT PERISH BUT HAVE ETERNAL LIFE."

I will definitely touch more on family in a later blog, because I have barely mentioned my daughter so far and she definitely is a huge part of why I am still here blogging away.


Links:

For loved ones caring for a family member with cancer: https://www.cancer.org/treatment/caregivers.html

God bless - April